Touring Kemang

My family and I are really going to like living in the Kemang area. It is an amazing amalgamation of Western stores and restaurants, Eastern stores and restaurants, and uniquely Indonesian twists. Kemang has a central shopping district that would rival any open-air mall anywhere else in the world. It is more urban than what most people expect from a mall, yet quaintly familiar.

I started the day sitting in the back seat of the car, so I missed some good picture opportunities (and finally felt too cramped). When I finally moved to the front of the car, I started taking pictures. The first three pictures below are on the main street leading in Kemang. You'll see some familiar company names, none of which I actually visit. In addition to those, there was a Burger King, a Cold Stone Creamery, a Circle K (2, actually) a McDonald's (open 24 hours and with a drive through!) and Coffee Bean and Tea Company.







The area of Kemang definitely caters to the Expat community. There are two grocery stores that deal exclusively in imported groceries. I didn't venture into either of them, so I can't vouch for the accuracy of that claim. Purportedly, these are the stores you go to when you want to buy American food - Kellogg's Frosted Flakes, for example. There is also an Indonesian grocery store that, in addition to carrying traditional Indonesian brands, carry a lot of Western brands. This store borders the complex in which we will live so is likely where we will do most of our shopping.

Since I was in Kemang, I took the opportunity to visit the shopping center that borders our complex. As I mentioned in my last post, I have been craving a Burrito, so I went to "Amigos", the Mexican restaurant on the second floor of the shopping center. I ordered a Margarita and a beef burrito with red chili sauce. It was quite good and really made me feel like I was sitting in a restaurant at home.

I was pleasantly pleased with everything I found in this mall. In addition to the Western grocery store and the Mexican restaurant, we have a small furniture store, a bakery, and, my favorite, a book store full of English language books. As much as I hope to learn Bahasa, I still want to read my books in English. The below pictures are the shopping center outside our complex, the security to get into the complex, one of the International schools and an Oriental rug shop.









Two other things I have found common in areas that cater to Expats instead of the locals. First, you see more white faces than Indonesian. What surprised me, was the number of languages spoken. The foreign companies I am aware of in Indonesia that would import Expat labor are either British, Australian or American owned. What has surprised me is the number of French speaking foreigners, and German speaking foreigners I have encountered. From my other international travels, I know that most large cities - Paris, Berlin, Hamburg, New York City, Hong Kong - are a tremendous mix of global travelers and residents. Those are all industrialized countries, however. Jakarta has always reminded me of Mexico City, and I did not encounter such diversity there.

The other, less appealing, aspect of these areas is the price. My lunch cost me $16. An ice cream cone I bought this evening at the Baskin Robbins near my hotel cost me $4 for 2 scoops. I am accustomed to paying $3-5 for a meal when I'm outside the hotel, so $16 while not a shock for a similar meal in the US, was a definite shock for prices here in Jakarta.

The rainy season lived up to its name today. Half way through my tour of Kemang, the skies opened up and the rain did not stop until early this evening. You hear a lot about cities that are always overcast - London, Seattle - and the dour attitude of the people who live there. They are often accompanied by high suicide rates. What's interesting about the cloudy skies here - they don't seem overcast. I've only seen blue sky during the day once on this trip, though the mornings are often clear. Despite the lack of sun, I would not recall this trip as three weeks of overcast skies. The absence of rain has been more noticeable than the absence of sun.

Another thing I am finding to be uniquely Jakartan - if not Indonesian - is everything is in some state of construction. Whether it be a sidewalk that seems half finished (see below picture), or an empty lot between two newly constructed buildings, cranes towering over the skyline, or scaffolding on an existing building to create a new visage - everything is under construction all the time. The only thing I haven't seen is road construction - I can't imagine what traffic would be like if they were doing road repairs.

Closing down the week

I'm feeling much healthier now, despite the continued long work hours, and I'm ready to finally do the sight-seeing and window-shopping I had intended to do last weekend. I'm also going to buy a DVD player that I'll use in the hotel and then use in the new house when we move here.

Today we had to say good-bye to a great colleague, a burgeoning friend, and an excellent consultant. I've spent the last year working closely with him on the "project from Hell", and I will truly miss working with him. He is yet another casualty of our continued struggles with the existing financial environment. Luckily, copper appears to be hovering around the $1.50 mark, and, if sustainable, we should be able to maintain another year of strong profitability...just not the outrageous profitability of the last two years. Hopefully, we can soon bring him back to work with us on other projects.

