Jakarta in Top Ten Worst Cities To Live & Work In

Jakarta in Top Ten Worst Cities

Apr 24th, 2009, in IM Posts, Opinion, by Ross

View the original article here.

108 Comments on “Jakarta in Top Ten Worst Cities”

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deta Says:
December 23rd, 2009 at 4:11 pm
Andy, just because Dixianga said that he stays in Perth, doesn’t mean that he tried to suggest that he is Australian. To me the name clearly sounds Chinese. Fix that for you.
Winmar Says:
March 27th, 2010 at 1:13 pm
Some people love Jakarta, but what makes it better than, say, Bandung? It’s not exactly an attractive place. I’ve been there a number of times, but have never lived there. I’d like to get back to Indonesia to live though, and Jakarta is the most likely place I’d find a job, so would like to know why so many people seem to enjoy it.

Also, don’t write off all African cities. Cape Town has beauty that Jakarta could only dream of (but lots of crime in certain areas), Harare and Bulawayo would be great if not for Mugabe, Lusaka’s booming, while Mombasa is quite reasonable.
bettelgeux Says:
May 27th, 2010 at 9:53 pm
ODINIUS!!! spare Manila please!
Raja Hafeez Says:
June 13th, 2010 at 5:08 pm
This is stupid polling or what ever,.. one can expect Indonesia and African cities to be seen in worst cities… but how can peoples put new Delhi or cities like mumbai in worst places to live in…
Delhi and mumbai are one of the most expensive cities to live in except those cheap areas somewhere in between with Muslim colonies and slum and lower castes peoples …
rest you people cant even think of buying a flat or a rented flat in delhi and mumbai.
with best metro rail and world best infrasturctures with all the basic as well as advanced facilities.. the world best police with most advanced technologies all together in every field …worlds best mnc’s making there hub in NCR(delhi regions) it is one of the favorite destination of foreigners…
i guess its all Muslims all around the world who voted in this pole..
rubbish peoples with rubbish thoughts..
i wonder… what going to happen to these peoples.. they will die fighting each other as they are doing now.. orthodox bulls who even don’t know why their religion was created..
muhammad must be asshamed of you… coz he was a nice and true saint.. but his follower muslims are rubbish crabs..
lgilmartin Says:
June 28th, 2010 at 1:00 pm
I’m not sure Jakarta deserves to be number two on this list but I think it’s fair to say Jakarta is a generally unpleasant city. Pollution, noise, no footpaths, open sewerage – if you claim to love that, well, you’re lying. As an expat I love the people here, I don’t think I’ve been rude to once because of the standard of social harmony, but I have found it almost impossible to enjoy the city. Walking around kampungs can be nice if poverty doesn’t make you lose your will to live (obviously Indonesia is a much more unfortunate place to be for the poor) and there is such a huge gap between the rich and poor it’s impossible not to be seen as a snobby expat. Jakarta is part of a developing country, so you can’t expect it to look and feel like a developed city, but why does there always have to be a group of high and mightys ready to call people soft for thinking a city is rough compared to what they’re used to?
Isaac Sorsa Says:
September 14th, 2010 at 6:07 am
Bogota is a great city, I live there as an expat and feel much safer- even in the poor barrios- than I do in the poor parts of Chicago. This list means nothing.
John Williams Says:
September 27th, 2010 at 11:24 pm
You are all self deluded – it’s absolutely a pit of a city and everybody knows it LMFAO why try to lie to yourselves?
Hikmatullah aziz Says:
November 8th, 2010 at 1:54 pm
Hi
dears I am Hikmatllah aziz from afghanistan living in kabul city of afghanistan and i want to go to jakarta and live and work there, but i don’t know how to go there if anybody can please help me it will be your kindness this is my email address if any body wants to help me please contact me (hekmat.arab@yahoo.com).

regards

Hikmatullah aziz
Max Says:
December 21st, 2010 at 2:36 pm
just love jakarta…just the traffic and some pollution….it must be the safest place i have been
brian Says:
January 5th, 2011 at 4:46 pm
just one question………HAVE U BEEN TO JAKARTA????????

