Lil' Monsters, Inc.: Datin Life in Jakarta/Bandung

Not many weeks ago, this mommy and her girlfriends conned ourselves some free food & lodging in Jakarta. And we were so lucky - free transportation were thrown in as well.

Well, actually we invited ourselves to a long-lost friend's bachelor pad, arm-twisted for a couple of meals and we were actually so entertaining that he let us make use of his car & driver while he was buried underneath tons of paperwork at office.

Shopping with car-cum-driver is SO different. No need to go round & round looking for a parking space! Once done, just call for the driver to pick us up at the main entrance, similar to Jakartarian upper-middle class, minus their bling-bling! Then, Mr. Driver will just whisk us to another shopping mall. Like fairy godmother. Like we really dig this datin lifestyle!

I was really at awe with the size of their shopping malls. Plaza Indonesia / Grand Indonesia (2 adjacent buildings) makes Mid Valley/Gardens looks puny. It wasn't a sale season at that time, but we found Chloe having 70% discount! My heart nearly stopped beating for a while. Thank god we found that the interesting items were not that cheap even after discount. (Branded labels are marked up much higher in Indonesia, that's why Mr. Host told us that filthy rich Indonesians hop over to Singapore for 1-day shopping trips.)

But genuine designer goods at shopping malls were NOT the main aim of this trip. Our main target were the questionable designer goods at the factory outlets in Bandung, of course. Questionable as in the goods might not even be overruns or rejects. They are just FAKES. Anyway, who cares, as long as they are of good quality & cheap.

Unfortunately, we were at Bandung during the weekends. As the town is on higher terrain & is supposedly cooler (Gohtong Jaya equivalent we were told, but hot like hell when we were there), there was quite an influx of Jakartarians, so the streets were jammed up with all types of large black Lexus and Toyota MPVs. It was a crawl everywhere.

But with the help of our 'personal driver', we still managed to cover about 10 factory outlets in Bandung (or more, I don't remember). My personal favourites were the bigger ones with better display, such as Rumah Mode, Heritage, Cascade & Summit. We were already warned beforehand that these factory outlets in Bandung are totally different from those in US, which have individual outlets for each brand. At Bandung, the goods are everywhere, so we were ready to'work hard' to find IT!

But once we found 'IT', the feeling was really high. Higher when the items are between RM10-RM30 only. Like when i found a black DKNY zip-up sweater (RM30) at the kiddy dept (which the sales assistant said was meant for young teens. Yeah, I can wear!). And this Hard Rock tee for Di-Di for only ~RM10.

Before we left, our 'personal driver' took us to Jln. Cihampelas (a.k.a. Jeans St., the origins of factory outlets). It was ah..em..different! But we did found this cool, cozy place to eat.

All in all, have a look at my personal stimulus plan.