Last night, my departing colleague took me to a local Indonesian restaurant. At 6 PM, we were the first people to arrive and had the place to ourselves. The normally attentive service was even more so to their only customers. They replaced the plates on our table so quickly I jokingly remarked that they must have a shortage in the kitchen and need to quickly wash them to use at another table.

The restaurant itself was very Mediterranean in decor - odd in the South Pacific. Mahogany furniture, floral table clothes, large paintings on wall-papered walls. It reminded me of any of the finest restaurants I've been to in the US - "The Cellar" in Los Angeles, "Donovan's" in Phoenix, "Cygnus" in Grand Rapids. We ordered beef sausage as an appetizer, and then split four other dishes, mostly beef. My favorite was asparagus sauteed in a spicy peanut sauce - it was absolutely delicious. I've had a lot of dishes prepared using peanut sauce, or a spicy peanut sauce, and I have to say I am hooked! I am craving my Chipotle burrito, though. I think I'll eat at Chilli's (yes, the one you know and love) this weekend.

The best part of the meal - after the good conversation we had about working in the IT industry, living in Indonesia, and our families - was the final price. If you eat at any of the US restaurants I named above, you're probably going to pay a minimum of $80 per person. Our total tab was less than that after wine, 4 main dishes, appetizer, and a strawberry smoothie (guess who ordered that).

Earlier in the day I had been quite adventurous with the food. I was babysitting our recent production release of the latest version of our "project from Hell" product, so I wanted to be at my desk as much as possible. This meant I couldn't really go out for lunch and I was tired of eating at Wendy's. This time, I went to an Indonesian food court and ordered Nasi Sapi Lada Hitam - Rice, Beef and Black Pepper (pepper black). I ordered it "to-go", so they packed it in a Styrofoam container and brought it to my table. When I got back to my desk, I found my rice in the container, and my Beef with Black Pepper in what I can only describe as a plastic grocery bag tied tightly. Wendy's gives me my "to-go" drink (in a cup) tied tightly in a plastic bag, with my meal in a paper bag, and they put both in another plastic bag. It's like everyone owns stock in the plastic bag company, or the government enforces a "three plastic bags per person" regulation. I haven't asked.

A few other odd ends to catch up on:

1. Fast food does not have drive through around here - not that I've seen anyway. They do, however, deliver. I'm going to try it with Chilli's later.
2. For being the rainy season, I haven't seen much rain. Light shower now and then, ominous skies quite frequently, but not much rain. I've actually seen blue sky, too. First time for that in Jakarta.
3. I've decided that smiling at the guy with the assault rifle is a good move. Every main building has 4 or 5 security guards that check out cars before they are allowed to move close. The bombings of the Australian embassy (across the street from our building) and the JW Marriott (the hotel I'm staying in) several years ago still has everyone vigilant with security. I think some of it is the whole over staffing I've discussed before, too. I've never seen an armed guard, though. Most just have a nightstick. Here, after your car is checked, and they have you walk through the airport security check, they have an armed guard on the walk up to the main lobby. I've made a point of acknowledging him and saying "hello" every time I see him. Hopefully, he'll remember me if he ever has to use that gun.

Earthquakes? and Team Building

I woke up around 2 AM this morning to what felt like a rolling wave in the building. It happened two quick times in succession, and then stopped. I remember laying there thinking – did we just have an earthquake? – before falling back asleep. At work, I Googled “Indonesia Earthquakes”. Apparently we have had three earthquakes since I have been here – though not last night. So, the one night I actually felt an earthquake was the one night Indonesia did not have one. I’m sure my wife would have an explanation for the rumbling that woke me from my sleep, but that’s a different story….for a different audience.

Today was a big day on many fronts. First, I met with the team and presented my vision for the team over the next 1-2 years, explained a little about my background and my management style, and provided a detailed explanation of my expectations of everyone on the team. It’s tough to tell how they are receiving the message. I tried to be light-hearted. The title of my presentation was “I have a bule for a manager….what does this mean for me?” “Bule”, is the Indonesian word for “White-faced foreigner”. Usually, “bule” is deferential. Most companies don’t send their imbecile workers on foreign assignments, so the locals have only really worked with people who would be successful in any environment. “Bule” can also represent what they dislike about the white-faced foreigners – privilege, arrogance, and aggressiveness. My title got a good laugh.

