REMINISCING

This is the late 70s—previous century—and the location: Jakarta. I hadn't turned 40 yet and had been contracted as regional-rural planner for a Dutch Technical Assistance Project. If I remember correctly the code was LTA-33. Duty station was a district on the north coast of West Java, but working visits to Jakarta—the Ministry of Public Works (the Executing Agency) and the Netherlands Embassy, had to be made frequently.

In those days there was Hotel Indonesia, and on the same side but a few hundred metres up Sudirman, Hotel Kartika Plaza. Hotel Indonesia's old building was declared a historic landmark site and was incorporated physically and business-wise into Hotel Kempinsky. Kartika Plaza was torn down and replaced by an office tower.

The Dutch contingent of experts stayed in the Kartika Plaza and it was there that I stayed on my visits to the capital. Rooms were big and comfortable, food nothing particular, but the main attraction was the Happy Hour—pay one, get two—from 5 to 7 pm. Every day there was a large group of deskundigen happily drinking, the tables never empty of full glasses of beer.

And then, at 7, when the bill was being presented the crowd thinned noticeably and steadfastly, among the remaining few, there would be one or two who, without batting an eyelid, asserted that they had only drunk the second glass of an order! Inevitably it would be me and team mate Paul paying the largest share of the bill…

Paul, my good friend, I hope that in the part of heaven you are now residing, those sods are not allowed to enter. Have one on me!