the city of insanity

The good news is: six months ago I moved to a new apartment and this time it's not rented. It's a 46-story high superblock apartment, with 2 towers and 6 wings, located on a prime location, meaning I share the building with thousands other people from around the world. Aside from Indonesians, the apartment has its share of Westerners, Chinese, Indians, Africans, you name it. It's like a mini planet. 

The bad news is: within the six month I stay there, I am now convinced that 3/4 of Jakarta populations are insane. I've realized for a long time that Jakarta is not the friendliest city to live in, but now living among so many people I realize that the majority of the people in this city are just simply rude and selfish bastards who will only destroy the already damaged city, and it's happening fast.

Case no 1:
There is a taxi queue in the building. During morning rush hour, an attendant will list down our names and call us when the taxi arrives. I was in the line with this lady, she's about 45. She gave her name to the attendant right after me and her name was Dewi, which sounded nothing like mine. When the attendant called out my name, she confidently walked to towards the taxi and opened the door, causing to me shout in protest, "Hey lady, that's my cab." She looked at me and told me, "No, it's my cab, I'm Patty" I didn't see that one coming so I was dumbfounded for a while. Even the attendant was confused. Of course with so many people on the list he couldn't remember which one was who. Now is there any other way to tell a crazy person off other than being crazier than her? After I regained my composure I stepped in front of her and simply pushed her aside and told her, "No, that's my name. Your name is Dewi you crazy bitch." and I got on the cab. Had I been more polite, I would've lost the cab to her.

Case no 2:

The lady at the unit right above me has some plants she puts on the railings on her balcony. By rule, we are not allowed to have any plants out on the balcony because it will involve watering the plants and the water will wet the unit below us. And that's exactly what happened. On the first day we moved, it was like a local rain because she watered her plants. The unit that I bought had been empty for a long time so she could just do as she wanted. I did the right thing, I called the management to sort things out with her. But it didn't stop. The lady kept her plants and continued watering it, wetting my balcony. I called the security. She stopped for a few days and started again. My husband went up there but she refused to see him, she sent her niece to meet my husband. Her niece told him she would give her aunt the message. As predicted, the watering started again in a few days. Finally I emailed a complain letter to the management, demanding this matter to be taken seriously. It finally stopped after the management threaten to switch off her water.

Case no 3:

At the parking lot, a man as old as my father deliberately drove in the wrong direction probably because it was too much of a hassle for him to follow the rule. So he blocked my car. A sane person would've backed off because he was the one who's wrong. But no. Maybe because he thought he was an older man, he told us to back off. My husband refused to back off, so he just stopped the car there, waiting for the man to back off. A security guard came. But instead of telling the man, who was clearly breaking the rule, to back off, the security told us to back off, maybe simply because that man's car was more expensive than our car. That angered us so much. My husband stormed out of the car and asked the security guard "Why are you telling me to back off? I'm right. He's the one who's wrong." The security guard replied "Yes, but he won't move." What kind of stupid answer is that? My husband walked to that man's car and asked "What's your problem? You took the wrong direction. You should back off". Do you know what his answer was? He told my husband: "Yes, but I always go this way." How arrogant was that? My husband lost it and called him nasty things. It took almost a beating from my husband to make the man move his stupid expensive car.

Those were just 3 examples. Not to add the daily annoyances like people who won't give you way on the elevator, or people who park their cars and taking up space. Too much selfishness and arrogance are happening in the city.  Now tell me that those three incidents were not insanity.

I am not a big fan of Foke, but I think it's not him that brought the city to this sorry state and it surely takes a lot more than Jokowi to fix this city. It has to come from the people. What exactly can you expect from people who are heartless, selfish, insensitive to others and the worst thing is that they don't think that they are wrong at all.

People of Jakarta, in my opinion, are just hopeless beyond repair. And I can't wait until I can escape.