Another Friday Morning Trip

Last week Friday morning was another morning trip that I should take use public transportation whenever my friend had another tour of duty. Even it was not my first trip to office alone, but it always excited me because it has so many ‘challenges’ to use Jakarta public transportation.

Few years ago I did 4 times public transport exchange to reach my office. But nowadays I only have to do two exchange public transports to reach the same destination.

The first ‘challenge’ is I had to get out of my house earlier to catch the first angkot. That was the first phase. I need this angkot to reach the nearest Trans Jakarta bus stop, called as Taman Kota bus stop, even tough I had to ride it in almost half an hour to get there. And it depends on how the driver’s mood, it could be early or vice versa.

After that bumpy trip through many alleys with bad road, especially in kembangan area, I had to walk to the bus stop through pedestrian bridge above one of longest street in Jakarta. Only with IDR 2,000, its IDR 3,500 after 7 am, I had my ticket to catch the latest invention of mass transportation in Jakarta.

Even I had the ticket not mean that I got easy to catch the first bus arrived. Mostly I had to take long queue with unpredictable bus arriving time. But that day I found only four others waiting in that small bus stop. And I catch the second bus arrived which crowded as usual.

There are two routes of Trans Jakarta which passes that bus stop. One route is Kali Deres to Pulo Gadung and the other, which is the original route, is Kali Deres to Pasar Baru. Both routes surely have to make a stop at Trans Jakarta Central Station in Harmoni area.

My office location is in Lapangan Banteng area, so I have to take the Pasar Baru route. But since both routes have to make a stop at Trans Jakarta Central, I could take the other route and make a quick transit then catch the Pasar Baru route from there. The interesting thing is that different routes have different crowd……..and different smell! Pasar Baru route buses always filled with office workers and students. But Pulo Gadung route buses mostly filled with market worker because it stops by several big markets like Pasar Senen and ITC Cempaka Mas.

Jakarta public transportation passengers won’t wait longer for less crowded transport mode. It happened because the old kind Jakarta public transport mode never on time. So the passengers always flood the first bus or angkot. That habit carried to this newest Jakarta public transportation which also called ‘Busway’. So the first bus always flooded with passengers but the next ones probably less crowded or even almost emptied. And nowadays the provider smartly launched emptied one or two buses to take awaited passengers at several bus stop within crowded peak hour.

Even crowded or emptied, whenever I got it the bus, I only take less than half an hour to reach Pasar Baru because Trans Jakarta given exclusive ways within the busy street of Jakarta. That Friday I took only 20 minutes to reach Pasar Baru, included quick stop at Trans Jakarta Central.

From Pasar Baru bus stop, I should take 15 minutes top walk to my office area. On my half way walking, there was a man who got off from taxi and walked behind me. He almost had the same path as I took. It keeps me wondering, in what reason he did that? Did he want to do some small sports or did he has limited cash to pay the taxi, exactly as shown in the meter?

That day I took exactly 11 minutes. Then I got my hand scanned in nearest attendance machine to make me officially ‘in’ the office. But my trip isn’t over yet. I must continue my walk for next 10 minutes to be seated in my official cubicle. That was the last phase of my trip.

I took more or less 60 minutes trip to my office, that was included all my awaited and also walked by foot minutes. With that early departure from my home I’ll never late for office hours unless there is something beyond measure happened. Or I’ll be late whenever I want to be late.