I also had heard that many of them said I resembled Chandler, from the TV show “Friends” (Matthew Perry for those inclined to look him up). My first slide was titled “First Impressions”, and I debunked the myth that I was on the TV show, related to Matthew Perry in any way, or channeling his persona. This, too, got a good laugh. So, hopefully they are feeling more comfortable with the strange “bule” coming to manage them.

Tonight was also the big team-building event – bowling. When they told me about it last week, they said there would be a prize for high individual score and high team score. Of course, my competitive juices started flowing. I asked what the average score would be. When they said in the 90’s, I knew I could win this event. I asked my superintendents how the team would perceive their manager winning the event (thinking I may have to bowl left handed). They said that last time they did it, the management group had the top 4 scores. Game on!

The bowling alley is in the middle of a two story strip mall that housed a university, restaurants, and furniture sold in the middle of the hallway like the sunglass kiosks in the US. We were all wearing our work clothes, including one brave woman in a skirt, so I was curious how the bowling would turn out. I never expect bowling shoes to be the pinnacle of fashion. In fact, they intentionally make them as ugly as possible so no one will steal them. Mine made me feel like Michael Jackson in the Billy Jean video – bright white loafers.

The lanes themselves looked like the polished, hardwood floor lanes in the US. That is, until you looked at them at an angle. Then you could see they were planks of warped wood laminate, probably laid on top of sheet metal or, worse, barely leveled concrete. When I threw my first ball, and it landed softly, I thought I was in for a long game – and we were only playing one each. We each got one warm-up frame and then the game began.

Each team had five players, and I had worked on projects with all but one of the other members of my team. My first frame I went 7-1, just barely missing the headpin on my first ball. Then I found my groove and followed with 3 consecutive strikes and two spares. I had 104 points after 6 frames. I walked the floor and saw I had double what everyone else did, so I did 4—on the 7th frame. Then I noticed that our team score was not very far ahead of the next team, so I picked it back up and threw two more spares and then a 7-1 on the 10th. I finished with a 154, not too bad for someone who bowls 2-3 times per year.

My team finished with 513, just over 100 average for the group, so you can see we needed my score to be high if we were to be in the running for team high score if most were going to score in the 90’s. There were 9 teams total, and 40 players. My 154 took first place by 13 pins. The team 513 took 2nd place; short by 32 pins. The 1st place team had the 2nd place individual, and four others who scored over 100. Next time, I’ll have to bowl over 180, just to be safe.

The prize I won was a wireless keyboard and mouse – a productivity enhancer. Someone in the crowd yelled “work harder bule!”, to much laughter. I don’t need a wireless keyboard and mouse since I primarily use a laptop. So, I gave it to the person with the lowest score, because she is obviously spending all of her time at work while everyone else is out bowling, so she should have the tools to make her as productive as possible.

After bowling we had dinner at, of all places, Pizza Hut. If you are thinking of the greasy, pepperoni and cheese pizza you see in the US, think again. These pizzas had baked potatoes, fish, chicken, and some odd looking fruit on them…except mine. Well aware of my food allergies – and, apparently, monitoring their watch and me for a few minutes after my first bites – they ordered a pizza they knew I could eat, though it was not a favorite of the rest of the group. When the waitress brought it to the table, she put it right next to me and said “American Favorite”. It was, and I enjoyed it.

One other observation I made today, and it’s not groundbreaking by any means. The more people do for you, the less you are able to do for yourself. I notice that having a driver, I have no sense of direction in the city. I can look at a map, and then go outside and have no idea what I’m doing. Same thing for calling my driver. Our department admin handles communicating with my driver when I’m at work, the hotel handles it when I’m there, and he walks with me if I venture outside of those two locations – like tonight when he walked me to the bowling alley. I’d be lost without these people! Sometimes, when you get the things you always envied, you realize you were better for not having them….but you still don’t want to give them up!

Should be an interesting two years.

Lingering cold, Immigration, and the Perfect Mess

The cold I have has lingered longer than I had hoped. Yes, you can just catch a simple cold in Indonesia. It isn’t SARS, or Dengue Fever, or any of the other exotic variations available in this tropical environment. I don’t have a fever, or a head ache, or a body ache – just a very stuffy nose and a mild cough. So, I did what any normal, rational human with an acute upper respiratory infection would do - I spent 30 minutes in the gym.

