Comment by decimalenough

> ...which I can't say about any other SEA language. Phonetic spellings, Latin alphabet, no tonal sounds, dead easy grammar and a million loan words you already know.

Nitpick: Sounds a lot like Tagalog (Filipino), another SEA language.

>Jakarta is definitely for the adventurous though, and you had better have an iron stomach.

I love, love, loved backpacking across quite a bit of southeast Asia. I did not like the massive gastrointestinal problems nearly the entire time though.

I spent big money on four things for that trip: the flight, shoes, backpack, and toilet paper. I would've killed and eaten someone to get my hands in alcohol free wet wipes.

> which I can't say about any other SEA language

maybe this doesn't qualify as "south east asian", but Korean is very easy to learn how to read too. It's not latin alphabet, but you only need to learn 20 symbols, and then everything is phonetic! you can have a lot of fun "reading" all the signs after you study a bit on the plane. Not as many loan words though

How did the language end up with a Latin alphabet?

most SEA languages are similar btw

>Also, Indonesian food IMHO is at the bottom of SEA food culture. MY has wayyy better food (both in quality and diversity).

I won't speak for the quality but this seems like an extremely dubious statement. Malay cuisine is certainly diverse, owing to settled migrant populations from other parts of Asia, but they don't have the dizzying array of indigenous cuisines on offer in Indonesia, many of which aren't readily available in Java.

> Also, Indonesian food IMHO is at the bottom of SEA food culture. MY has wayyy better food (both in quality and diversity).

Agreed! Malaysia is really underrated, or at least it was by me. Now it's one of my favorite spots in the world, food is great (not as Thai's but comes close), wonderful sea, wonderful jungle, Kuala Lumpur is becoming a really nice city and CoL is value for money.

Putting Indonesian below Filipino food is quite something.

> Indonesian food IMHO is at the bottom of SEA food culture

I take it you haven't been to Burma / Myanmar

A little tip for your next visit to Jakarta :

- Indonesia is a tropical country, and Jakarta is in the vicinity of the sea, so depending on the month of year, it can rain anytime on the day. So, if you are not comfortable with rain, always use a taxi/grab/gocar to go around.

- If you are pressed for time, I suggest you use airport train to go to the airport. At least you won't get stuck on traffic.

- About the noise problem, I think it won't be a problem if you sleep in a tall building. The last time I go there, I sleep in a relatively good hotel and deliberately choose the higher floor. And the noise doesn't become a problem for me.

Hope this help and you can get a nicer experience on your next visit

    > Jakarta has a noise problem.

I offer a practical template: <Large city in developing country X> has a noise problem.

When you say "temples", do you mean masjid (mosque)? It is pretty normal anywhere in the Islamic-majority world to sing prayers over a loud speaker a few times a day.

> Traffic was terrible. I almost missed my flight due to taking a bike over a car, but then it started pouring rain and I had to huddle under a bridge while I waited for a car.

I guess people perceive this very differently. One sees it as an adventure while another one sees it as a hustle. Jakarta is a hustle. Some people like it and make them feel alive. If you don't enjoy it, it'll make you miserable.

> Also, Indonesian food IMHO is at the bottom of SEA food culture.

I agree. I hate the food but Malay food is similar. What Malaysia has is two other major races (Chinese and Indians) and a strong expat community (ie: Thai, Viet and Japanese) that bring lots of food diversity.

Rain, noise, traffic... welcome to SEA

  BLACKWATER

  Angwi fled his mountain home, the soldiers, as they burnt his village down, near the border line.
  He’s left the card games by the valley fire, the stories that his uncle told, the stories old, the spirits past.
  He’s seen the land taken away and given to the Java men; they’ve flown them in from distant lands.
  Angwi fears for his people’s songs, the nights they danced the valley strong; the hunding grounds, steep mountain side.

  slash and burn

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mrciT3lXtwE

Tabaran: Recorded Pacific Gold Studios, Rabaul, PNG, July to August ‘88

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XX5p1sjvW6s

They also have not prosecuted the earlier genocides they made: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indonesian_mass_killings_of_19...

