Palembang - The Road Untraveled

Sometimes, the cheap airline ticket one is able to get does open up the doors for adventures. And so, it happens that I was on the flight to Palembang. I was conjuring images of lost empires of the Sriwijaya days, Parameswara’s ancestry, ruins and charming architecture. Considering, it was also declared Visit Musi Year 2008, I looked forward to the adventure. And adventure indeed.

Arrival at the international airport, we were greeted by surprised immigrations officer. “Di Palembang lawat kawan?”
“No. Holiday.”
“Ada kawan di Palembang?”
“No.”
“Show return ticket.”
Ok, now, that’s a first. It’s a good thing we printed out the Air Asia itinerary. I mean, with the paperless ticketing systems these days….. one could get into a lot of trouble :P I can’t help but wonder though – where are the tourists?? Visit Musi Year? No tourists.
We left the airport without anymore fuss. We got onto the hotel airport transfer and was on the way to our adventure.
Looking at the town….. it doesn’t seem very….. “cultural” nor “historical”. As in, I don’t see any culturally distinguishing marks nor heritage buildings. But I have 5 more days. I can discover a lot.

The Horison Hotel turned out to be a luxury indeed. A 4-Star business hotel and I felt like a 5-Star guest! We extended our stay here for the full duration of our time in Palembang.

We freshened up and scoured the maps we printed off the Net and also the map provided by the hotel to look for the best destination to lunch. The maps – confusing. Nothing like taking it in our stride. So, we walked out. We had an aim – we wanted to get to this place called called Penginapan Jln Demang Lebar Daun. We stopped halfway at a Sate place and had my favourite Indonesian-style Sate Kambing. I love their satays. I wonder why it isn’t available in KL!
After the bite, we headed out towards Jln Demang Lebar Daun….. but decided to stop a beca instead. To our dismay, we were walking away from the direction of Jln Demang Lebar Daun. Thank God for wanting to take a beca ride then. It was at this point, we knew that the map was a useless device we had in our hands!

We got to Jln Demang Lebar Daun alright. But have no idea where was the Penginapan place we were looking for! We asked people and even the restaurant owners and they were stumped. Baffled. Nevermind then. And it started to pour. Cats and dogs. We ran out, caught an angkut kota, took us back to a spot we were a little more familiar with – Palembang Square which we passed on the beca earlier. That was near to the hotel – or so I was told by my other half.

PS as it is generally called, is a bit of a middle-class mall. Much like your Summit in Subang Jaya. And there’s even a Carefourre! So, the people were not that poor then. Yes, one thing that struck me was that, although I was expecting to see a culturally and heritage-rich place, I was also expecting to see poverty. I am not sure why. Maybe it is just the Indonesian thing. Or I only have Jakarta as a benchmark. But you don’t see much poverty on the streets. I wouldn’t say people walked around flaunting their richess. I guess, Palembang is full of middle-class. Yes, there is still street kids and beggars, but not as rampant as say… in Cambodia. Or Jakarta.

We walked back to the hotel when the rain subsided and lazed about there till dinner time. Which we then went to this night stalls (much like the Malay open-air mamak stalls we have in KL). We passed by them setting up on the way back from PS. That’s how we stumbled upon this eating place. Well, we went into one which had lots of people eating. We thought – surely we can’t go wrong. Food was not that bad. Speaking Malay gets you by some. Typical Indonesian food – Mie Goreng, Nasi Goreng, Cap Cay Ca, etc….. Yes, at times like these, I’m happy to know that I still have some spoken Malay in me to function in a country like Indonesia. In fact, I can’t believe I still remember some of my Bahasa Indonesia from when I worked in Jakarta years back!

After the first day of traveling and trying to grasp our bearings of the new place we were in, we hit the sack early.