It better be gone when I awake in the morning, though. Tomorrow night we are doing a team building event and I am kicking off the whole occasion with my “what does it mean to work for me” presentation. I need to be able to speak for the presentation, and have the energy to help my team win at bowling.

Sunday was much like Saturday, only I spent more time awake. There is an expat grocery store nearby, and I took the brief walk to see if I could find some familiar medicine that wouldn’t put me to sleep. I didn’t find any medicine at the grocery store. I did find Kellogg’s cereal, Jiff Peanut Butter, fresh fruit, and juice. I only bought the fruit and juice as I wasn’t sure where I would find a bowl or where I could store the milk for cereal.

Above the grocery store was a pharmacy. Nobody spoke English, so I bought medicine based on the picture and waited until today to confirm with my colleagues that it was worth taking. Glad I waited. The one that would have treated my symptoms had expired. I had lunch at a pizza restaurant and went back to the hotel for a four hour nap, then woke up, watched a little TV, and went to bed for the night.

I forgot to mention that on Thursday last week I went to the immigration department. I had to sign and initial about 15 different documents – none of which I could read – and have my picture and fingerprints taken. The place was a zoo. We couldn’t park in the parking lot and the inside of the building reminded me both of the trading floor on Wall Street after they announce the crop reports, and a Central American police station in a movie from the 1970’s starring Nick Nolte as a photo-journalist covering rebel insurgencies. Luckily, my company is thoroughly prepared for the expat experience at immigration. They made an appointment for me, so when I arrived, I walked right up to the counter to sign the documents, walked right over to take my picture and fingerprints, and walked right out. Total time at immigration was about 15 minutes. Some people looked like they had been there for days.

Also, I’m reading a fascinating book that I think should be required reading for anyone in management – especially those charged with process improvement, process control, records management, or any other profession where fastidiousness is encouraged. The book, “A Perfect Mess”, posits, quite cogently, that the cost of cleanliness often outweighs the benefits and, moreover, the benefits of messiness often are incalculable. For example, we never would have found penicillin if Fleming’s lab had been as meticulous and sterilized as today’s research environments.

To put the argument in perspective, the best analogy is that of a deck of cards. I give two people a deck of cards and inform them I will be timing how fast they are able to find four cards I name at random. One of them, in preparation, sorts the deck numerically by suit. The other does nothing. I name four cards. The person who sorted the deck can find those cards significantly faster than the person who didn’t – 6 seconds vs. 16 seconds, on average. When I advise them to put the cards back, the ordered person puts them back exactly where they would be in his defined sort, while the unordered person puts them back on the bottom of the pile – 6 seconds vs. 0 seconds. So, the act of finding and replacing four cards is 12 seconds vs. 16 seconds. On the surface, it would seem that order is preferred. Of course, if you add in the 90 seconds, on average, it takes to order the deck, it took 106 seconds for the ordered person, and 16 for the second person. At what point does the benefit of order surpass the cost? Well, assuming that order is consistently maintained – which, in reality, it seldom is – it requires 23 repetitions before adding the order is cost effective.

If that were the end of the analogy, the meticulous, fastidious and OCD crowd would walk away crowing. Unfortunately for them, the real question is – how often do you need an ordered deck? When you want to use a deck of cards, what, typically is the first action you take? You shuffle it, to create disorder and a useful randomness. So, an ordered deck really has no utility. This analogy applies to many other aspects of life. Quite a fascinating book.

One week into my stay I finally upgraded to the club level. My frugality extends to my role as a consumer of company funds. As I mentioned in an early post, I wagered that the $45 daily rate would be cheaper than eating elsewhere. I avoided the hotel restaurants and instead visited their buffet. Breakfast buffet was $19, dinner buffet was $35 - $54 total. Internet in the room is $72/week. Dry cleaning is expensive - like $5 per item. By agreeing to pay $45 a night, I get breakfast, dinner, free Internet and two items pressed each day as part of the fee. Plus, I get unlimited drinks (when I'm not sick). I think of it as the "all-inclusive" plan.

Side note - the spell check on my blog engine doesn't recognize contractions. Very odd.

