Jakarta ...meeting IBM Indonesia

Wake up early and went to the swimming pool and swim my usual 30 lanes! Great to have a pool almost as big as I am used to! And next to my bed!

Swimming pool of "Four Seasons"

At breakfast I met the majority of the team, except for Nitin, who was still on the plane this morning. Also Waya and Danny our local ABV hosts were there. When I shake hands with Waya we realized we were swimming together before breakfast, not being aware that we would meet later.

 

After Breakfast David & I arranged our flights to get out of Bandung at the 23rd of March so that we don't have to worry about that one anymore.

The national monument is not far away from where we booked the flight so we visit that. It was full of school kids, visiting the monument. You even can go up, but there was a queue for at least an hour or so as the card seller who approach us told. He explained there is a museum about the Dutch time, which elicit

a reaction from me that I am Dutch.  He immediately started to talk Dutch and quite well actually. His grandmother happened to work for the "Nonnenklooster". I expected to meet people who still speak Dutch, but definitely not on the first day.

A girl at the monument

After visiting the monument we went for lunch before we went back to the hotel to change to go to the IBM office. The office is located in the center of Jakarta at Plaza Indonesia, an shopping mall with shops like Versace, Louis Vutton and more big brands. They are located there since 2010.

View from IBM

At the IBM office we met Ibu Hartini, Ibu Santi, Bapak Tan  & Bapak Kiki from IBM Indonesia who welcomed us and explained about the program for the first and the last day. We got a tour through the IBM office. Never thought to need to go to Indonesia to see a real IBM data center.

IBM Indonesia office

Our team in front of the centennial wall in the IBM office

At the end of the tour through the office we had a chance to meet and talk with the IBM Country Manager of Indonesia Bapak Suryo. He explained a bit more about doing business in Indonesia, telling some stories and what is expected from us. The was great to meet him.

Than it was time to go out for dinner. The food was great and although it was not officially called like that it looked like an Dutch rice table. We had all kind of dishes. I had my second Sirsak juice of the day. Great drink!

It was a great day, hard to imagine that we have to start working on Monday. It still feels like a holiday. But that will change soon, I guess!

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Our first stop ...the Jungle.....and than Jakarta

Read about my second day here
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Bandoeng, Bandung....here we come!

I started the team blog today, so go to Bandoeng, Bandung, to read about our team and the start of our journey!
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Only 4 days to go....

Only 4 days to go, so counting down has really started ......

All preparations are finished, packing has been done, logistics has been prepared, my work has been finished or transferred to my successors, so ready to go.
Thanks to the great help of Nitu, our facilitator who joined CSC Indonesia 3 last year and Jean from ABV (Australian Business Volunteers) we are all well prepared to this great and probably life changing experience! Last Friday already I noticed a first healthy nervousness with myself. It is so exciting!

The next last three days at work will be used to dotting the i's and fill in some blank spots. Feels good to leave with an empty agenda!

Thursday evening I will meet David from Ireland at Schiphol and together we'll fly with KLM to Jakarta with a stop in Kuala Lumpur. Friday evening (local time) we meet most of our team mates and than our adventure can start. We'll stay in Jakarta for two nights to meet the country manager of IBM Indonesia. We stay at the luxury hotel Four Seasons. Our stay in Bandung will be more according to local standards, which I will tell more about when arrived.

We all are thrilled to finally meet each other and ready to start our assignment where you can also read about in our team blog. For the address see the "About me" section.

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Packing has started ......

With fresh snow on a Sunday morning it is hard to imagine I will be in a tropical environment in less than two weeks time!

Time to start packing! I had a big fitting session this morning to decide what I will pack so that I am prepared on an Islamic working environment: dress modestly is the advise, should not be tight fitting or revealing! In practice this means blouses with long or three-quarter-length sleeves, skirts reaching below the knees! Pants are allowed!
For me this means wearing linen pants and fortunately my Mom still has a skirt which I brought back from one of my Asian trips and applies to the "rules".

We also need to be prepared to the freezing offices, so knowing myself of being "cold blooded" I need matching vests as well. Scarves are need for the occasions that you might need to cover your head!
Quite different packing list from my normal holiday trips!

Hopefully my suitcase is big enough and all will fit within the 23 kg allowed with KLM. But that's something for next week!

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DISKOMINFO

DISKOMINFO or Dinas Komunikasi dan Informatisi Provinsi Jawa Barat (Office of Communications and Information Technology of West Java Province) is the organisation I am going to work for during the 4 weeks of our assignment. Together with Karen from USA and Manuel from Canada we are asked to provide recommendations on ways to improve e-government delivery in Jawa Cyber Province addressing Financial, Marketing and IT processes issues.

The first week of our assessment we will figure out what this exactly means and what we need to do to reach that objective.

All the tree of us are thrilled and cannot wait to start.....

DISKOMINFO is part of the Government of the Province of West Java located in the famous Gedung Sate.

Provinci Jawa Barat

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Visa finally obtained!

Getting a visa for Indonesia isn't as quick & easy as it might go for other countries.

First you have to fill in an online form which generates a request number. With the request number you can and have to make an online appointment to go to the Embassy. Someone has to go there in person, you cannot send your passport via mail with all the papers to the Embassy as it can in other countries.
Apparently a lot of people request for a visa, as the first possible date was a month ahead, already half way in January, but still on time before leaving.

On Friday January 18th I went to the Embassy with all my papers (I thought), including passport, photo, travel booking form and a sponsor letter from an institution in Indonesia as indicated on the website. Unfortunately my paperwork was not complete. I also needed a copy of the KTP (ID) of the person who signed the letter from the "Dinas Komunikasi dan Informatika Provinsi Jawa Barat".
My remark that it was not clearly mentioned on the website lead to the reaction that others did bring it.......an example of losing face in case the lady had to admit that it is indeed unclear? 

I tried to reach the Dinas Komunikasi while I was still at the Embassy, but bad luck, I couldn't reach the right person, people who answered the phone didn't speak English......so I returned back home empty-handed.
Happily ABV, the organisation in Australia who organises our trip, and the contact person of the Dinas Komunikasi responded quickly on my additional request. Two working days later I went back to the Embassy and everything was ok! In 10 minutes I was on my way back to the office.

Another 3 days later I could pick up my passport with visa! Finally! After three times driving to The Hague, how great to live in a small country!


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My Visa