Next morning, we woke up to pretty much a super scrumptious breakfast spread at the hotel. Again – I never expected the food to be so good at the hotel. But there it was – fantastic food. And such a wide variety for breakfast! Continental to local – lontong, nasi uduk, nasi langgi, tekwan, bubur ayam, etc.. etc! It was superb! I mean, for the price we paid, it was a steal.! And the hotel even provided free city shuttles on the weekends! I think Malaysian hospitality industry ought to learn something from their neighbours. Really. Malaysia is an embarrassment.

After breakfast, we took a taxi to the Plaza 16 Illir. It was supposed to be a floating market, but is now a multi-storey bazaar. Selling nothing but clothes, clothes and more clothes! Oh my God! No souvenirs, no little trinkets or curios. I saw some songket, which Palembang is supposedly famous for, but nothing very eye-catching. It was just…. I couldn’t wait to get out of there. Plus, the both of us really stood out like sore thumbs. Firstly, it was the way we looked – looking Asian, but not Indonesian Chinese. Asking us if we were from Korea or Japan, which wasn’t necessarily a good thing cause they then think you are rich. Then, it was the way we were dressed. I was in my absolute holiday wear – T-shirt and shorts and slippers. And no women wore shorts there! Oh dear. Too bad. That’s all I’ve got. Of course, when I started speaking broken Indonesian, they probably just assumed that I was some pissy local who lived abroad and forgot my roots :P

We walked about and around the Plaza 16 area, which turned out to be next to the Ampera Bridge. That famous, famous bridge in Palembang. Ever been to Palembang? Know anyone from Palembang? They will talk about their Ampera Bridge. It is like the San Francisco Bridge of Palembang. It looked quite grand, maybe with the red colours. I heard it is spectacularly lighted up at night. Unfortunately, I never made it to Ampera at nights. Beneath the bridge was the Musi river. That famous Musi river, but like all rivers in this part of the world (Malaysia included), it was filthy. Yet - we saw some kids swimming naked in that river. I was imagining the types of diseases they could contract. Ewe... one kid even posed naked, swinging his little birdie all about when he saw me with a camera!

We continued walking and walked through lots of shops selling the famous Pempek – fish keropok, Palembang style. I ate a piece, sold by an old lady on the streets. I really couldn’t acquire the taste for that fishy stuff! So, I was a little apprehensive even to buy any back as souvenirs!! But the shops, other than the Pempek shops, were mostly sundry shops, electronic shops, bike equipment shops….. really nothing touristy about them! Some bakeries were amongst them. Their cakes were those typical 1960s cream cakes which we found in KL then. Very pretty in a tacky way. We stumbled upon Matahari mall. I thought – hey – they have a Matahari mall here. Not so bad then. I thought it was going to be the same as that Matahari mall in Bali. How wrong I was! It was inside another shopping complex. But I think this one was for the lower-income group. It was shabby, dirty, and really does look a little sleazy. Matahari was nothing like what they have in Bali. Sigh.

We decided to have lunch somewhere. But didn’t know where. We didn’t know how far were we in relation to the hotel. The map just didn’t give an accurate enough picture. It was terrible! We decided our best option was to take a taxi. And so after much negotiation (they don’t have meters there and everyone is using the “harga petrol naik” excuse to charge us cut-throat fares), we boarded. We decided to go to Rumah Makan Sri Melayu for some Palembang food. We found the rumah makan the day before when we were at Jln Demang Lebar Daun.

Not disappointing at all, I tell you. I love, love, love Palembang food. The sambal was all just so good. The Pindang Udang that we had was really yummy too. It is really similar to Padang food. Makanannya siap disaji, embak!

After lunch, we walked all the way back to the hotel. Since we already knew that road. It was a good 3km walk, took us half an hour in the hot sun. We lazed at the hotel again, making use of the pool (and the freezing waters) to work off those calories!

For dinner, we wanted to go to this place called Murtabak HAR – another recommended place on the Net. You see, on the hotel map, it looked like it was quite near, but it doesn’t say where we were supposed to turn, etc… all in all, that map was just useless. We disturbed the reception again (at this point, considering it was only the 2nd day, we probably had asked them so many questions that they must’ve regretted that we were extending our stay)….. to tell us where we can find Murtabak HAR. The young boy at the reception, bless him, drew us a map. We walked there.

