Excited Bandung prepares to greet leaders

Yuli Tri Suwarni, The Jakarta Post/Bandung

There was a definite air of excitement and anticipation as the city of Bandung made the final preparations ahead of Sunday's commemoration of the 1955 Asia-Africa Conference. This quaint city is out to impress.

Streets and Art Deco buildings in the vicinity of the Merdeka Building, the venue for the commemoration activities, have been cleaned up. Newly planted flowers and fresh coats of paint are noticeable. Giant white canvases have been deployed to cover up those buildings that could not be helped with a quick makeover.

Walking along the main thoroughfare Jl. Asia-Africa, the sounds of angklung (traditional bamboo musical instruments) and other instruments are heard drifting out of buildings as children and musicians practice their welcoming performances.

"We took at least Rp 80 billion out of the city's coffers to pay for the preparations," Bandung Mayor Dada Rosada proudly told The Jakarta Post.

"That does not include renovations to the airport and Merdeka Building, which were paid for by the provincial and central governments."

The highlight of Sunday's commemoration will be a historical walk by the Asian and African leaders along Jl. Asia-Africa to the Merdeka Building. Once inside, the leaders will adopt a declaration on a new strategic partnership between the two continents.

Dada is nervous. Eager to put on a good show, he says he is losing sleep because of anxiety over the preparations. At night he patrols the streets looking for anything that might reflect badly on his city.

"You know, Bandung looks beautiful at night. But some of the unsightly things that are not noticeable during the day also become apparent when there are not so many people bustling about."

But the "beautification" of the city is not without its critics. The city has used the opportunity to push thousands of hawkers and vendors off the main streets of the city into the alleys. Couples caught in the city's parks at night are being stopped and asked to show identification cards to prove that they are married.

"There are those who reject these efforts. But that is normal," Dada said. "Our aim is to make the city pretty again, and that is for the benefit of the majority of residents. Just look at the main streets, they are all clean and the parks look gorgeous."

The head of the provincial organizing committee for the event, Nu'man Abdul Hakim, said everything was set to go. "The airport is ready, the venue is ready for use and the roads are all smooth. Only a few streets beneath the Pasteur-Surapati flyover need a bit more work."

The provincial government, with financial assistance from the central government, has also expedited the completion of the new Cikampek-Purwakarta-Padalarang (Cipularang) toll road. Delegates traveling by bus from Jakarta to Bandung on Sunday will be among the first people to use this new toll road, which will cut the travel time from Jakarta to Bandung from 3.5 hours to two hours.

Despite these assurances it is clear that the preparations are also overwhelming the city. The devil is in the details, and as of Thursday evening it was evident that many devilish details still had to be worked out.

A decision on how to accommodate the thousands of delegates is still being ironed out. For now organizers are planning to shut down completely Jl. Braga beginning on Friday night in order to set up a 200-meter-long air-conditioned tent to seat delegates.

"All the hotels near the venue are full," Nu'man said on Thursday afternoon. Adding to his concern was the sudden change in the travel arrangements made by the national organizing committee for ambassadors and delegates, who were originally going to travel between Jakarta and Bandung by train on Friday night and Saturday morning. However, he has been informed that they will now all be traveling by bus on the new toll road.

One can only imagine that Nu'man's headache is as bad as those of Bandung drivers who must quietly suffer for a few days as streets are shut down and traffic rerouted for the benefit of their international guests.