You know, the hospitality practitioners in Bandung would love to have everyone think that Bandung is a perfect city—a city that can provide anyone visiting it with a pleasurable, enjoyable, and impeccable experience at all times, at all places. Yet as someone that have lived in this city for quite a long time, I have experienced firsthand that the reality, unfortunately, is as not as pretty as everyone would have hoped for. By no means that the intention behind this post is malicious in nature, like preventing or scaring anyone to visit this city, but if you are planning to visit this city, then it is perhaps be better for you to know stuff like this, so that: (a) You can better prepare yourself, and (b) You know exactly what to expect and thus, to some degree dissatisfaction and disappointment can be prevented.

This post is the first part of a series of posts I will make to reveal the not-so-pleasant sides of Bandung.

First one: traffic. As a city still in a continuously growing phase, it is to be expected perhaps that in Bandung, just like any other growing cities in the country and even the world, the traffic is actually not that all friendly. Traffic jams are commonplace amongst the streets of Bandung, and the situation gets even worse when week-ends or holiday seasons are coming: adding throngs of tourists into an already crowded streets is certainly a recipe for a good, healthy traffic jams. But the situation in Bandung perhaps is a bit unique compared to any other cities in the world particularly because of two factors: public transportation and motorbikes.

Bandung’s most prominent public transportation system—if anyone can even call it a ‘system’—is the Angkot (short from “Angkutan Kota”—city transportation.) They are as numerous as they are troublesome, and as problematic as they are helpful. On one side, they can provide cheap transportation that covers a massive scope of the city—if you know your way around their rather intricate network of routes and passes, you can reach almost all sides of Bandung with rates much, much lower compared to when you, for example, rent a car or using a taxi. However, on the other side of the coin, they are one of the primary reasons why the traffic in Bandung is often seem so convoluted.

Imagine this: although common sense says that they shouldn’t, they can and will stop wherever and whenever they want to in order to picking up or dropping off their passengers. ‘Wherever’ and ‘whenever’ here means that they can stop on street junctions, during a moving traffic, while a traffic jam is occurring, or in other times and places a vehicle cannot and should not be allowed to stop. Their overall driving mannerisms are not exactly screaming proper etiquette either, and their drivers are not the kind of people you will want to get on bad terms with.

Although, the Angkot is nothing when compared to the other factor why Bandung streets sometimes a good source of unwanted stress: the motorbikes. Perhaps an exaggeration on my part, but in my eyes their numbers on the streets on any given day could probably reach hundreds or even thousands. The motorbikes are just everywhere. If you are driving your own private vehicle in Bandung—which cannot be entirely recommended—the motorbikes are a source of constant nightmares if you fear for the safety of your vehicle.

Imagine this: during a traffic jam or otherwise slow moving traffic, the motorbike riders will surround you on all sides, from left, right, front, or behind, and they always try to move forward no matter what even when it’s not actually necessary. So, they will force themselves to creep forward on the left or right of your vehicle, for example, even when there’s barely enough space for them to move forward without scratching, touching, or otherwise damaging your vehicle. Oh and they often fond of cutting in from the right or left without any warning, and it is commonplace for motorbikes in Bandung to actually cross the sidewalk intended for pedestrians because they want to keep moving forward during a traffic jam.

In short, just be prepared for everything if you want to brave the streets of Bandung, especially if you are using your own private vehicle. It may not as bad as Jakarta (where in the world a place with worst traffic than Jakarta?), but the streets of Bandung still have enough problems to infuriate those who are not prepared to deal with them.

Tags: Bandung, Bandung City, Bandung Streets, Unpleasant Sides of Bandung
Categories: Unpleasant Sides of Bandung

This entry was posted on Sunday, October 25th, 2009 at 4:11 AM and is filed under Unpleasant Sides of Bandung. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.