Saturday 12th May
Out and about
Bugil’s Cafe is more than just a bar, it’s an institution. This venerable hostelry is known and loved throughout the expat community, especially the well-heeled business brigade for many of whom it’s their watering hole of choice. Bugil’s supremo, Bartele, is also the owner of the One Tree bar on our very own Jalan Falatehan – and a burgeoning empire of other pubs and restaurants throughout south Jakarta, including the long-established Eastern Promise in Kemang.
So it’s no surprise to learn that this mogul of the menus, this boss of the bars, has moved into the Deep South of our magnificent metropolis and started up a bar called de Hooi in Pondok Indah. Now for those who aren’t familiar with this little enclave of Jakarta, it’s the city’s stockbroker belt – full of very large, very expensive, and shudderingly hideous wannabe mansions that are veritable nightmares in concrete, mediocre monuments to bad taste,
De Hooi is set back from the outer thoroughfare of Plaza 2 and has a homely, welcoming frontage. “No lace curtains, I’m glad to see!” I chuckle to myself as I open the door and peek inside. My first impression is that it’s got the Bartele touch in style and trimmings, and has also inherited that earnest bustling hubbub that’s a hallmark of the original Bugils. There’s a good crowd of lively guys and girls, it’s like going in to a party that’s in full swing. Working my way through the throng I bump into Bart himself, and warmly congratulate him on his latest venture.
Exiting through a side door I find myself in a sort of garden area with tables all round and a bandstand at the far end. More to the point, there’s a drinks table at the other end where I hit the free flow beer. Walking round to the back I take a sweeping look at the building and the bar, and give the whole place a very big thumbs up. It’s a shrewd investment in a good location, and should do very well financially by providing a hearty European pub atmosphere in deepest Pondok Indah.
I also get chatting with Lens, who holds the fort at the Eastern Promise these days. We discover that we both arrived in Jakarta in the same year, and have followed a similar career path for much of the time we’ve been in Jakarta. In the course of our chat I ask him what he thinks about Blok M, as he’s as neutral an observer as you’ll find. His immediate response is that the place has got a reputation for lousy taxis, aggressive touts and annoying child beggars, and he can’t for the life of him understand why the owners haven’t got together and sorted out the mess long ago.
Looking round I can see half a dozen guys who are (or used to be) Blok M regulars, and I remark that quite a few of the guys I know have moved on to Kemang, Jalan Jaksa or other night spots in and around south Jakarta, including Bugils. He agrees, and says it’s a shame that the Blok has gone through such a bad patch.
When Robert Louis Stevenson wrote “To travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive” he describes my journey from Bart’s to the Blok with perfection. After a pleasant skinful of free-flow beer at de Hooi the taxi ride up to Blok M is like a scene from the Keystone Kops. My driver is a cheerful soul, but no amount of personality can compensate for a total ignorance of the Jakarta road system and I have to carefully steer him northwards through the swirl of Saturday night traffic.
In my slightly inebriate state all junctions look the same, and the flashing blur of garish lights is like something out of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. “Left – right – no, straight on – no, it’s right – I mean left” is the lamentable state of the Reveller’s decision-making ability. It suddenly dawns on me that I must sound exactly like one of the legendary Jakarta parking attendants, that fine band of dyslexics without whose misguided dedication the city’s car repair workshops wouldn’t have half the body mending that they do.
More by good luck than by good judgment we eventually swing into Jalan Falatehan, pull up outside Top Gun, and I stumble out of my cab straight into a pothole. Hobbling towards the welcoming entrance I inadvertently tread on something soft which emits a piping shriek – it’s one of the street urchins who gets below the radar and runs straight under my feet. Solicitously advising the tearfully hopping little tyke to piss off and go home, I finally reach the door and make my entrance.
After a convivial hour of quaffing and chatting at Bart’s I’ve got quite a hunger on me, so the first act after scrawling my initials on the pool list is to sit myself down at the bar and summon up a solid meal. Sop buntut doesn’t quite fill the bill, so I order a steak sandwich as this is a snack that’s quick to prepare, almost foolproof to make, and provides instant ballast.
The waitress who serves me is obviously new – a cheerful rose with a winsome smile, but alas very little English. Just as I finish giving my order my name comes up at the pool table, so I move to battle stations. The first game is not just bad, it’s terrible – my defeat is like an action replay of Pearl Harbour. Saved from a humiliating retreat to the bar because the regulars whose names head the list are moving on to greener pastures, I play on.
