Meetings, Metal Dectectors, Martinis

I feel like I'm being bitten all over and not in a good way. In the coffee shop once more and there are mosquitoes in my hair, on my arms, down my pants, nibbling my eyes. Disease-spreading motherfuckers.

I'm calling this Jakarta Day Two as though I've been here since... Thursday? I'd not really done anything much till yesterday. The evil pooing and all. Today's pooing has been less traumatic and I have been able to face the future with something resembling hope. Hope that the world won't fall out my arse.

We had a 'meeting' today with some of the team we will be working with/who will be helping us. As always, the term 'meeting' turns my blood to ice. I don't know why. I suppose it's the assumption that I'll have to talk seriously about serious things and use terms like 'fiscal' and 'blue-sky' and nod wisely and not crack knob jokes. Dani asked what I plan on doing when, one day I have a serious job. I'm don't exactly know. I'm pretty sure I'll have to run into the Ladies and scream 'BUM!' at random intervals just to get through the day.

As it turns out, everyone at this 'meeting' was pretty cool. They're all about our age, and you could go for a bevvie with any one of them. It's certainly calmed me down about what tomorrow brings. I have no specific role in this project, I'm just along for the ride and hopefully to be useful at some point. One of the guys, Micheal, offered his assistance as a tea-maker or general gopher. I smiled politely but my brain screamed 'Back off dude, that's my gig!'

We were going to head home after the meeting but saw the lights of the Marriot hotel ahead and asked the taxi to make a quick detour. Dani was gagging for a pint after two weeks in Pakistan and I wasn't about to say no to a fortifying cocktail. You take your joy where you can when staying in a Sharia hotel with no bar. As our taxi pulled up, a team of Marriot staff opened the doors. Not to help us out, to check for bombs. They're pretty thorough too. Then, on the way in, we had to put our things through an X-ray scanner and walk through a metal detector. Bombs again. The Marriot was one of the hotels that was bombed here back in 2009 and I guess they've not let their security up since then. Slightly scary, though I guess now it's one of the safer places to be. The Martinis and Carlsberg were well worth the security measures though.

And so to bed. In the morning, an early start and the first of or 10 or so days with the women. Please pray to your respective deities that I don't do/say anything inappropriate and that I manage to be, in some small way, vaguely useful.

Today I like; Cocktails, non-scary meetings, the fact my stomach appears to be returning to normal.