A Shaky Start to IndonesiaJun 13, 2011
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| Jakarta, March 15 -18 Our arrival in Indonesia was slightly traumatizing. In hindsight it was a comedy of errors, but at the time there was definitely nothing comedic about it! We got in line at immigration, where the first step is to pay for your entrance visa - US$25.00, or the equivalent in Indonesian rupiah. Problem #1 - Seeing as we had just arrived from Singapore, we had neither dollars nor rupiah. So we asked for an ATM, and learned that the only ones in the arrivals hall are on the other side of immigration. Now really, where’s the sense in that? I’m sure lots of people, coming from other parts of Asia, Europe, the Middle East, wherever, would face the exact same problem, one that could be easily remedied by placing an ATM next to the entrance visa payment booth. So, Charles left collateral (his passport and me) with an immigration officer so he could go out and get enough money to pay both of our visas. Problem #2 - the ATM wouldn’t let him withdraw enough to cover us both, or else he just wasn’t used to dealing with millions of something yet and typed in the wrong amount of zeros. (I’m gonna bet on the latter.) We had to convince the officer to let me go out and get more, which luckily I managed to do, and we got back in the entry visa payment line. Of course, while we’d been dealing with the ATM situation, a huge Cathay Pacific flight had arrived, so now we were in line with hundreds of other people. We finally got our visas, got into line at immigration, and made our way up to the front. Problem #3 - We didn't have a continuing ticket out of the country. Now I know this seems stupid; I know this is usually a requirement when entering a foreign country. But when Charles called the Indonesian consulate in Honolulu prior to our departure to enquire about getting an extended visa (visa on arrivals are good for one month; we were planning on staying two) he was told that there was nothing we could do ahead of time, it could all be taken care of at the airport and that no continuing ticket or any other documentation was required. So many backpackers come into Indonesia and then travel overland/by sea into Malaysia or East Timor (which you obviously wouldn't have a ticket for until arriving in country) and we've since met several travellers who said they weren't asked for a continuing ticket at all. We told the officer that we were planning on travelling to Malaysian Borneo (which at that point was definitely a possibility) but he would not be appeased. He told us we needed to book a ticket before we would be allowed to leave the immigration area. They brought back a ticket agent who offered to book us on a flight back to Singapore in 30 days, but we didn't want to go back to Singapore in 30 days. We didn't want to go anywhere in 30 days; we had plans to be in country for two months, which is exactly why we had tried to get an extension before even leaving the States! We haggled with them for a while, and then finally gave in and agreed to buy a ticket, but only if they would allow us to go out to the ticketing area so we could study our options, and find one that was affordable, and to a place we actually wanted/needed to go. I think eventually, they just got tired of dealing with us, because our personal immigrations officer escorted us over to another agent, and though I couldn’t understand what was being said, I imagine cajoled her into letting us through. We still didn’t have a clue what was going on, but she stamped our passports, made us promise to buy an outbound ticket ASAP, gave us a look like, ‘okay, get out of here... now,’ and that was that. It’s not like we like, bribed the agent or anything, but that’s kind of how it felt... like we were being allowed illegally (or reluctantly, at least) into the country. Fun sidenote: I haven’t got a clue how on earth he recognized them, but during all the drama and waiting in lines, Charles spotted Far East Movement - the group that sings ‘Like A G6’ - being escorted through a special 'famous person' entrance. They probably didn't have to show a continuing ticket. Later that night, we used the hotel business center (for $7.00 an hour!) to hastily book a flight out of Indonesia to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. First thing the next morning, we got a cab to take us to the Department of Immigration so that we could get our visa extension straightened out right away. The trip took an hour and a half, despite the fact that the office was only 10km or so away. Seriously, the traffic is so bad in Jakarta... we’d already been in the car about a half an hour when I looked behind me and realized we could still see the hotel. We finally made it to the office where we searched, in vain, for someone who spoke English. We eventually found the right queue, filled out the paperwork, made copies of our passports, and turned them in... only to find out that we would have to make a minimum of two more visits before getting them back, with the visa extension, in a week. That wouldn’t work... even if we’d wanted to stay in Jakarta for a whole week, we already had a flight booked to Manado two days later. We left, resigned to the fact that we’d just have to take care of it later, sometime before our first month was up.* *We finally ended up getting the extension taken care of on Bali, two weeks later. We paid a ridiculous sum of $100.00 to have a service do it for us, but that was the only option... unless we wanted to spend a week going to and from Denpasar to take care of it ourselves. The most frustrating thing was that when we organized the service, they didn’t even ask for proof that we’d be leaving the country. I took out the printouts of our tickets to Kuala Lumpur, and like, shoved them in the chick’s face, but she wasn’t interested. Sigh. |
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