Today I travellled by taxi, planes and a ferry in Indonesia. My journey to Singapore via Surabaya and Batam was uneventful, but there have been some hiccups lately concerning transport systems. Today Indonesian VP Yusuf Kalla took a symbolic train ride from Jakarta to Yogyakarta, showing faith in the country’s transportation.
As many people will know, a ferry that caught fire a week ago off of Jakarta, sank with investigators and TV crews aboard, killing 3 people. That whole saga was played for our benefit on the news, during the ferry crossing from Batam today! Personally I must admit to taking care to check where the exits and life jackets were. The hour long voyage hada few bumps, but otherwise was fine.
Booking my ticket to get to Singapore, Adam Air was available. Actually it was the cheapest airline, but there are reasons why some things are cheaper (Adam Air founded 2003, 2 crashes, Qantas founded 1920, no crashes). A weird thought corssed my mind today as we were about to take off, what must it be like to be a flight attendent on a budget airline? Anyway the airline I took Mandala, has a pretty good record as the airline is connected to the airforce. In flight service today was polite, beverage was water, food was sponge cake. In Surabaya a Muslim school boarded the plane, they were quite civilized and I’m sure its a thrill for teenagers to get to fly.
