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.