I have personally flagged them as a country non-grata.

Is there any place you can go now that isn't doing a genocide? USA is out, Europe is out, Russia is out, China is out. Obviously the middle east is out. Most of Africa. Australia? They're strongly aligned with the USA though. And they did one in the past. Tiny Pacific islands but they're basically USA colonies?

Clean safe water from the sink is not something you'll find in most of the world, in fact. It's not just SEA.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Safe_drink_tap_water_map....

So basically it's only safe to drink tap water in western countries + Japan, Singapore, Chile, South Korea, and a few of the rich Arab countries.

I would argue that even the blue areas here would be speckled with lots of non-drinkable areas if you zoomed in, due to old lead piping and so on.

I traveled often between Jakarta and Japan in 2018, 2019 and 2020. The real breath of fresh air for me was literally the fresh air back in Japan. After running around for a week through Jakarta, I would inevitably develop a deep cough and a clogged nose. That said, the people, the food, and as someone else pointed out the nightlife is amazing.

> not too polluted

Are we talking about the same Bangkok? I'm talking about the Bangkok in Thailand where they literally shut down the schools due to air pollution being so bad [0].

What Bangkok are you referring to?

Malaysia is wayyy cleaner than Indonesia, both in air quality and trash on the ground.

[0] - https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/jan/24/bangkok-pollut...

For me Manila is the uncontested worst city in SEA. All of Jakarta's downsides, plus an absolutely horrific airport, worse traffic, extremely limited public transport network (which doesn't extend at all to the places where most business travellers go, namely Makati/BGC), higher crime and more violent crime too (lots of guns around), and worse food.

About the only upside is that most people speak some English, which is manifestly not the case in Jakarta.

> I spent a lot of time working is South East Asia. Jakarta is the worst city, yes it is big but very filthy like New Delhi or India in general. Second filthiest is Malaysia.

Malaysia's a pretty decent size country, not a city. Can't say as I'd have referred to KL as filthy on any of my visits (admittedly only 3 times over the past 12 years). Kuching wasn't filthy either.

This is such an odd position to create a burner account to argue...

N=1 but my experience with Philippines and Malaysia is exactly the opposite.

what is the cheapest for a nomad

> very filthy like New Delhi

Think you mean Delhi NCR? New Delhi is pretty small, and mostly houses political and social elite.

I'd take Bangkok over Singapore any time of the day/month/year. There's still a bit of chaos in Bangkok in 2025 but once you spend a few days there and learn how to avoid peak traffic hours and areas it's incredibly charming and charistmatic city with loads of activities and opportunities for all classes of people. Singapore while clean is incredibly dull and characterless unless you're a billionaire.

and air

I found it probably the worst of anywhere I've ever been, you can taste it and just being outside slightly burns the back of your throat. I still really like visiting though.

Air quality is terrible. AQI does not lie. It's even worse when you're sitting on the back of a motorbike 6ft away from 10 other gas powered bikes.

There is slow adoption of electric vehicles, but still very low adoption rate (like less than 10% of motorbikes).

I'll just chime in that Chinatown in Glodok might have been that place a couple decades ago, but seemed quite deserted now :/ There's still some shops around though.

A local beer in a bar will normally be around 60k IDR so $3-4, wine is more expensive generally in SEA you'll normally pay around 90-100k IDR per glass.

Alcohol is more expensive than other countries, in general.

If you're strict or allergic, very difficult. Fish sauces and pastes like terasi and patis are culinary staples on the level of soy sauce and make it into otherwise seemingly vegetarian dishes.

If you're willing to flex a bit and just avoid obvious meat/fish, you'll survive, there's plenty of tofu, tempeh, veg etc. Gado-gado is always veg, nasi/mee goreng, etc.

Tempeh is an Indonesian staple and from what I understand pretty popular with vegans.

Because they're both hot, polluted, congested and mostly poor, but Bangkok is literally the world's most popular tourist destination city while Jakarta is not.