One of the things I like about this game is that the piss-poor player can sometimes emerge victorious not through any merit of his own, but an error from his opponent – and so it is with my second game. Lulled into a false sense of security by my well-honed ineptitude, my adversary gets a bit cocky and sinks the black as well as his own ball – leaving me to muddle on into another game.
Much to my own and the audience’s surprise I win the next game, but can’t follow on as my food has arrived. Salivating with pleasurable anticipation as I briskly foot it to the bar, I’m taken aback to see not the sandwich I ordered, but a very large fish steak with a mound of chips and braised vegetables. The poor waitress is mortified, but I smile and say no problem as I like fish and it looks good. Which it is, and I wolf it down with hearty appetite.
Polishing off the last chip and chunk of broccoli I take a long swig of ale and stretch contentedly, then turn round to see what’s happening in the bar. The attendance is rather thin tonight, with far more girls than guys. But there are some real stunners among the Sweet Young Things, including a brace of new girls straight from the kampong. Ah, Indramayu wins again! I reflect, as I watch these two newcomers nervously survey the scene.
But there are also quite a number of old girls, I notice, including three that I usually spy lurking in the darker recesses of the Club. Vaguely wondering what they’re doing so far from home, I wave cheerfully but keep well clear of their clutches. Chatting with an old friend we agree that it’s an excellent turnout of Sweet Young things, and we both bemoan the fact that we aren’t in hunting mode that night.
Tonight’s minstrels are in fine voice, playing and singing an excellent medley of pop classics to an appreciative audience. Once again I reflect that this is what the Blok M punters really like – a good mix of tuneful songs and a foot-tapping rhythm, not the tedious pounding of high-volume techno noise that drove the Reveller back into Top Gun many moons ago.
As I’ve often had cause to remark in the past, some nights you find several girls quite independently wearing the same item of clothing, or sporting exactly the same colour. And tonight, it’s pink. The new pool girl, the deaf and dumb petite beauty I wrote about just recently, has left her tight leather outfit at home and is wearing plain jeans and a pink top, as are three other girls dotted around the bar. It’s a tribute to true beauty that a girl looks gorgeous no matter what she’s wearing, and she catches my eye with a delighted grin as I nod approvingly at her ensemble.
Out of the corner of my eye I see my favourite D&D Indramayu girl holding court at the bar with three guys in attendance, one of whom has clearly succumbed to her ample charms and is closing the deal. She suddenly jolts upright, gasps and opens her mouth in stunned disbelief. Vigorously shaking her head she hold up two fingers, makes a pained throat-cutting gesture and bursts into mock tears. I stifle a laugh, as she’s rumoured to expect nothing less than five hundred and two hundred is a calculated insult.
Aha, this guy is clearly an old hand who knows the going rate and is a shrewd negotiator. Of course he knows full well he’ll end up paying more, but he also knows that she has a reputation as a highly optimistic chiseller with a grossly inflated opinion of her own value and the generosity of the guys. So by starting low and upping the ante in small increments he should get her for a reasonable outlay.
But she too is a seasoned negotiator, in addition to being one of the most accomplished actresses on the Blok. I miss the climax of their protracted negotiations, but as she’s still in the bar ten minutes later I can only assume that the deal fell through at the last minute. When will they learn, I reflect sadly, that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bar.
The night continues well, the animated crowd making up in enthusiasm for what it lacks in numbers. It’s been a long evening though, so I decide to pack it in and go home at midnight having had a very pleasant and highly entertaining time. As I leave the bar the street urchins give me a very wide berth, fearing that they too may be trampled underfoot. One of the more cheeky little beggars shouts out “Meester, pees off!” as I stroll down the street, savouring the night air and the receding sounds from the bars and the little warungs dotted along the pavement.
Reflecting on the night as I sit hunched up in my little bajaj, I just wish that the Top Gun band, good though it was, could have kept the volume down a bit – and look forward to a quiet sleep in my quiet little backwater. But as the driver turns sharply into my street I’m met by a barrage of music and singing. Apparently there was a wedding in my local community today and a traditional all-night dangdut session is in full swing – right across the road from my bedroom window.