And it was not too bad. We had the egg murtabak. And the owner was the one and only Indian we saw in the entire Palembang. He’s probably mamak, we don’t know. Maybe a descendant of Parameswara! After Murtabak, we walked around the area for a bit, and went back.

This is turning out to be a pretty damn relaxing holiday with not much to do or see. Maybe this is what a holiday is supposed to be. Not filled with activities at a non-stop rate!

The next morning, yet another delicious breakfast at the hotel. What’s more, they even change their breakfast menu daily! It was so great! We don’t have to eat the same food everyday!

Today was the pilihanraya wargokota Palembang untuk memilih walikota Sumsel (Sumatera Selatan). Today, we had also planned to go to Kemaro Island – where there is actually a Buddhist temple and pagoda. We took the free city shuttle from the hotel to the jetty. Our driver was a very friendly and helpful guy. I forgot his name though. And we found out a little more about Palembang. There are so many, so many hotels in Palembang, but none are targeted at tourists. They are mainly for ahli niaga. Majority of Palembang citizens are Chinese. And they have always celebrated Chinese New Year with fireworks and go to the temple to pray, eventhough it wasn’t allowed in Jakarta. Most of them are ahli niaga. They are no demonstrations in Palembang for the fuel hike or for the elections simply because people of Palembang prefer to work and earn money. Tiada masa untuk demo! Huh, must be the Chinese mentality infected the entire place. Which was a good thing then.

We arrived at the jetty, only to be charged Rp300,000 to take a kretek across to Kemaro Island. No way, Jose! I ain’t paying that! We asked for cheaper boats, and the guy just pointed us to the Perahu Naga that was already waiting. Ikut rombongan, we were told. That’s fine too. They said it meant that we have to wait till the boat was full before it would move. That’s fine with us too. We went into the Perahu Naga and sat. Only to find out that it was a chartered boat! No other boats were going out to the island unless we take the private kretek. But the old man managing the perahu, probably took pity on us after we told him we were from Malaysia (haha, admitting we were from Malaysia had some use then!) and said he will check with the tour organizer to see if we can sit in the boat. Bless that woman, she said yes. She turned out to be an Indonesian Chinese, spoke to me in Mandarin and told me that she had a son studying at Sunway College in Malaysia. They were very friendly, she and her group, offering us snacks and drinks. The whole group were Indonesian Chinese from Jakarta, coming to Palembang for a wedding and decided to go see that temple in Kemaro Island. What luck! We got to go to the island on a free ride! But we decided to give that old boatman a token sum anyway.

Kemaro Island – was nothing to shout about. The temple and the surroundings were not properly maintained. However, we were told that the place is bustling come the Chinese festival season – Chinese New Year, Chap Goh Mei, etc. We can see that they are prepared to take in thousands of worshippers during the festive period. But on an uneventful day like today – it just looks lifeless, but for 3 or 4 caretakers. They have like thirty WCs lined up on one side of the island! But other than seeing a familiar deity and taking some photos of the 8-storey pagoda which was under renovation, there really was nothing much at the Island.

Well, we followed the group back to mainland. The main lady even offered to drive us back to the hotel. She spoke in Mandarin, asking if we were sure we would be ok? We must be careful, etc.. etc. She suddenly sounded like my Mother! After much thanks, we left the group at the jetty and took a walk as we wanted to go see the Benteng Kuto Besar – the old Dutch fort. Again, some Chinese lady from the tour called out to us – and told us to carry our backpacks in the front and not at the back, asked us if we are ok getting back to the hotel, told us to be careful and keep safe, etc….. all the fuss that they gave to us about safety, felt a little odd to us. We’ve had 3 days of no troubles – in fact, I would say the people of Palembang are genuinely friendly and helpful. Just probably the language barrier creates a bit of a problem for them truly helping. But the way the Chinese group was telling us over and over again to watch our backs made us feel like, perhaps there’s another not-so-good part of Palembang that we were fortunately not exposed to. I wondered though – if the not-so-good part was a racial thing or was it in general?
Anyway, we were not allowed into the Dutch fort. I just found out (now that I am writing this) that the Indonesian army still uses it! No wonder they looked quite panicky when we walked into the fort!

