Demographics and Such (aka Life in the Time of Lebaran)

You know, it's funny how once every year, Jakarta empties up so much, it's almost dead. I mean there's virtually no traffic at all. Nor much of anything else for that matter. That tells us two things:

1. Most of Jakarta's residents are from out of town,
2. Jakarta is the only city in Indonesia. Or at least that's what the general populace thinks.

Then again, I haven't been around this country much, so I can't quite speak for other cities. But still, think about it. Whenever people want to do anything, work, education, etc. they look to Jakarta. Sure, that's no problem. The people can think of things however they want. The problem is when the government starts seeing things that way as well.

Why do I say this? Well for starters, somebody please tell me 20 other cities in Indonesia that has the same amount of skyscrapers as Jakarta. No, I'm not being sarcastic, I'm being curious. I've not seen much other places that has skyscrapers in Indonesia.

Still on the topic of urban development, how about that Busway thing? Have it anywhere else, besides Jakarta/Jabodetabek?

Oh, and don't forget that upcoming monorail project. Where's it being built? Jakarta and... no wait, just Jakarta? Hopefully not.

And what about that annoying commercial of a guy dropping all his stuff at the airport? What's the tag for that one? "visit JAKARTA" or something to that effect, right?

How about movies? Check your local movie website. Compare the movies playing in Jabodetabek to the other cities there. Go ahead, have a laugh. They're still playing movies we watched months ago.

Chrissake, people, how can we expect this country to grow, if the only city we focus on growing is Jakarta? No, I'm not saying that we aren't doing anything about other cities, I'm just saying it's not as good an effort.
Seriously now, we're a big country. The f*ckin biggest in southeast Asia. There are plenty of other places to develop, you know? Just because Jakarta is the capital city doesn't mean it has to be the ONLY city. Once you focus too much on one city, you leave the rest up for grabs. Just like our so-called "culture-war" with Malaysia. I hate them for what they did, but I gotta hand it to them, they're smart.

Bottom line, development in areas other than Jakarta would mean better growth nationally, and it'll help prevent shit like that happening again.