Interesting thing, life

I recognize I have been remiss on timely updates to my blog. These last few days have been a whirlwind of activity.

Thursday and Friday were both long days at work. Recognizing that my driver's day begins before mine and ends after mine - making his Wednesday closer to an 18 hour day - I changed my work arrival for Thursday to 9 Am. I ended up staying until after 8 PM. Friday was not much different. We've been struggling to resolve some issues on our Help Desk application, and I'm trying to impress upon the team the importance of fully testing the application before publishing it for release. Thursday night, after seeing the results of our testing, I was highly confident that our code was ready for production release. To my surprise and frustration, there were two bugs - closely related - that prevented us from going to production. So, we spent Friday attempting to reproduce these issues - one of which we were unable to duplicate until 4:30 in the afternoon - and then resolving them for another release. I had high confidence in our code once again when I left late Friday evening.

At this point, I have no idea if my compatriots in Phoenix updated production with the new version. I made a conscious decision to not check my work email until tomorrow morning. If we did not release the new version, it would only upset me, and there is nothing I can do about until Monday morning, so no use getting upset over something I can do nothing about.

Friday afternoon my nose started to run. It's been itchy, on and off, since I arrived, but it really started bothering me Friday afternoon. I completed my work out Friday evening and ordered a massage (loving these $25 1/hr massages!!) for 8 PM. I've always known that a vigorous massage helps release toxins from your body. It's one of the reasons they advise you to drink lots of water afterwards, to help flush it out. After this experience, I'm a confirmed believer. About half way through the massage, as the masseuse was working my arms, my nose opened up like a faucet. I actually had to ask her to stop and bring me some tissue. At the end of the massage, I was so congested it was like trying to suck air through a straw clogged by a piece of ice. Luckily, ever since my first trip out here, I've carried medicine for food allergies, cold, and travellers diarrhea. Unfortunately, the only cold medicine we had at home was Sudafed PM, which knocks me out. I think I was awake for a total of 5 hours on Saturday.

Despite my Rip Van Winkle impression on Saturday, I did find an opportunity, in my medicine induced haze, to make the obligatory DVD shopping trip. I was on a hunt for Bolt and Wall-E, two movies for my daughter. They had both of them. I picked up a number of other Disney movies, too - Peter Pan, Alice in Wonderland, Pocahontas and a few others.

To change gears a bit - when you travel for business, or spend time abroad, it's always tough to be away from family. Communication technology - email, phone, webcam, etc - helps shorten the distance by helping you keep in touch and stay connected. This works well when everything is fine. When there are crises, or when someone close to you is in pain, the distance seems even farther.

This week, a great person died. She lived well into her 90's and I think we all thought she would live well into her hundreds. She was vibrant, full of life, and spread joy everywhere she went. I'll remember playing cards with her at the lake, and hearing stories about her undying support for Michigan State football. I did not know her well, but I do know well the impact her life had on those around her. She will be missed.

Wednesday - Long Day, Good week

Very long day for me. I still haven't quite adjusted to the time as much as I thought I would have. I'm waking up before my alarm every day. Monday and Tuesday I was up at 3:30 AM and 4:30 AM, respectively. This morning I was up shortly before 5 AM. Worked out well, though, because I was scheduled to have a meeting with my management in Phoenix at 6 AM local time. When I logged on to check my email before leaving the hotel, I saw the meeting was cancelled. My driver was already waiting for me downstairs, so I went to work anyway. Normally, if my day starts at 6 AM I like to return home around 4 PM. Today, I had another meeting with Phoenix at 8:30 PM local time (6:30 AM Phoenix), so I ended up arriving at the office at 5:45 AM and leaving the office at 10 PM. Like I said, very long day.

This has been a very productive three days. Monday, I met with all of the Superintendents who will be reporting to me and discussed my vision for the organization. We have had several discussions on the products we support out of Jakarta, current issues, and I've sat in on some of the weekly meetings. Tuesday, I had several project specific meetings and a brief meeting with our Indonesia CFO - whom I report to administratively while on assignment here. In the afternoon, we had a meeting with the full team (all 35 people) and informed them of my new role.

