Alteration Artisan

An alteration artisan at work on Jalan Cihampelas, Bandung.

Alteration artisans are quite easy to find in markets and places that sell ready-made or ready-to-wear apparels in this city. They work fast too. You can wait while your apparels are being altered or mended.

Perilous Walk

A shopper walking on Cihampelas street, oblivious to the danger she was in.

Jalan Cihampelas (Cihampelas Street) is a popular and important tourist destination in Bandung for its shopping attractions. Ironically, however, this street has no pedestrian walk. Worse still, the city's government does not seem to care and has not done much to improve the situation. Pedestrians are left to their own defense when it comes to their safety. It's very embarrassing.

Fresh Fruit Salad on The Streets

Photo caption: A man selling rujak or fresh fruit salad on Cihampelas Street.

Rujak (or rojak in Malaysia and Singapore) is a popular dish here. It is made of an assortment of sliced fresh fruits you can see in the man's cart and a sweet, sour, hot dressing made of palm sugar, red chili paper, tamarind, shrimp paste, salt, and peanuts.

A rujak seller/vendor like him can usually be found traveling with his cart or putting his cart on a busy street waiting for customers.

If you can't stand the hot, sweet, sour taste of the dressing, you can also ask for the fresh fruits only.

Unlike in any other cultural traditions where salads are eaten before the main course as an appetizer, rujak is usually eaten as a stand-alone dish or an afternoon snack. It is very refreshing, particularly on a hot day. It can also be eaten after the meal as a dessert.

If you don't like the idea of eating foods sold on or bought from the street out of hygiene concerns, you can try them in restaurants and hotels. Yes, many of them serve it on their menu.

Flying Saucer

Next time you go to Bandung, don't forget to scan the sky and the roofs. If you're lucky you might see this like I did: a flying saucer landing on the roof! I spotted this on Jalan Cihampelas street, home of world's superheroes in city.

Strangled Skateboarder

Oh, oh ... what happened to this skateboarder? He didn't see a cable in front of him and was strangled in his action.

Fortunately he's not a real living skateboarder. He's just a statue. I don't know if its placement near the electric cable was deliberate. It might be. As far as I know, the electric cable had already been there before the statue was put in the front yard of the building next to the one where the cable was. Perhaps the maker of the statue was very much aware of it and deliberately put his/her work there. It might also be possible that he/she was not aware of it. Either ways, it creates a funny scene.

Hideous Grotesquerie

Is this a Hollywood horror movie character?

Perhaps! But this hideous character was found nowhere near Hollywood. It is in fact just a wax (or polymer?) figure put at a store front of a clothing shop (or 'distro'/distribution outlet as it is called here) at Cihampelas Street.

Scary, isn't it? But in spite of its appearance, this figure and a couple of other have attracted passers by to the store.

Here is another one:

Gift and Souvenir Hawkers at Cihampelas Street

Gift and souvenir hawkers/street vendors at Cihampelas Street.

Flier-man

A man distributing fliers to motorists on Jalan Cihampelas, a street in Bandung that was once known as Indonesia's denim capital and now a street packed with stores and vendors selling different kinds of apparels and fashion accessories.

ATM Guards

Look who are guarding an ATM (Automated Teller Machine) booth in front of this shop at Cihampelas Street?

Yes! They are superheroes!

A Tree of Thongs

A tree where thongs "grow" on Cihampelas street.

We call them "sandal jepit".

Peuyeum Bandung

The word Bandung is part of quite a few collocations when it comes to food and beverage naming. Here are some examples: siomay or baso tahu Bandung, mie kocok Bandung, soto Bandung, bakmie Bandung, brownies Bandung. For our Malay friends in Singapore, Malaysia, and Brunei the phrase air Bandung may also be a familiar phrase although we don't have a beverage by that name here.

Of all those names, none is probably more closely associated with Bandung than peyeum, the Sundanese word for tapai or tape.

Tapai or tape as some of you may know is a kind of fermented food made of carbohydrate food source such as cassava or glutinous rice. It tastes sweet with a little bit sour flavor. As you can see in the picture, Peyeum Bandung is typically made of cassava.

Skywatch: Noah's Ark Landing Site

I often jokingly ask this question to my friends, "Where did Noah land his ark?" Or "Do you know where Noah's ark landing site is?"

When everybody is getting serious about the answer (many would say it was Mount Ararat in the eastern Turkey), I'd say, "Nah ..., it's much closer than you think. It's in this city."

They'd be confused of course. Then I'd say, "it's on Cihampelas street." And they would all laugh. They of course know what I mean. It's the Perahu Jeans shop facade.

Have fun with Skywatch Friday, everyone!

Young Street, Bandung

Several questions thus raised when I saw this:

- What would be the opposite of this street? And is there such a street?
- Why is youth (young people, the condition of being young) often associated with shopping, fun, and hip?
- Etc., etc.

This street, by the way, is located at Ciwalk (Cihampelas Walk), Bandung.

The Safest Street in the World?

Imagine a street that's home to many of the world's superheroes. It must be the safest place in the world!

This is the thought that often plays in my mind whenever I pass Jalan Cihampelas (Cihampelas Street). I'm not seriously thinking about this, of course. I mean, these superheroes only exist in fictions, and on this street particularly, they are just part of the decorations of the fashion stores lining it. Still, the thought amuses me, not to mention how extraordinary it is to think that so many superheroes "live" in a relatively small place like this.

All that said, this post is the second installment of my coverage of one of Bandung's most famous and fascinating streets. Please check my post yesterday for the first installment of the Cihampelas story.

My World: Spiderman on Cihampelas

Jalan Cihampelas (Cihampelas Street), Bandung, is very well known for its apparel and fashion shops, but above all, jeans! That's how it got its nick name: Jeans Street. What's unique about the shops on this street is that they are decorated in such a way that they become an attraction of their own. It's probably the only street outside Hollywood where Rambo in action is positioned next to Aladdin and his flying carpet and other fictional heroes like Superman and, as I framed in this photo, Spiderman.

The fictional character spiderman (also spelled spider-man), by the way, was first introduced to the public in August 1962 in a Marvel Comics published comics book "Amazing Fantasy". His real name in the story is Peter Benjamin Parker. The superhero was created by Stan Lee (the scripter and editor) and Steve Ditko (the plotter artist).

This post is Bandung Daily Photo's participation in My World Tuesday meme. Too see other posts of the participating blogs of My World meme, please follow the link.