October 22 – SHITTY DEPARTURE FROM MANILA
We had a relaxed vibe coming off from a good show prior to our flight heading for Jakarta. We all met at the airport, unlike last year’s tour, where we chose to meet at Sy’s place, which took a lot of time getting to the airport. We all made it to the NAIA at 6pm but since I got in earlier, my family thought it would be great to check out the casino nearby so we spent 30 minutes in the casino before we get to the departure area of NAIA Terminal 3. The rest of the boys came in 15 minutes later. We’re all 2 hours ahead of the schedule, not bad.
We proceeded to the Terminal Fee booth to pay our dues so we could all check in our baggages, all went smoothly up until it came to our drummer Tristan, who was advised to see the Immigration Officer because his passport is already due in 4 months whereas the minimum validity of local passport should be 6 months. Pressure suddenly came upon us, so we assisted Tristan to the Immigration Officer to validate the said incident. The Officer then broke it unto us that there is no way that Tristan could make it past the Immigration because he won’t be permitted, that it would be a risk if he would board the plane and make it to Indonesia, coz he might get caught by the Indonesian Immigration and he will be deported along with a fine of P50,000, or worse, he might get jailed just because of that. So we weighed in our options, if Tristan won’t be able to make it, there is no way he could refund his ticket, let alone re-booking the flight. It’s either we leave him and carry on without a drummer, or we all forfeit, now that would be a goddamn waste. Tristan was so disappointed at this time because we have been preparing for this for months only to go down to this, a tour with 2 legs without a drummer, how the hell could we pull it off? So I told the boys that if we don’t want to waste all our efforts, we should carry on with the show. I told them that my 13-year old son Aejei, knows most of the Bad Omen repertoire by heart and I have seen him play along to the songs when he is rehearsing at home, so we might as well give it a shot to save face from all this frustrations. So we board the plane without a drummer and flew with lots of anxiety, wondering if we could pull off an act such as what was planned. Thought it’s pretty suicidal.
We arrived at the Jakarta Airport past midnight wherein we were welcomed by our host, the Bintaro Skinheads headed by Tiga Enji, one of the older boys in the crew. We changed our pocket money into local currency rupiah and got 880,000, sounds like a lot but not really. We hop on a cab and head on to Bintaro, a suburban town situated at the outskirts of Jakarta, it took us a tad more than an hour to reach the place. Jon Fishbone had to stay in another place apart from us because he’s been asked to stay with his wife, who happens to be working in Jakarta. Bintaro was a quiet neighborhood much like the ones we see in our suburbs. Didy of The Sta Prest Boys offered us to stay on his house for the duration of the tour. He gave us a clean room and we were treated to a Nasi Goreng meal, but some were too tired to eat so Sy and I stayed up for some chow and chat with the boys who hanged around the place. The Bintaro skins were so pleased to have us around that we get to stay up until 4am even though we know
That we have to get up early for us to: 1.) enjoy the day and get around the city and 2.) To rehearse for the show, remember that we don’t have our original drummer with us and Aejei, my 13-year old kid is gonna fill in for us. We spent most of the night talking and comparing local words and how some sounded a lot like our own language. We also talked about crazy practices and cultures until I got really tired and hit the sack.
Day 1 – October 23 (Bintaro to Jakarta)
I got up at 7am and found all the skinheads were already up, they offered me some bread and sweet tea, then they took me for a walk around the block to get to Sonny’s place, I was so amazed at how the whole neighborhood resembles a typical Filipino suburban community, like people chatting on the streets, vendors peddling their Bubur Ayam (Congee) and chickens walking around freely. Jon arrived bit late because of the traffic, in which the locals think is common to have 2 hours jam. We had our lunch and by the time we finished our meal, we were only left with enough time to rehearse so we dumped the idea that we’re gonna see the city. So we proceeded to Corridors Studio just a few blocks away from where we stayed. It’s a decent studio with a Pearl drums and Marshall Stacks. We ran down the possible repertoire and asked Aejei which Bad Omen songs can he play and how many cover songs can he pull off, we were so surprised that we ended up with a list consisting of 15-songs worth of original and cover materials. So we hit the studio. We started on songs that Aejei remembers the most, and after an hour, he perfected the whole 15 songs. The Bintaro skins were so amazed at how Aejei, whom they regard as a kid, would be able to tear up the drums just like that. After 2 hours of rehearsing, we felt relieved by the fact that maybe, just maybe, we could pull our act together in Tristan’s absence.
