The Tax Bracket of Comfort

I used to think Jakarta was different from the rest of the capital around South East Asia but this assumption was built from my narrow experience as a middle class traveling there, brushing up on the city’s chaos but never deeply understanding the other side of the story in Jakarta.

As an adult, I only saw the story of people navigating Jakarta using a very crowded public transportation, stretching their budget that doesn’t have a room for comfort. It all looked pretty stressful.

In this city, comfort has a steep price.

Rather than experiencing Jakarta, as a 20 somethings, the city never appealed to me. In fact, I simply tried other places like Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand before I even tried Jakarta.

Now that I frequent Jakarta, seeing the skyscrapers, the semi rundown apartments, and the public transportation, I felt that sense of familiarity as the car I was in drove past the highway.

Anyone can live in these cities, it’s just the tax bracket that decides our comfort.

Coming from a small city, I was often being told Jakarta is no place to live. It is known for its traffic jams, pollution and high cost of living. Living there is stressful but after sampling a few big cities around South East Asia, they are all the same.

For example, if you travel to Bangkok far from the touristy area and neighborhood, you can still see the functional denseness, the powerline that’s become a bridge for the squirrels. The semi run down apartments, the family with its complexity in contrast to high rise condo and premium apartments and housing.

The same goes when you travel to Kuala Lumpur, just travel outside the main tourist area, you’d see the same experience and something that really feels familiar.

While I have not lived long enough in Jakarta, not even more than a month, I can already guess my experience would be highly decided by the neighborhood I live in, the type of transportation I can take and even the accessibility to green spaces and things that make the city more liveable.

Now, I understand why most people from Jakarta want to visit smaller cities and find charms in village life. They find the island life enjoyable too which is why they typically escape to Bali or nearby cities for their mini weekend getaway.

If I were to live in Jakarta, I would travel all around south east asia or even further. The flight costs a lot cheaper than from other places in Indonesia.

Is Jakarta liveable for Digital Nomads? I mean, for someone who enjoys city life rather than island life, Jakarta is certainly liveable. When you live in a comfortable condo even north Jakarta feels pretty fine despite its “reputation” on the news. I happened to visit a high-end condo and neighborhood in North Jakarta, they feel completely different from the average life in North Jakarta.

And South Jakarta, which is known for its upper-middle class neighborhood and trendy areas, still has a distinct image too like Pancoran area where it feels just like everyday Jakarta, so crowded and densely populated with semi-run down apartments.

When it comes to cost of living, for transportation alone without relying on public transportation, a taxi which is reliable in this city would cost $31for 2 days. It’s a bit more expensive than other parts of Indonesia, especially in Java.

A day in Jakarta, a person could spend $7/meal comfortably excluding the transportation. So, to live a very comfortable life in Jakarta, one has to spend at around 30$/day for meals and transportation. So, if you make $1000/month that doesn’t stretch very far. Then just imagine how some people in this city make less than $400/month with a family to take care of. But many people can do it, they can survive with that baseline.

In the end, all these cities feel so familiar and no wonder why I always like to live in these places all around SEA cause it just feels familiar compared to island living that to me, a little too unique and the pace of life that's too slow for my liking.