Patrick hit the nail on the head, it is like NYC was a long time ago.fun, exciting and with character..ohh just came back…live in Canada….can’t wait to go back

2nd worse in the world?????? not even 2nd worse in Asia..not even in top 10 if in us of a…..
but still the article is amusing
FlemmingR Says:
January 7th, 2011 at 3:58 pm
I will go to Jakarta soon and it’s really interesting to read what other people here tell about the city..
The no.1 worst city is Nairobi, Kenya.. stay there for one week and you are lucky if your not killed…
The most boring country in the world must be Gambia.. one big dump
I have been to Manila too and I never have any problems there…
scather Says:
January 27th, 2011 at 4:08 pm
As an expat working Jakarta I can assure you it is a pestilential shithole (no offence to the inhabitants). Its is dirty, noisy, grotesquely overcrowded, so polluted that every breath is shortening your life and the temperature is pretty much 33 C all the time, with a permanent stink of dung and diesel. There is not a day you dont smell something gag-inducing. You cant walk or cycle as the narrow streets are crammed with psychopathic “drivers”, dozing squatters, carts, wagons, shoppers rats, cats garbage and dung. THe city is dysfunctional and will probably be abandoned in the next decade. Frequent power failures, floods (actually the same flood, in the same places, at the same time, year after year after year) and permanent gridlock traffic jams suck the life out of the place. Also its a port city, mostly below sea level and sinking. The people in charge are too busy getting graft to take any effective action. The harbour is a chilling picture of oil black “water” polluted with chemicals and millions of tons of garbage, truly disgusting. No one seems to care. The people here seem to think its paradise but only perhaps compared to Bangladesh or some of the sad cities in Africa. If youre rich you can buy some respite from the oppressive noise and clamour, but for the rest, well it helps not to think about it. It s one of the cheapest capital cities of the world to live in. The Indos don’t take food hygiene too seriously so u have to be very careful what you eat although its not as bad as Bandung which serves up giardias, worms, dysentery and the full gamut of diahrea on a regular basis.
Scather Says:
January 27th, 2011 at 5:00 pm
Brief addition. It must be said, for such a large city (15 Million? 19 million? know one seems to know for sure) it is remarkably free of violence. Muggings are almost unheard of although items will go missing, but only if you’re careless. As for terrorism, you’ll die of old age or pollution related disease long before’ the terrorists get ya. Most violence here occurs at demonstrations involving Islamic extremists and the police.

Recently the government, in a baffling move, restricted the duty free liquor stores allowing them to sell only to diplomats. Since there aren’t that many diplomats, and many have access to embassy canteens with better prices and selection, it means wine and liquor are unavailable to the average expat. Since Muslim Indos don’t drink (anything stronger than beer) it seems a pointedly vindictive move although I’m told its about taxes/graft. Of course there are many expat alcoholics and they make do with the local beer, it’s not very good, but its very available. (You cant make good beer without good water and Indonesia doesn’t have any) Feeble attempts at censorship and hypocritical attitudes to sex and porn are more unintentionally funny than serious.
And yes you can whore or get married easily, according to your taste, whoring being much less expensive in the long run.
Ed Says:
February 9th, 2011 at 9:46 am
I’ve been living in Jakarta for the past 2.5 years and… well… I think the published results here are greatly flawed, but I wouldn’t exactly call Jakarta heaven on earth either.

things that make Jakarta good for expats:

1. cheap labor: seriously, most expats who come here end up spoiled and have a real hard time adjusting when they get back because they have to do everything by themselves!!!
2. cheap food: if you’re willing to put your stomach through the initiation phases and let it get used to the local bacteria, that is. but even then, the nicer places are still cheaper than most developed countries.
3. lots of flavor but none of the poverty: being an expat generally means you’re shielded from most of the worst things that poverty can do to you. Sure, you see the kids begging for money in traffic, and you will see people living in a hut with no running water, but rest assured that will never be you.
4. relative better treatment from locals: the people here are actually really nice to expats. They are generally very congenial and seem to have an almost infinite amount of patience for some of the bullshit behavior I’ve seen some expats exhibit.

things that make jakarta a shit place for expats

keep in mind, these are all things that we can deal with as expats. they just aren’t very pleasant.

1. the bureaucratic culture is insane: in order to get ANYTHING done here, you either need to be really patient to put up with all of the inefficiencies, or you go to a “facilitator” to skirt the process for you. Do you realize how perverse that is? To have the normal process be SO onerous that most people who can would just pay someone else to do it? And yet this is the norm for 90% of the things you do here.