We walked around the same area we did yesterday, to find that all the shops except for a few eateries were closed. Ok, so they close on weekends. That’s very odd. Even the bakeries! We had lunch at this Bakso Lapangan Tembak Senayan place. I recognize the outlet from my days in Jakarta. It was good and oh, the Jus Pokat was superbly rich and thick and had chocolate sauce! Yummo. We wanted to look for this night market which was recommended on the Net. Let me tell you that no one in Palembang knows about this very mysterious night market on Jl Sayangan. How odd. One hotel guy said he didn’t know there was one. Our hotel driver said it opens at 9am. We took a beca to Jl Sayangan and there were no markets to be had. The beca guy was stumped and he was feeling so bad that he couldn’t help us. He told us to go to the Tour Info Office to get help! We decided to just give up on that damn night market.

After lunch, we called the hotel to pick us up and waited for the pick up at the jetty. The telephone call was quite a pain. They didn’t understand much English, and they couldn’t decipher my broken Bahasa Indonesia either. But the guy came after 45 minutes, but as soon as we arrived at the hotel, 3 hotel staff came up to us to apologize! Again – this is service our Malaysian hotel needs to learn. And they are only 4 Star, mind you!

That night, we walked to PS Mall again….. and decided to find something to eat there. Our first stop was an Indonesian fast food joint. Had their Indonesian style fast-food of Mie Ayam Pangsit and Teh Botol. Then we walked into Carefourre and I was enraged to find that they produced Tim Tams and Gatorade in Indonesia so the products were significantly cheaper to get in Indonesia. We bought some junk food and just laughed at the thought that we were on a holiday and grocery-shopping at Carefourre! The queue was endless – again, confirmed the fact that there is a huge number of middle-class residents in Palembang. After groceries, we went to eat again at this place called Topaz, another middle-class joint where we had Mie Goreng Kangkung Belacan and my Jus Pokat again! Oh their Es Jeruk is great too! Then, we walked back to the hotel.

There was a wedding at the hotel and we went to have a peep. It was so typically Chinese-style, that wedding. With the corny display of pre-wedding photos at the reception desk. However, it was very cute to see these flower wreaths to congratulate the couple lined up along the outside of the hotel, leading up to the hotel’s entrance. Of course, I supposed, the more you want to apple polish, the bigger your wreath!

Next morning at breakfast, we saw the wedding group. And guess what? Some of them were conversing in Hokkien! My other half, being Hokkien perked up. I told him, it was his chance to speak to them in Hokkien and find out where that stupid night market was!

It was just a little odd for me, to hear a Chinese speaking Bahasa to another Chinese. The only time we do this back in Malaysia is when we want to speak secrets (because when you are overseas, it is almost guaranteed that people don’t understand BM) or if we’re just having fun or saying a few phrases here and there. Not a full-blown conversation with another Chinese in BM. But here, they do. Of course, it is after all their national language. They were so well assimilated. Only the older generation speaks the mother tongue now. Not so much the younger generation, I guess.

After breakfast, I went to get a cake. It was after all the reason why we were in Palembang – to celebrate my other half’s birthday (again, don’t ask me why Palembang. I don’t know. I didn't make the booking! Cheap flight?). I bought a Black Forest slice and asked if they could get me one candle. The hotel staff asked me for the age and I said, it’s ok, just give me one candle. She then said all their candles are in numbers. I had to laugh. Now, the whole hotel will know his age. So, I said 32. The hotel asked me if it was a kejutan and I said yes. So they then offered to take it to the room for me. They got it delivered within 5 minutes. Again – Malaysia is an embarrassment in terms of hospitality service. And I’m talking about hotel staff who can’t even speak to me properly in English yet delivering excellent service!

