Living in a Kos in Jakarta




 

I always see my life divided into various chapters and this is a chapter about living in a rented room of a boarding house in Jakarta or what we call "Kos". 

After living a dream life on my wife's family farm in Davao, Philippines for about three months, I had to return to Jakarta, sadly just about a week after my father-in-law was buried. 

I had to return to Jakarta because the company that I'm working for just won a new project for another four to eight-year timeframe, and we had to re-establish many systems in the project to be delivered within seven months.  

I was lucky that Indonesian technology companies are so far advanced that basically, you can get whatever you need over the internet or online. Our investing companies, financial technologies, banking systems, and online stores are so far ahead compared to the Philippines or even Australia, but maybe my recollection of Australia is no longer updated. Things may have changed. 

With the help of a couple of friends from the office, I was able to find a place on an app called Mamikos.  The place that I chose is called Wall Living and it's just walking distance of our new office building and it looks quite nice. Well, I was hoping that I could just walk to the office, but after staying here for almost two months now, our office is still not ready yet. 


The front view of Wall Living kos
but during the day the parking lot is filled up with all the cars


The room where I stayed

The monthly rent of this room is Rp. 4,5 million (approximately, USD 300) per month, electricity included with a warm shower and air conditioner, you get the room cleaned every day, and free laundry of four pieces of clothes daily. I have this big window room with a nice view. Since my room is up on the third floor I always sleep with the window open and I could see the building lights at night. Actually, the tower on the right is where my office is supposed to be. 








I like walking so I don't mind the 10 to 15 minutes walk to Lotte Shopping Avenue, or to Kuningan City Mall where I used to spend the day working at the coffee shops there. The best part is walking on the path right under the elevated road. The city government of Jakarta maintains a nice walking path with plants and gardens in the middle of the lanes of Prof. Dr. Satrio road. It's so much more convenient than walking along the pavement with all the motorcycles parking. It's actually a good break, I could work at home the whole morning and clear my mind by walking to get lunch and continue working for the rest of the afternoon at the coffee shop. 


I enjoy staying here. Mbak Rani, the cleaning lady, and pak Marsiman the guard are nice. My room has always been squeaky clean every day and I love waking up and looking out the window to see the morning sunlight brushed through slowly the three towers. Sometimes I could even hear birds chirping in the morning too. 

The first day when I checked in I found that the Air Conditioner was not too cold. I reported to the owner immediately and a couple of days later, the owner replaced the compressor and fixed the problem immediately. 

I will leave this place with a fond memory. Would I go back to stay here again? Yes, definitely, but I'll venture to look at other options first, so I will have some comparisons. The only thing that I think can be improved would be the chair. This plastic chair doesn't look too strong, and it's really not comfortable to sit on if you want to work at home the whole day. I might ask the owner if he can put a different chair if I stay here again. 


You can't sit long on this chair

My wife spotted immediately that the room has a big size fridge that she felt was unnecessary. I agree, I think a small fridge would be sufficient since the room doesn't have a kitchen so you don't really buy a lot of things to put in the freezer. I only have salad, bread, milk, and orange juice most of the time. Having a microwave inside the room would be a nice addition, so you don't have to walk up to the kitchen on the fourth floor to heat your food. 

Well, that's my brief chapter of the first time living in a kos, a beginning of a longer chapter later of continuing living in Jakarta. 









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