2. rampant corruption: let’s not kid ourselves, graft and corruption has been institutionalized here in Jakarta. This is a trait that is common to many developing countries though, and not unique to Jakarta. Having said that, it doesn’t make it any less frustrating to deal with. Social justice is something reserved only for those who can afford it, and efficiency is only achieved when you find ways to dodge around the system. a lot of this actually stems from the bureaucracy that is in place, as it presents opportunities for those in positions of power to exploit the weakness of the system.

3. Work is not as easy to find as you think: With a combination of 1 and 2 plus the current wave of “indonesianization” movements in many companies, it’s becoming harder and harder for expats to find work here in developed companies. A lot of expats I know just had their positions taken away from them and given to locals who have only 1/4 of their training, skill, and experience. The reason why? well, oldest story in the book: cost. This I can understand to a certain extent. Companies need to cut their bottom line to stay lean. I understand that. But with that mentality, it does become harder for expats to get work as for an expat to get work here, it just becomes that much more of a hassle for the companies. And often times, the presence of a bule on your work force presents a huge political time bomb that you have to deal with later on. This is an instances where the huge income disparity really does not work towards your favor as an expat.

4. traffic: I don’t think I need to elaborate on this

5. pollution: see above statement… well, okay, one thing. the rivers here smell like a potent combination of excrement, garbage, and chemicals. I can’t take a walk outside without coming home smelling like something died on my back.

6. not walkable: Jakarta is not a walker friendly city. In pockets of places, you can do it, but the moment you leave the nice expat areas, walking pretty much becomes an adventure of it’s own.

7. no reliable public transport: combine this with the lack of walkable places and the traffic and you have….

8. it’s not easy to get ANYWHERE. seriously, any place you want to go to is an hour. doesn’t matter if it’s down the street or a mile away, it’s an hour at least. while this is really not THAT big of a deal normally, it does mean that you just can’t do that much with your day if you need to run around. And a lot of commitments that you do make need to be very flexible.

9. blatant moral hypocrisy: this is the one that really gets to me. For all the proclamation about their willingness to fight crime, prostitution, poverty, etc, etc, most legislative acts put into action are things that in their very own nature, utterly useless to perform it’s intended duty, and generally act as another tool people in power can exploit to their own gain. This is why while a lot of politicians here will make proclamation that they will spend every ounce of energy stopping the moral collapse of their society, they are not above picking up a bargirl or two themselves. It is also the reason why such institutions can exist in the first place: the market supports it, even if on the surface it claims to be against it. Again, common in developing countries, and sometimes people have to do what they can with what they have. Indonesia can almost get a free pass for this since it is still a new democracy. (about 10 years of real actual democracy to speak of)

As for detroit, f*ck that city. no jobs, high crime rate, and backwater provincial mentality means that whole state can rot for all I care. The only good thing to come out of that place have all left it the moment said thing grew legs.
roy Says:
July 12th, 2011 at 4:52 pm
well according to me jakarta is a very nice city with a variety of good food who knows the taste, i have been living in jakarta from 1995 , till then things have changed but i still love this city,being an expat from india it has amazing feel to be like indonesian
fredo Says:
February 1st, 2012 at 10:02 pm
Great post
I don’t live in Jakarta, actually I live in Italy
but I’ve just got a job offer from a recording studio in Jakarta
(as a music composer for commercial TV)
and I’ve been thinking about moving away for a while
I lived in London and Tokyo, but Jakarta…wow!
it sounds different
I do not want to bother you ..because probably this is not the right place
to ask these kind of things
and if I do, please feel free to ignore me
I just wanted to know a very practical thing
like…They did an offer of 20 milions rupiah per month
plus house (I don’t know which kind of house)
which Is About 1600 euro (per month) ..sounds good…. In Italy..
I just wanted to know about living over there with
that amount of money…
I’m an easy guy, but I don’t know anything about life in Jakarta
and I don’t want to find myself in troubles

That’s it

Thanks

Enrico
berlian biru Says:
February 2nd, 2012 at 3:46 pm
Twenty million a month for a presumably single guy with no rent will go a long way in Jakarta. I’d take the job if I were you, better economic prospects here than in Europe at the moment.

Just be prepared for the initial culture shock, London or Tokyo it certainly ain’t, but if you’re a young guy and working in the creative sector you will thoroughly enjoy your time here and will have a ball.

You’ll not regret it.
stevo Says:
February 2nd, 2012 at 5:09 pm
Enrico, you lucky man

Go pack your bags….