The majority of Indonesia's population consider August 17th, which is on Monday and therefore a public holiday, to be Indonesia's Independence Day. They continue to believe that Indonesia became independent on that day, conveniently forgetting that the date actually commemorates Sukarno's proclamation of independence rather than its actuality, which didn't truly happen until 17th August 1950 when the Republic of Indonesia was finally established with a unitary (but provisional) constitution . (See this timeline.)
So, rather than celebrating 64 years of independence, 59 is the correct age of the country. Whatever, August 17th is when flags wave in the breeze, youngsters clamber up greasy poles, relay races are held in back streets and folk celebrate.
And, public announcement number one, the Ya Udah Bistro has special long weekend opening hours: Friday, Saturday, Sunday - from 08:00am – 02:00am and on Monday from 8:00am – midnight. .............................. On Wednesday next, the 19th Hidung Merah Circus will be holding a Fund Raising Benefit Performance, with "a night of music and clowns". This will be held at the De Hooi Cafe in Pondok Indah Plaza 2.
There will be performances by Opie Andaresta, Je'Jaka, Gomez and Friends, Relax, DJ Max Don , Nana Mirdad and Dan Roberts - who, I've written before, organises "workshops for kids from a variety of backgrounds, encouraging such skills as juggling, plate spinning, diabolo (and yo-yo?) tricks, acrobatic skills, and, perhaps the key to all this and more, trust."
Tickets cost Rp.150,000 which seems very reasonable as it includes Free Flow beer from 7pm-10pm!!!
To pre-buy tickets, contact Dan by phone 0812 1292 0142 or email. ................... Another email notification I've recently received is from Merdeka Coffee. Their fairtrade coffee is now available from the new \"Antipodean\" cafe that has opened next to Vinotti in the Kemang Hero Complex - Jl Kemang Selatan I, Jakarta. The cafe, as the name indicates, has a focus on the Kiwi/Australian style of cafe. The coffee, is of course, Merdeka Coffee.
Coffee packs are available from Rp.50,000 and can be ground, or brought whole bean.
The Antipodean crew are looking forward to seeing you soon for a flatwhite.
I presume other nationalities who have no idea what a "flatwhite" is will also be welcome. .................................. So, that's a selection of my recent incoming mails. However, I now have a major problem in sending them. Every subscriber to Indosat M2 was informed that it was necessary, for "security reasons", to change our passwords for logging on to our accounts before August 11th. This I dutifully did and can access my mail on the webmail page, thus noting that my password has been successfully changed.
However, my dial up connection for sending emails, my POP3, informs me that my username and/or password is invalid. I can only connect through Telkom, which is how I've managed to post this. (Details: Username: telkomnet@instan / Password: telkom / No: 0809 8 9999).
I've emailed their 'customer service' department via webmail and, as expected, received no reply, not even a read receipt, and it's impossible to get anyone to pick up the phone.
If any of you have the same problem, please email me and I'll fire off a letter to the Globe and Post.
Update 15.8.09 I have received a friendly and hopefully helpful email which opens with a "sincere apology for the delay reply." I hope their suggestion(s) work.
