FOR FOCUS ISSUE -- GOLF

Avie K. Utoma Contributor Jakarta

Be on time or you have a big problem

All sports including golf have their own rules. For instance, missing your starting time, or tee time in the lexicon of golf, will cause you a big problem, no matter who you are.

If you thought golf prowess would allow you to play anywhere anytime, you're wrong! Not even golf's number one, Tiger Woods, can get away with that. Say his tee time is 8:57 a.m. and he arrives at the tee box one second late, he would surely get a two-stroke penalty! Worse yet, for lateness beyond five minutes, one would be DQ-ed (disqualified)! It's a golf rule, even when it's only a local rule.

For golf professionals, a difference of two strokes could mean a loss of hundreds of thousands of dollars. It happened to American Duffy Waldorf two weeks ago on the 12th hole in the final round of the FBR Open. He would have finished the tournament in outright second place and taken home US$540,000. But he got himself penalized for doing what he wasn't supposed to do. Had he repaired his ball's pitch mark after he took his shot from the fairway, he would have gotten away scot-free. Instead, he was penalized and finished tied with Fred Funk and Joe Durant, each collecting $336,000. A rule is a rule.

For amateurs, it's slightly different, yet the effect can still be the same. Although they can probably get away with bending a few of the official rules of golf, if they miss their tee time, it's almost like the end of the world.

What they get is a worse penalty. Either they completely lose the chance to play, plus paying the entire green fee, or they are put back to a later tee time, like three or four hours later, subject to some other sucker's cancellation.

So, what's the big deal about tee time? Why is the starting time so important? Basically, it's the old supply-demand theory. On any given day, the maximum capacity that an 18-hole golf course can accommodate is no more than 280 players. Provided it isn't raining in the afternoon, and the day starts at 6:30 a.m. Sure, you can fill in more players, but that means there'll be a lot of unhappy customers not being able to finish their rounds.

And in planet golf, everything is about numbers.

Let's talk about some of them now. Within a one-hour drive from Jakarta, there are 34 private or public golf clubs totaling 684 holes, or the equivalent of 38 18-hole courses. Some have only 9 holes, others have 27 or 36 holes, while most are 18-hole courses.

Jagorawi is the only course with 45 holes. And visit any of these courses on a Saturday or public holiday (except when it's a long weekend), you will find all of them are full. All of the tee times are fully reserved. Hypothetically, that means only 10,640 players can play on that particular day.

So far, there has never been any real effort to find out the exact number of golfers in the country, much less in Jakarta. A good guess is that it ranges between 50,000 and 75,000, expatriates included. Who really knows! But one thing is for sure, whatever the numbers the tee time has definitely become a precious commodity. That's why the green fees for Saturday and public holidays are sky high.

I have heard stories about disgruntled members of some exclusive clubs who never get to play at their own clubs, which charge nauseatingly high joining fees and annual dues.

In order to reserve a Saturday morning tee time, for instance, members must do it the preceding Monday by fax between 8 a.m. and noon. Any reservation received before or after the prescribed time is annulled. And the story goes that one golfer lined up 10 fax machines, each sending the reservation form and not one got through.

I sure am glad I didn't join such an obnoxious golf club. I count my blessings that, even if I have to wait an hour, at the two clubs I belong to I can just walk in and join my buddies for a great Saturday round. No hustle and bustle trying to get a tee time in advance. And numbers are only counted after lunch, when the pot is awarded to the winner and the bills settled.

Yet, for some expatriates the cost for playing golf here in Indonesia is considered reasonable, unless you come from the U.S. or Australia, where public and municipal courses are in abundance. But not if you're a subject of Emperor Akihito or if your national food is Kimchee. There's also a story about a Japanese man who enjoys at least three months a year playing golf day in day out here in Jakarta. It is believed that all of his expenses -- airfare, housing, food and green fees -- for his three-month golfing spree are probably equal to playing two rounds of golf back in his home country. And he's been doing it for the past 15 years or so!

In the meantime, from early January until the deadly Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) and the Iraq war became freaking calamities, loads of people were flying in from Asian countries and invading Jabotabek courses.

Fate had it that SARS and the Iraq war turned the tee-time market back to normal. Some clubs even passed a regulation banning players from SARS-affected countries.

It's probably safe to assume that golf will continue to be part of the trendy lifestyle. Like the continuing growth of imported built-up cars, people will probably not even blink at how much they have to spend to secure a ridiculously priced tee time. For as long as they think they look good, golfers will be out there on the 1st tee on Saturday morning.