Kramat Raya offers food for Ramadhan

Kramat Raya offers food for Ramadhan

By Gedsiri Suhartono

JAKARTA (JP): It is past high noon, a flock of food vendors is
seen carrying their merchandise along Jl. Kramat Raya in Central
Jakarta.

In less than an hour, signs of percolating fanfare marks
another chance for the vendors to reap their fortunes. As soon as
it strikes 2 p.m., people start striding along the walkway,
browsing for food to make merry their breaking of the fast meal
at dusk.

The dozens of stalls along the strip offer similar menus from
West Sumatra regional food specialties, snacks and various kinds
of kolak (sweet compote stewed in coconut milk and sugar).

Around 35 stalls offer light sweet snacks, popular among
Moslems to break the day's fast. The lack of diversity in the
selection of food signifies the vendors mostly obtain their
merchandise from the same source.

These generic sweet items include wajik (sweetened gluttonous
rice cubes), klepon (gluttonous rice balls filled with brown
sugar), layered regular and gluttonous rice cakes and chilied
tapioca chips.

"It's much more practical and less expensive," said one
merchant in reference to why people obtain food there instead of
cooking at home.

That the kolak is homemade is obvious by the huge pans filled
with kolak, compared to the generically bought kolak in plastic
bags.

Buyers unfamiliar with the hors d'oeuvre may have difficulty
in distinguishing the better quality lemang, a gluttonous rice
mixed with coconut milk and roasted in bamboo joints, from the
ordinary snack. At this point, buyers have to trust their
intuition: what does one's sight and sense of smell relay to
one's mind and stomach?

A hearty appetite for a particular morsel is, thus, the best
opinion shaper these food vendors can get -- much more effective
than any persuasive advertising method ever invented. Who can
resist turning one's head to see what the majority of people seem
to enjoy?

A plateful of steamy rice and spicy side dishes are
irresistible and are a convincing lure to passersby perplexed by
which stall they should stop at and what to eat.

Specialty foods, such as rendang itik (marinated curried duck
and spices) or kari kambing (chopped mutton in spicy coconut
sauce), are often sold out soon after stalls open for business.

Other popular items include crispy eels, chilied beef jerky,
fish head curry, and Nasi Kapau, rice mixed with vegetables and
side dishes of choice.

"We aren't quite sure why most foods offered are Padang
specialties. Maybe because a Padang merchant started this place,"
a seller who calls herself Mar told The Jakarta Post.

People who suffer from claustrophobia should opt for early
shopping because the strip will turn into a congested area for
both diners and shoppers when Maghrib, the dusk prayer coinciding
with the breaking of the fast, approaches.

People swarm almost every food stall. Outsiders could get the
impression that free food was being offered. So crowded is the
serving area that it is difficult to distinguish the customers
from the sellers.

People clamorously order and rush off with food to places
where they can eat their meals. The spectacle of people eating
while standing is as common as seeing colorful finger bowls
decorating the roofs of cars parked nearby, while the owners eat
their meals inside their vehicles.

History

In the last two years, the strip of road across from the Senen
Market in Central Jakarta has gained prominence as being a center
for busy Jakartans to buy food to break their fast during the
fasting month, Ramadhan.

During the fasting month, Moslems do not eat or drink from
dawn to dusk.

How the strip came to be a food center is unclear to most
merchants.

Some say it started with five sellers back in the 1970s, when
selling goods on the strip was illegal and merchants risked being
caught in raids and being fined.

One seller said that in 1992, the Jakarta city administration
decided to make business on the strip legal.

Now regular vendors own spots they claim as theirs after
paying Rp 900,000 per square meter to the city mayoralty. This
amount guarantees facilities such as bars to set up tents, water,
electricity, security and overall cleanliness of the
compound.

Temporary vendors who have not purchased a spot are required
to pay Rp 200,000 per month to have their spots and right to
conduct business ensured, said Lies, a temporary merchant during
Ramadhan.

Maintenance fees are requested daily from these small
merchants. The amount is calculated by each stall's width. Small
snack merchants, for example, have to pay only Rp 2,500 while a
wider stall with a brisk business has to pay as much as Rp 22,500
per night.

Tati, a widow with five children, told the Post that the fees
collected are reasonable. She sells mostly generic snacks.

"As a widow I get some sort of dispensation," she said, "I
only have to pay Rp 1,700."

Some admitted that business on the strip is based solely on
their wish to earn lots of money and, therefore, most vendors
merely emulate their predecessors on the strip.

Rumors have it that merchants may earn up to Rp 1 million a
night.

"I don't know where they get that figure," said Mar, a snack
merchant.

"I only earn enough to get by with my six children," Tati
added.

The size of each business is different. Some vendors merely
get by on a day-to-day basis, while others can employ up to 15
people to help run their businesses.