We lazed around by the pool and then we took a long walk to another mall. This one was called the Ramayana Mall – which had nothing but some stalls selling songket. Across that is Palembang’s latest mall – which shops include J Co Donuts, Breadtalk, Adidas, Sports Station, etc….. so, yes…. Welcome to Palembang’s high-class mall a-la One Utama. We bought 2 donuts from J Co (yes, never ate one in KL, have one all the way in Palembang) and walked around for a bit, looking for lunch. Nothing much inside the mall as we didn’t particularly want to grab anything we can get from Malaysia. In the end, we ventured out, found some shops and we had that Bakso Lapangang Tembak Senayan again. So they had another outlet at the Palembang Trade Centre. We had different items on the menu. One thing I noticed though – the chicken in Palembang is really, really small. I wonder why. Even at the fast food outlet, when you order fried chicken, it looks like they had given you a quail’s drumstick instead! Odd.

After that, we walked back to the hotel… yes, we were getting quite familiar with the roads within a 3km radius from the hotel already by this point. It was threatening to rain again. Weather in Palembang was pretty cooling, although they had hot hours where the sun was out with a vengeance! But it generally was always mendung.

That night, we decided to have one more go at authentic Palembang dishes. We got another recommendation off the Net – Rumah Makan Mahkota Permai at Jl Mesjid Lama. This was a Lonely Planet website. Can’t go wrong! We took the hotel shuttle again and our favourite driver drove us. Guess what? He managed to get us to Jl Mesjid Lama, but there was no Rumah Makan Mahkota Permai! He asked a beca guy and was told that it has shifted and is now known as Mahkota Indah. Whatever it was, the kind man took the trouble to ask how to get us there and get us there he did – to Rumah Makan Mahkota Indah! It was just really great of him! The food here – was much nicer and cheaper than at the RMSM. Although, both were nice. The owner was a really old bapak, around 80 plus, I guess. Who spoke to us. He said he heard us speaking Malay and knew we were not Indonesians. Asked if we were from Malaysia (yes) and he just came back from Malaysia after an eye operation in Singapore and he went up that “bangunan yang tinggi tu” and we told him that must be the Petronas Twin Tower in which I think he nodded his head. He told his staff to bring as many dishes as possible in which I politely told them to take back as we can’t possibly finish everything! But that’s how you eat Palembang dishes – semuanya siap disaji! What you don’t eat, you don’t pay, that’s all. But I love the food. The rosip tumis was the best of all. Of course, it was spicy. I love it! The sambal tempoyak was good too, although I thought in particular, the sambal tempoyak at RMSM was much better.

After dinner, the hotel shuttle took us back to the hotel. It was a different driver this time, how disappointing. But just as friendly this guy.

We got ready for our spa appointment! We had both reserved the K-I-S-S treatment – the “Keep It Simple & Sensual” treatment. Hahaha. How corny is that! It was a relaxation massage, followed by a body scrub and ending with a milk bath. The massage – wasn’t relaxing at all. It was quite painful, but she was just doing a good job. They were so shy, these girls. Well, the two girls assigned to us. The chocolate body scrub – I knew my skin was going to be brand new after the scrub cos she literally scrubbed me raw! Including my nipples!!! The milk bath was simply rich and that was relaxing for me. For sure. After that, I slept like a baby right through the night. And my skin - still smooth and silky soft till today!

Next day, I savoured the last of my super-yummy breakfast at the hotel before we had to check out and call it the end of our holiday. The hotel staff must be like “thank God these 2 idiots are leaving! It was the hardest 5 days of our lives!!” hahahahhaa…..

Will I return to Palembang? No, not on my own and not unless there was something important for me to get to there. It was disappointing in a way because I had expected some majestic culture and heritage form to snap photos. But still, in a way, it was a great trip. I can now say I’ve been to Palembang and traveled the road less traveled. I just didn’t know it was untraveled!