Efficient Singapore

Its 9:55 PM in Singapore and our plane, a Singapore Airlines flight SQ 968 is pushing back from the gate right on schedule.  In only 1 hr and 30 minutes, we touch down at the international airport in Jakarta Indonesia and taxi to the gate.  Knock off an hour for the change in time zones and we've arrived right on time, 10:25 PM, local time.  That's where Singaporean efficiency collides with a new kind of chaos, one I've been mostly unfamiliar with until now.  Oh sure, I was warned before my trip,  that things were not as orderly in Jakarta, but still I was somewhat unprepared.

O.k lets step back a minute...  I grew up in a small town of 300 people.  We had a small grocery store, a hotel, a school, a post office, a community hall, a church, a gas station, a laundry mat and a convenience store.  Yeah thats right, a convenience store, because going to the grocery store, which is located on the other side of town; a leisurely 4 minute walk, is sometimes just too inconvenient.  The closest thing to a traffic jam in Plamondon Alberta happened only once a week on Sunday afternoon.  You see, located 7 miles North of town was a small village of White Russians (something similar to Hutterites I guess).  Sunday was their day off, a day when the young men and women drove to Plamondon in their shiny new trucks and cars, which they only drove on Sundays.  And because they loved their shiny cars and trucks so much, and wanted them to stay shiny, they drove only 20 km/hr on the gravel roads into town.  You could expect 2, 3 even 4 cars lined up coming down the hill into town at 20 km/hr.  Traffic jam.  Then they all rolled into town and either parked outside the Pelican Hotel to buy off sales, or they crowded the parking lot on the other end of town where they flocked into the convenience store for cigarettes and snacks. Chaos!

So flash back to last week.  I get off the plane in Jakarta, a city of approximately 12 million people by night, and about 15-16 million people by day.  I'm relaxed and reasonably upbeat.  That is until I stroll into the arrivals area.  Its something akin to what I would imagine the inside of a bee hive being like.  People from all corners of the world are buzzing around in every direction.  Signage is often misleading and more often non-existent.  Only by luck do I end up in a cue through immigration where 40% of the people, after having waited 20 minutes in line, are directed to another cue where they must first purchase a visa.  Thankfully I have my multi-entry visa for Indonesia that took 2 weeks to obtain, so I stay in line.  After an hour of waiting, my passport is stamped and off I go to find a cab.  Once again I'm swallowed up by throngs of people pushing their way towards the exit, all vying for a car to their next destination. After some jostling, and having to turn down a few aggressive wannabe bag carriers, I arrive at a taxi counter where I ask for a car.  A young man, takes my name and writes down two numbers on a piece of paper.  396,000 / 510,000.  The difference between a standard taxi and a "Mercedes".  No, I'm not buying a car.  The exchange rate is $1 Sing = 7,500 Rupias.  I opt for the Mercedes, having learned from a colleague that a Mercedes comes with a trained and experienced driver.  Something I'm also told, is invaluable in Jakarta.  Its now 11:50 PM, nearly 1.5 hours since landing and I'm just getting into my taxi.  The airport is a short distance from the hotel and its late, so traffic is "light".  An hour later, and I've arrived at my hotel.  After a quick sweep of the car for explosives as we pull up to the drive and then a casual gesture from the well armed bell boy to ensure my baggage is loaded onto the belt and through the x-ray, I find myself at the desk.

So if you've read this far, you're wondering where this is all going.  Well it all becomes clear on my return to Singapore. Traffic on the way back to the airport is thick.  I mean, unbelievably dense.  Y'know, I've been on 2 cattle drives.  I've driven hundreds of disorderly beasts through chutes to be sorted.  And as I sat atop my steed, looking down onto the mass of hooves and snouts, I wondered what it all was like from their perspective.

After Jakarta, riding in the back of my air-conditioned Mercedes, street level among the masses, hemmed in on all sides, centimetres from the next car, 5 cars lined up in a row, jockeying for position as we squeeze into 3 lanes, surrounded by swarms of kamikaze scooter pilots, like mosquitos, a constant buzz, honking, smoking.   I now know.

They say it can take up to 4 hours to get to the airport.  I'm lucky, we squeeze through the cacophony in just over an hour.  After 3 hours, 3 security checks, and having my passport thumbed through 7 separate times, I'm onboard my plane.  I'm sitting on the tarmac in Jakarta, but now in the sanctity of Singaporean efficiency and order.  The plane is loaded and pushes back from the gate on time.  The flight lands without incident and rolls into Singapore on time.  I deplane, cruise through a clean and well marked arrivals hall, quickly check  in and out of immigration, swiftly breeze past customs and into an awaiting car in 7 minutes.  I welcome the structure, the expectations met, the satisfaction that here, the system works how it should, the way it is designed, to effectively and efficiently move people from where they are to where they want to be.

Traffic flows smoothly and I'm home in 20 minutes, not because traffic was heavy, or light, but because I live, predictably, 20 minutes from the airport.  Some say Singapore is too controlled, contrived.  I happen to like it.  Today, a tour guide on the Singapore River Boat Cruise described his city, his country to me in 3 words.  Clean, Green and Secure.  I would add efficient.