What to Do When You're Stuck in Jakarta's Traffic

I actually don’t live in Jakarta.  I reside in a remote area.  An hour commuting by car in the morning and one and a half to two hours in the evening. As much as I dreading stuck in a traffic in this city traffic,  I’m also in love with it.  I even missed it so much during Lebaran holiday earlier this year.  So you pretty much gotta have a strategy and think about what to do when you’re stuck in Jakarta’s traffic.

Seriously,  before you decide to move in to the city and turn yourself into one of those angry people sitting on their vehicles with its blaring horns, you better come up with a strategy  to spend one to two hours sometimes only with 50 meters progress. Lucky I don’t have to drive all the time.

I park my car somewhere nearby my kid’s daycare and I take public transport to get to the office. I will only drive only when I have meetings and or the traffic was not so heavy since with Jakarta currently is in infrastructure construction phase all at the same time (new fly over roads,  the first track mass rapid transportation and busway new corridors) .

I guess you already have the picture what should you prepare if you’re lucky enough to live here in this very city!  🙂 Ok let us get going with what this post should talk about!  😀

So, what to do when you’re stuck in Jakarta’s traffic?

1. Revisit your favorite musics and movies while getting your monthly bill done

The very first thing I do every morning before I drive is to check whether my favorite music cd(s)  is already with me in the car and even sometimes my favorite movie.  If not,  I make sure that my cellphone is charged enough so that it can play tracks I uploaded there.  It is always fun to listen to songs that can help me brighten up the morning.

If the traffic if bad enough,  I can even use mobile banking from my banks to get the bills done.  Already saved the bill payments that I regularly pay in the favorite items of the mobile banking apps.  So its only a matter of few taps before the congested traffic start to unravel. I gotta make my time productive right?  😀

Read about why you should use mobile banking

2. Finish your books and news feed

This is definitely for you who don’t dtive for yourself. If you’re a public transport user like me,  you definitely can finish a book. Well I don’t bring heavy printed book with me,  but read e-book from my gadget.  I finish some books during my commuting time.

Read my post about e-book reader apps that I use and free library app for Jakarta.

Not a book lover?  Finish your news feed.  Make them zero. Get the latest updates from many online news channel can be a fun alternative.  While doing it (either reading a book or news feed)  you can also listen to your collection of favorite music tracks in your cellphone.

3. Level up with the right radio station(s)

You can do this both when you’re driving your car or commuting using a public transportation. I love to listen a radio broadcasting business information.  I get the updates of foreign currency movement,  government policies or what expert syas about macre and micro economy at the moment.  Sounds pretty boring eh?  😛

Worry not,  music radio station is always a big help to upgrade knowledge about the latest hit in music industry.  To get more international feeling,  I’d tune to a radio app in my cell.

Read about AccuRadio app for your cellphone.

4. Write a blog post(s)

Since I blog,  my time on a bus is one of the most precious slots in a day.  Many times I finished a blog post during the time frame.  Seriously, traffic here is the best to give you the time to finish a blog post including put a picture or two and re-read the post before you hit publish  button.

Here is one of the blogposts written on a bus. It was about writing our own content.

5. Update your instagram feed with meaningful pictures

Well of course you can do this only when you don’t drive.  There were so many times I could get a good shot of how the city looks like and then I decided to be a worthy picture to upload to instagram. Or maybe you can get a good human interest pictures.

Here are some pictures I took in a heavy traffic.  Well,  most of them I took when I waited for bus.

[instagram url=https://instagram.com/p/8b0PmhvMt0/ hidecaption=true width=320]

[instagram url=https://instagram.com/p/9H_KWwPMnm/ hidecaption=true width=320]

[instagram url=https://instagram.com/p/61-bSvvMiy/ hidecaption=true width=320]

[instagram url=https://instagram.com/p/64i0RwvMtD/ hidecaption=true width=320]

Maybe you can read 8 Killer Photography Tips from Instagram Superstars.

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Of course I can continue the list with many other meaningful ways of what to do when you’re stuck in Jakarta’s traffic but I guess those five above already work for me.  Or do you have any other idea?  😀

My other posts in English:

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