Today's focus was coordination with the team in Phoenix, design sessions on new projects we want to start, and follow up on some projects I want to close out on this week. I did take a small break in the morning to finalize a very important detail of my relocation - where we'll live.
On my last trip, I toured several different apartment and housing complexes in Jakarta. We settled on Kemang Club Villas. Visit the site. Kemang is the part of Jakarta where most of the expatriates (westerners) live. There are international schools, western grocery stores, and a lot of cultural events and attractions. In fact, I only heard English spoken on the compound. This particular compound abuts the US Embassy and complies with all US Embassy security standards and protocols.

Today, I visited three of the floor plans. On the website, first click "Click Here", and then click on the "Homes" tab. The top has a few pictures of the compound and some of the interiors. The bottom portion of the page has the floor plans. I looked at Type A, Type B and Type D. Initially, we were thinking we wanted Type D because all of the rooms are on one floor...then I saw it in person. I've stayed in timeshares that were more spacious, and I wasn't thrilled with the fact that the elevator was not secured.

I had seen a Type A floor plan on my last visit, and really liked it. However, as you can see from the layout, the Master Bedroom is on a different floor than the other bedrooms. We can always make Bedroom 2 or 3 the Master Bedroom so we can be on the same floor as our toddler, but those rooms are tiny. Not sure they would hold a Queen, much less the King we are used to.

The Type B floor plan has similar issues with the Master being on a different floor. However, Bedroom 3 is spacious enough to act as a Master, while Bedroom 2 could be for our daughter. Ultimately, this is the floor plan we have decided to move into. Below are some pictures of the interior.

Terrace:


Kitchen:



Skylight:


Bedroom 3:



Bedroom 2:



Shared Bathroom:



Bedroom 4:



Master Bedroom:



Family Room:

First few days have gone well

Most people are afraid of a messy situation. You always hear of people turning down jobs they feel are difficult situations. These are the jobs I seek out. It's always easy to be a hero when there is a lot wrong with the situation.

Of course, with my Jakarta assignment, there is good news and bad news in this regard. The good news is there are definitely opportunities for some quick turn around - the low hanging fruit. The bad news is, it isn't as big a mess as many perceive it to be, which means I have to put on a marketing hat and promote the successes. Of course, the bad news is also good news for the organization.

I've spent the last two days observing, asking questions, and learning. As suspected, the people here are smart, open to change, and hard working. Having the right people is half the battle and I'm glad I don't have to fight that half. I have also observed a quiet frustration with the impact of some decisions made over the last few years. We have too many people on the team working more than 50 hour weeks consistently, and processes that negatively impact productivity.

One of the first meetings I sat in on, we reviewed a report that purported to represent a snapshot of the effort expended in the prior week. The only problem, none of the math worked in the numbers reported, and little of the information was actionable. This is a common problem I see in teams that are struggling to deliver despite good processes and people. If you report on the wrong information, you don't have the relevant data to make appropriate decisions. This is easy to fix, and we've made adjustments this week that will help us make decisions once we receive next week's report.

I've also had the opportunity to review my key objectives with the Superintendents reporting to me:

1) Focus on quality
2) Improved communication
3) Requiring everyone to give their best
4) Engaging people in their strenghts (we can't make money focusing on weaknesses)
5) Work/Life balance
6) Leading vs. managing - we want to lead

more tomorrow....

Travelling Woes

It was bound to happen. You travel the same itinerary long enough, or any itinerary frequently enough, and something will go amiss. On this trip I've had two issues.

First, Cathay Pacific just is not recognizing my dietary needs, even though they are listed in my reservation. They keep bringing me shrimp cocktails and other seafood choices. I continue to fly them over Singapore, however, because they have typically had at least one option on the menu not fatal for me to consume.

Second, they lost my baggage. I knew I was in trouble when I had to wait at the baggage carousel. Business Class baggage gets priority, so it is usually the first set of bags off the plane. When my bag was not among the priority, I knew something was wrong. It has yet to arrive. Now, in Cathay Pacific's defense, I think the issue is United's. I flew United from PHX to LAX, coach, so they did not mark my bag as priority. I tried to object, but the bag had disappeared before I could say anything. So, Cathay Pacific would not have given my bags the care typically granted to a Business Class traveler. Also, to their credit, they offered me cash as I filled out my report as an "advance" on total damages incurred. Of course $45 doesn't even pay for the pair of shoes that didn't make it, much less a full outfit to wear to work on Monday.