We used a rented van to get out of Bintaro and on to the venue, we stopped over to the Plaza Indonesia Mall so we could buy our plug adaptors, coz Indonesia has a different outlet for their electricals. We then headed on the venue and arrived an hour earlier than the start of the show, so we went out and look for rice meals near the place, we found a street shop serving Nasi Goreng (Friend Rice) and it was friggin spicy. When we get back to the venue, people were starting to get in, most of them came riding vespa scooters. Most of the bands that played that night were Oi, Streetpunk and Ska bands. Bad Omen were slated to play 5th right after the Sta Prest boys who played a really good set. I felt a bit anxious if Aejei could pull it off and hoped that he won’t get nervous coz that would be the end of it. So we started off with “Unite and Fight” and the crowd went on to a mosh and pogo frenzy. I was so surprised with the response that we got from the crowd, that seemed to boost up the bands’ morale so we started to tear it up with every song. The kids were crowd surfing and singing along. 3 songs before the end of the set, the sound system started to get fucked up because of the kids goin up and stage diving hence hitting our equipments in the process. By the time that we were playing the cover song called “Were Coming Back”,both the guitar amps have broken down, but the skins kept on singin along. So we supported them by putting them up on the mic, They chanted along then suddenly, somebody grabbed my leg and raised me on top of the crowd, so it happened, I crowd surfed in Jakarta. After that great moment, I asked Sonny, the vocalist of Sta Prest Boys, to jam with us by singing a Jakarta version of Cocksparrer’s “England Belongs To Me” , and he did graced our set by doing the vocal duties and even havin the entire crowd chant in unison to Jakarta Belongs to Me. It was truly a great set, after we’re thru, we get to meet and greet the crowd outside the venue, they are a very warm people. They were so eager to meet us and take pictures with us. I was s\also flattered by the fact that Firecracker, a leftist skinhead group from Central Java Purwokerto, have traveled for almost 12 hours just to play with us. Some were even waving their football team’s banner coz from what I learned, these guys were pretty much hardcore supporters of their local football team, they even got a rift with the other town’s team much like how England’s hooligans were getting into fights with each others team supporters. To sum it up, Leg 1 is pretty much a success.
After the show, we took a cab again coz we won’t find any public transportation during that time of the night. A cab running for an hour took us P1,000 and we would be taking 2 cabs, so you’d have an idea how much we are paying for our transportation. We arrived at Bintaro to have an hour of rest at Didy’s place and then prepare our things for the next trip towards Bandung.
Day 2 – October 24 (Jakarta to Bandung)
We all got up for like 7am and we all took turns at shower and using this squatting toilet which don’t come in pretty handy. Jon came in with Tiga I think an hour later. We were picked up by a funy looking colorful schoolbus which is actually a jeep like transportation designed to look like a train, it will take us to the bus terminal which will take us to Bandung. People were laughing wherever we passed coz were on a colorful train packed with punks and skinheads. We got to the bus terminal and we left just right after we bought some snacks and water from the local convenience store AlfaMart. Tiga rented the whole bus for us and the whole Bintaro skinheads. The ride to Bandung took like 4 hours straight without any stop overs, the city is much like our version of Baguio City coz they also call it the Flower City, the ride up there is pretty smooth since the terrain is straight even though its basically a mountain. The climate in Bandung is much cooler that that of Jakarta and Tiga was telling me that people up in Bandung were fashion conscious, probably because of the weather. In front of the venue, University of Pasundan (UNPAS) were rooms converted into art galleries for the local students. Tiga then introduced us to Aan, the bandung show organizer and the vocalist of the Oi band Haircuts, he welcomed all of us and handed over a bag full of Bad Omen stickers, I was so surprised with that present, a guy whom we haven’t even met before, have just printed lots of stickers for us and even printed some T-shirts promoting the said show. The venue is a school auditorium which is capable of holding 800 people, I was so delighted by the sight of Marshall stacks and goo PA system and a hefty set of drums coz im sure the show’s gonna be loud. Approximately 500 people came over to the venue and we met some really great people all waiting to see us play. I also saw a lot of street punks and some hardcore kids lined up outside the venue. We then looked for a place to have our lunch and we found this local restaurant serving rice meals and coffee. It started raining hard around 3pm so we thought we had to head back to the venue. Show had already started around this time with a good ska band doing some 2-tone covers, lots of skinheads and punks were skanking with every beat. Then the all-girl hardcore punk group The Ponis played with their own brand of punk, coz they add some weird sounding keyboards on their tunes. Haircuts, the skinhead band played a real fast hardcore Oi set, Aan was throwing stickers at the kids and they all went crazy, they had a very loyal