Boozy 'bule' baiting at BuGils bar
JAKARTA (JP): Descartes, no doubt after suffering a pecuniary setback, once said that the only certain thing in life is uncertainty, or something to that effect.
The developers of the Taman Ria Senayan entertainment complex must be nodding their heads earnestly in agreement. For Taman Ria is one of those places that was conceived and planned when all thought of economic travail (or "multidimensional crisis" as we here at The Jakarta Post like to describe it), was regarded as being something akin to treason.
As a result, the complex's huge, precast concrete main block has been left standing forlorn and virtually empty overlooking the man-made lake like one of Hitler's bunkers staring blindly and morosely out over the English Channel.
Even Caravella, a restaurant housed in an enormous mock Phinisi schooner moored by the side of the lake, which I once reviewed for this rag, seems to have run aground and, shuttered up and dark, had all the appearances of a ghost ship on my recent Saturday-night outing to Taman Ria.
But cheer up, chin-chin, put a brave face on it and so forth. All's far from being lost in Taman Ria and there's still plenty of inviting restaurants and pubs there where you can get a bite to eat and, even better, a beer to glug. One of the latter is the cheekily named BuGils, a little piece of Amsterdam transported miraculously to Central Jakarta and a true jewel in this city of glitz and garishness.
Location: Taman Ria Senayan, Laguna Ria Building Level 1, Jl. Gerbang Pemuda No. 3, Central Jakarta. Tel: 5747650, 5747652. Hours: 10:30 a.m. to midnight Sunday to Thursday. Up to 3 a.m. on Friday and Saturday nights depending on the crowd.
What's it got: Good selection of all the old favorites, as good as you're likely to get anywhere, plus an excellent selection of Dutch and Indonesian dishes on the menu. Bintang draught goes for Rp 20,000 (Rp 90,000 per pitcher), small Carlsbergs for Rp 27,000 and small Heinekens for Rp 34,000, while cans of Foster's, Carlsberg and Corona all kick in at Rp 37,000.
A regular spirit will set you back Rp 28,000, while, as you'd expect, premium spirits command premium prices: Rp 40,000 for Chivas Regal, Jack Daniel's or Black Label. For cocktail fans, the prices vary between Rp 37,000 and Rp 45,000, while a glass of the house wine (Cuvee Speciale) will set you back Rp 40,000 (Rp 210,000 for a bottle, if your stomach is up to chancing that much of the old Cuvee).
Here's looking at you: As you take time out to study the cluttered events-listings, personal ads and notices crowding the walls of the tiny, dimly lit vestibule and spy the warm lights glowing within behind the curtain, you know you are onto something well out of the ordinary in Jakarta.
This sense of expectation is more than justified as you enter the pub with its dark stained wood paneling, wooden floors, heavy furniture, soft lights and stained glass canopy over the horseshoe-shaped bar. You might as well be a world away, which, of course, is exactly the effect that the designers were trying to create (the joint has only been open for a year and a half, but looks like it's older than old Methuselah himself -- quite a feat of interior design).
It's a compact and cozy pub, and kind of triangular in shape, with the bar being located on the baseline and the entrance at the apex.
When we arrived at 9 p.m, there were only a few hardy punters slurping at the trough, but by the time of our departure at 11 p.m., the place had filled up nicely with a good mix of Europeans and locals, making for a good buzz all round -- one of the local wags even had a go on the white upright piano strategically located in the center of the pub to give us a bit of a knees up, as Londoners would call it.
In fact, BuGils to my mind looks more like a London pub than anything else I can think of, an impression reinforced by one of those noisy fruit machines that are so ubiquitous in England. Fortunately this one wasn't working -- yet! But perhaps pubs in Amsterdam are the same. I wouldn't know as I've never been there.
Oh, by the way, they've even got a bule serving wench, sorry, barmaid. Now, that's something out of the ordinary in Jakarta, isn't it?
Odds and ends: Well, let's cut to the chase and get any possible controversy over the name of the place out of the way. I referred to it as cheeky before and not without reason.
You see, the word Bugil means stark naked in Indonesian. Hey, that's not very cheeky, I hear you sniff in a superior, worldly- wise tone. Well, that's not all, for BuGils also has a more sinister meaning as it is a compound of the Indonesian words bule, sekali and gila. Well? Well, bule is a slang word that actually means albino but is used to refer to Europeans, Caucasians, whiteys, you know, that kind of thing, sekali means really, while gila means mad or crazy.
But don't worry, any of you afflicted by old-fogeyism out there should refrain from getting cranky or flapping the wings in righteous indignation as BuGils is actually owned by a Dutchman who apparently has a bit of a taste for self-deprecation (pity there aren't more like him, I say). And, of course, it could be worse, the pub could have been called monyet putih (white monkey), another common street term for Europeans here.
Last Call: Ten out of ten on all counts. Great looks, atmosphere and service and congrats to the owner and staff on a job well done. For any of you looking for a regular watering hole, you could do a lot worse than BuGils. (Bill Blade)