The secret of shopping odysseys

The secret of shopping odysseys

JAKARTA (JP): Hans used to tease me about my shopping because
I go distances to save money. I go to a shop downtown because the
milk in that shop is Rp 500 less expensive than in the shop near
my house. I'd rather travel from one end of Jakarta to the other
than to give away Rp 500 for free.

However, Hans travels in all directions in Jakarta when it
comes to shopping for his dinner parties. Once I decided to go
with him on one of his shopping odysseys, but of course Hans had
his objections. I coerced him to bring me by saying that he must
share his secrets with his friends, otherwise if anything happens
to him those secrets would be buried with him.

So one morning, a few days before his birthday party, we set
out for Glodok, the Chinatown of Jakarta, where all the spices
and ingredients for Chinese menus are available. Hans went to one
of the stalls and started choosing things he wanted to buy, all
the while grumbling about the poor quality. When he had
everything together in a heap he started to bargain for the
price. The woman calculated the amount and said, "Rp 75,000 for
everything." Whereupon Hans showed his indignation and shouted,
"What? 75? The most I am willing to give you is 50." A
negotiation followed, in which the woman was willing to come down
Rp 5,000 and Hans increased his offer to Rp 55,000. The
negotiation then came to an abrupt halt as Hans suddenly
disappeared into a crowd.

The woman told me he would be back soon and gave me directions
to the place where he would be. I found him along a street where
many food hawkers had their stalls. Hans was enjoying a meat dish
with some satay. "I didn't have breakfast this morning," he said.
He was certainly hungry, because after finishing the dish he went
to another stall to order something else.

I suddenly spotted an old friend of mine, now a CEO of a
multinational company. "So, you come here to eat too?" he asked
me. "Best food in the world, whenever I am in this part of
Jakarta, I come here and enjoy!"

My mouth fell open. Now, here is a man, whose office is within
walking distance to some of the best dim sum places in the world,
as well as chic and elegant Thai, Japanese, Vietnamese and
American restaurants, and he comes here to eat at this muddy
place where beggars prey on leftovers. But watching Hans eat made
me feel hungry, too, so I settled for a bowl of tofu with brown
sugar and ginger sauce, so delicious that I concluded that other
dishes must be too. After finishing three bowls, Hans ordered
tofu for desert and we walked back to the shop where the woman
still had his goods put aside. It seemed that the food made him
more lenient. He didn't bargain any further and just paid.

The next few days we went to places all over Jakarta to buy
special foods, such as the Pluit fish market where we bought some
nice, fresh seafood. Afterwards, Hans wanted to show me food
stalls where the best food was served. "Try the stuffed tofu or
the fishballs, which are so bouncy, you can play ping-pong with
them". In another stall, we ate a bowl of noodles, this time from
Belitung, with a thick meat sauce. Hans added a bowl of noodles
from Medan with lots of seafood and from Pontianak with crab
meat.

On the day of the party itself, we went to the Senen area,
because Hans always buys fresh noodles and meat balls from a lady
there. But again we did not stop where we had planned, because in
a different shop we tasted some delicious otak-otak, a kind of
grilled fish balls, and we also had some noodles served with beef
tripe. After eating two bowls we finally went home with two
doggie bags of lontong capgomeh (rice cooked in leaves with all
the trimmings) and a portion of soft shell crab.

His cooking was delicious and all the guests enjoyed the good
food and company. The spirits were high, but Hans didn't eat much
and I may have been the only one who knew why.

-- Myra Sidharta