Jakarta Monas, Cathedral and Mosque After getting a SIM card, I was able to do some touristy things, and found my way to the National Monument in Jakarta. This is probably the one must see in the city, other than the Cathedral and Mosque, as it has a great history museum showing the origins of the founding of Indonesia including the occupation by the dutch and gaining independence after the second world war.
I paid 15,000 entrance fee and spent quite a lot of time reading through all of the exhibits in the museum area. and made it to the elevator to the top of the monument at around 4pm, where I doscovered that it was closed until 7. I tried to understand the situation about whether or not I could get back to the same spot without paying more, as I felt that 15,000 IDR was a huge sum of money. After establishing that I could come back I made my way to the Cathedral.
This route took me past Masjid Istiqlal, which is the largest mosque in South-East Asia, and in terms of capacity, the 3rd largest in the world. I was too nervous to go inside as I was not sure how to be respectful and/or whether or not I could take photos inside, so I got a few shots from outside and continued on my way to the cathedral.
The cathedral was too big to fit in the viewfinder of any of my cameras, and I had to take the shots in parts! It seemed like there was a service in progress when I arrived so I didn't go inside again, and decided to come back at a later time.
I headed back to Monas, but it was still too early to get in to the tower. Some locals spotted me though and started chatting to me, mostly because I was Bule, so they taught me some Indonesian words, like Mata for Eyes, Kaki for legs, and some others which didn't really stick in my mind.
It was eventually time to go back in to the Monas, and as I went through the security check, one of the guys there was playing guitar, which I felt was a nice relaxed atmosphere ... they had a job to do and did it but didn't stress out over it!
I used the tap card I had been given for the entrance, which meant there was 0 credit left on it, and headed to the queue for the elevator. The queue was longer than I had been expecting, and it took about 30-40 minutes to get to the front even after they opened up again. WHen I got to the front I discovered that I did need to have a further 15,000 in the card, which I had just spent on getting back in to the area as a whole, however, they let me go through anyway without paying when I explained that I had just missed last time. I suspect the fact that I was a tourist from abroad rather than a local tourist, was the main reason they let me through.
The view from the top was definitely well worth it. and I spent quite a bit of time taking photographs of various parts of Jakarta. I had met up with Medina the previous day in a Mall, and she had advised me that South Jakarta was a much better place to stay in terms of what was happening in the city, and showed me buildings she had worked at, so I mde sure to photograph those too.
Once I made it back out, I booked a Grab taxi to get to Melly's Garden Bar and Resto. This didn't go very well though, as the taxi driver was unaware that the only entrace to the park for Monas, is in the north, so he went to the south of the park and waited for me there. We eventually managed to meet up, and I gave him a tip equal to the taxi fare since he had effectively just driven twice the distance to provide the service.
Melly's was a nice bar which hosts live music. I ordered a Bintang (Bintang means star, and the logo is a red star), and fried rice meal. The Bintang was great and after doing the maths I thought the rice was very good price too!
I ordered a Grab for the way back and the driver was unable to find the hostel on the way back. Fortunately I knew the local area well enough and was able to use google maps to tell the driver a nearby place to drop me off.