following as they had complete command on their audiences. Then Rescue, the rockabilly band from Jogjakarta played, these guys were pretty awesome coz they could really tear it up even though theyre all aged below 17 years old, their drummer is only 12 years old and he’s been standing on his kit while bashing the skins. They played some classic rockabilly cover tunes and some original songs. Aan then informed me that we’re gonna get up next so we prepared our things and tuned our gears, felt a bit anxious on how we would be received by the kids here in Bandung coz we really have no idea what to expect on the crowd although they have been pretty enthusiastic from the very start. We hit the stage with “Unite and Fight” then we launched into some covers and alternate em with original tuneages. The crowd got really wild and they were singin along to some songs, we even covered the Private Stock tune “Future Generation: where I taught them how to sing along to the “gen-a-ration” part of the chorus and they were pretty cooperative. By now, everyone in the band got the boost from that and started performing better, I saw Sy and Jon jumping around onstage and then I looked at the back and there was AJ rippin it up like a monster on the kit, I haven’t seen him like that before. When it came to our “we’re comin back” song, I dropped my guitar on the lead guitar part and got the crowd to chant to it , that was really awesome and sweet. After our set some more ska and hardcore punk bands played, AJ was so eager to mosh with the crowd, I told him he might get hurt so instead I took him up front and told the boys to let my son crowd surf, they carried him all the way to the top and crowd surfed his way back to the stage. Sy also gets to crowdsurf around that time. It was a real fun time. The show was halted to a quick stop to give way to the muslim’s prayer time because there was a musholla (chapel) nearby.
We got outside the hall for some fresh air from that grueling set, then we get to meet more people who were all smiles telling us they had a great time during our set. Tiga later informed us that we must be heading back home because most of them will have to make it to work the next day so they needed to rest. So we bid farewell to the organizers Aan and his crew for the warm accommodation. We took the bus and hit the road. Jon Fishbone was cracking jokes and gave thanks to the Bintaro crew for helping us out on the tour, they then asked me to sing “we’re coming back” and they all sang along with me. It was a great way to end the tour. We all slept all the way back to Bintaro where the rented car was waiting to pick us up and take us to the condominium unit that Jon’s wife had arranged for us for the night.
Day 3 – October 25 – Rainy Jakarta and Traffic Hell
This time, almost everyone in the band opted to wake up really late coz the past couple of days got the best of us and so we wanted to relax a bit. We got up at around 9am and talked about the plan on how to get around the city, so Jon arranged for the car rental that we’re gonna use for the rest of the day up until we get to the airport. Tiga Enji arrived at 1pm and so we head on to travel to his friend’s place in Maruya, where we will find some Distro. It was so traffic around Jakarta and the trip was too long that we got caught up in the heavy rains, we found a restaurant somewhere at around 4pm. After our lunch, we head on to the Distro where we met some punks who were residing in a rented place where they do all their shirt printing and distro, it was like a commune of some sort. Jon and Sy traded some bad omen merch for some shirts, tapes and CD. It started raining really heavy around this time that some of the places near the area were submerged in knee deep floods. We left the place at around 6pm coz Enji told us that we might get caught up in heavy traffic back to Jakarta. And he was right.
The way back to the city was long and irritating, because we got caught in traffic jams which seemed to be everywhere. We had to take all the alternate routes just to get back to our place and catch our plane home but to no avail. Cars and motorcycles were queued up endlessly and our driver doesn’t seem to mind at all coz he wasn’t taking advantage of some spaces where we could have gotten past thru some jams. Pressure started to get in as we are just 3 hours from our flight and we’re still caught up. We reached our place and packed our bags with only 1 hour left before our flight, we did everything real quick we didn’t even bothered to take showers at all. We bid farewell to Tiga for the whole 3 days that he’s been with us.
We made it to Jakarta Airport at around 12midnight and our flight was at 12:55am, so people were already lined up when we checked in our baggage. We left Indonesia with smiles on our faces amidst the tiring experience of being caught up in the heaviest traffic jam on earth. We promise ourselves to make it back there.
We’d like to thank Tiga Enji for organizing the whole tour for us, Didy Sta Prest for letting us sleep on their floor, Sonny for singing with us, the Bintaro Skinheads for always helping us whenever we needed it. We’d like to thank the Jakarta organizers for putting up a show, the Firecracker crew, The Desire and everyone in the Jakarta punk scene.
We’d also like to thank Aan and the Bandung organizers for putting up such an awesome show, and for printing those Bad Omen stickers, that’s the sweetest gift that we got on that tour.
We will always hold Indonesia close to our hearts. Terima Kasih Indonesia!!!
albert
BAD OMEN