Thanks to the new regulations on liquids, I no longer carry toiletries in my carry-on. I only carry things I cannot afford to be without - my laptop (and its accoutrement's), a book for reading, my money and identification, and one change of clothes. This helps me travel light, but also puts me at the mercy of quality service in the airline industry - something that seems to be harder and harder to find these days. So, arriving in Jakarta with my travel clothes, and a pair of shorts and a T-shirt in my carry-on, I had nothing to wear to work.

On the way to the hotel, I asked my driver to stop at a shopping mall so I could buy one business outfit for the next day. Slacks, button down shirt, undergarments, socks set me back $100, about what it would in the US. I expected as much because I bought US brands, though I could not find a Ralph Lauren store, which is where I usually shop.

On my shopping adventure, I noticed a few things worth mentioning. First, finding a parking spot was impossible. Think a US mall the week before Christmas. This was a Sunday afternoon, prime shopping time, but the sheer volume still surprised me. Second, the prices I paid, and the volume of shoppers, are proof that Indonesia, at least in Jakarta, has a thriving middle class. I'll temper that assessment with the fact that their are probably only two malls like this serving the 18 million people in Jakarta, so they don't have many alternatives. Third, the staffing at the stores is ridiculous. I think I've mentioned on prior trips how it appears like companies and governments create jobs just for the sake of having them (like, two toll booths on a road with no exits between them), but this was purely comical. At the top of every escalator, three people stand around waiting to help direct you (of course, this is because their are no maps anywhere in the mall). In each department, 5 or more people are standing around waiting to service you. This is not per floor, this is per SECTION. So, when I needed dress socks and undergarments, one of the five people in that section came over to help. When I needed a shirt, that was a different group, and for my slacks, yet another group. All of them followed me to the cashier so they each got credit for the sale from their section. I really just wanted to go to one spot - preferably arranged by brand - and buy everything.

I finally arrived at the hotel at 4 PM - a full 3.5 hours after my flight landed. The JW Marriott is a nice hotel....the Ritz it is not. Interestingly enough, they appear to be sister hotels. The reception desk walked me to my room, explained all the amenities, and then arranged for everything I indicated I needed - which at that point was help working with Cathay Pacific to locate my luggage, food, and a massage. When I walked into the room, I swore I was at the Ritz. Same carpeting, same bedding, same style bathroom, just smaller and they want me to rent a DVD player instead of providing one in the room. I didn't mention I could by one on the street for cheaper than their daily rate. They also have a "Club Level", like the Ritz, though I am going to try and eat my meals outside the hotel and see if that is cheaper than the $45/day rate to have all my meals at the club level. My guess is it won't be.

I crashed around 9 PM and woke up at 3 AM. It's now 7:30 and I've had my workout, worked for a few hours, and eaten breakfast. Still no word on my luggage. If it hasn't arrived by the time I leave work tonight, I'll need to make another trip to the mall and this time I'll buy 2 day's of clothes and hopefully that will be enough until my bags arrive.

New Journey Begins

This is a trip that wasn't supposed to happen. It wasn't going to be necessary. Before recessionary forces engulfed the global economy, my family and I had plans to move to Jakarta the first week of January. That all changed when copper fell from $4/lb to $1.20/lb. That tremendous drop in value resulted in a reorganization and reduction in force - and a delay to our plans.

Luckily for me, the plans for my future did not change, they only delayed. The delay, however, means that for the second year in a row, I will not be spending Valentine's Day (or, Singles Awareness Day, depending on your situation) with my wife. The bright side is I should be able to help set things up initially for my family's big move while I am there.

More than any other prior trip, I'm excited for this visit. It is the start of my new journey - one that I anticipate will be life-altering... in a positive way. When I entered college over a decade ago, it was with the intention of doing something in international business. It took me nearly 13 years, but I'm finally doing it.

My plans for this trip are extensive:

1) Transition management responsibilities from the existing team manager to myself.
2) Finalize my family's housing arrangements
3) Introduce my vision for the team
4) Introduce myself as a manager, outline my expectations, and explain my management style
5) Familiarize myself with everyone on the team, every application we support, every project underway, and the formal and informal hierarchies established within the team.
6) Kickoff a few new projects and initiatives.

I have three weeks to accomplish it all. It's that kind of rapid pace, intense focus that I have always loved about working - especially in the IT industry. I hope I can live up to my own expectations.