Batam Info Thread

[tiuminator]

Originally Posted by SEAJ

I was in Indonesia for a few weeks towards the end of 1997.

Prior to 1997, the Rupiah vs USD had been hovering around 2300 - 2500, went up to between 2,500-3,800 first part of 1997 before drastically jumping to +-6,000 around Christmas, and then +-12,000 and reaching a high of over 16.600 when the riots etc broke out in 1998.

Just approximate rates I remember.

SEAJ

Rate was hovering 10000 rp to S$1 back then.Man, we really spent like multi millionaires. Even tip the girls 100k and they were so happy and gave us tip top service. But nowadaya even rup were to drop to 10000 again i wont be happy. I fact i wld be more worry cos cost wld goes up and will not come down even if 1day rup strengthen to 5000.

[SEAJ]

Originally Posted by localbest

Was rather surprised that the flutuation of the rupiah can be so great before reaching economic recession in 1998.
...
I remember during year 1998, the value of my relative semi detached house in manga besar has dropped almost 10 times, very jialat man.

House become concrete.

Money become paper.

Car become metal.

..........

Yes, all you said was so true. I was there actually to transact a property and it became a disaster and everything just froze up. Total disaster!

But I did manage to buy a couple Kijangs which when I initially got there were priced at approx. US$ 25,000 for around $6,000 each. I think probably my lifetime best deal!

SEAJ

[AC7935]

Hi bros planning go batam alone for this long weekend this afternoon..

Anyone know is it affected by the Malay Puasa or anything there..

Or anyone will be around there this weekend too for Cheong

Thks a lot

[Siawlang]

Originally Posted by AC7935

Hi bros planning go batam alone for this long weekend this afternoon.. Anyone know is it affected by the Malay Puasa or anything there.. Or anyone will be around there this weekend too for Cheong Thks a lot

Bring soap

[AC7935]

Originally Posted by Siawlang

Bring soap

Bring soup for

[SEAJ]

Originally Posted by AC7935

Bring soup for

Its SOAP and not soup!

SEAJ

[nono1973]

Originally Posted by newyorker88

I hear of a story of a guy who was caught by a drug dealer who loan him some money or some thing which I am not sure what, the drug dealer put him in a gummy bag, together with a HP. He lowered the bag until it just touch the waters. Off the bridge at night.


The rest, you figure it out.

Interesting,the first thing when you say this,my impression is Buggy jump...lol...except in the case of that guy you mention,it's being done to him in a more evil way. I can imagine that guy after being tied up in a sack and thrown from the Batam Berelang Bridge with the water level just touching him after being thrown down,not forgetting there is high and low tide in the open sea. It's a timeless torment which one cannot break free and if he ever does,it's very likely it'll means death as he will have no strength or too exhausted to swim back to shore.

Originally Posted by SEAJ

You’re welcome – but I am still of the opinion that your “style” has gone a long way to set the tone for other posters here and make this thread the civil – and more importantly – informative thread that it is.

Unlike some threads on other destinations filled with boring, confusing and vile posts by agents and their clones as well as seniors who seems to only want to dominate discussions there with their mutual back-slapping whilst castigating “newcomers” for daring to ask questions even! And even actually stating that they are NOT interested in sharing any information about “THEIR” place as they do not want others to spoil THEIR playground! What happened to the spirit of sharing and caring in some of these threads? What’s the point of their presence if they are NOT willing to share information?

But then again, I say to each his own and that everybody of course have every right to do whatever they want to do!! I just wanted to thank and congratulate you and the other participants of this thread on maintaining this friendly and informative atmosphere here.

Regards

SEAJ

Thank you once again for your compliment. And thx for sharing the DOs and DONTs of a thread too. From my opinion,it really depends on the title of a thread as well as the title of the Forum holding the Thread. Like this thread,which is named Batam Info Thread under International Field Report. What would a person be expecting when he/she steps into this thread. Most likely it is to get info from it. So example if being a newbie i need to get info from Batam Info thread,what would i do? I would most likely ASK a question that i need to know hoping to get answers. And most answer to questions in this Batam info threads will be very often be leaded to the below link :

http://sbf.directory/showthread.php?t=66580

Yes,that is page 1 of this thread. This thread has been around for more than 7 years,and the information contains in it is huge (more than 1700 pages) and more importantly mostly accurate to date.

Ok,now comes the part from the senior's point. The posters from 7 or so years ago visited Batam,all of them pays for it...some had good experience,some had bad ones,but they still pays for it to experience the good and bad. Being a newbie,i come into this thread ask a question and EXPECTS my question to be answered where other people from 7 or so years ago pays to get? No wonder the seniors are mostly pizzed ,and to make matters worse the questions i asked have been answered before a zillion times in this thread. Not fair from the eye of the senior's point of view,isn't it?

Now comes the attitude of me being a newbie asking questions. When i ask a question,am i demanding that my question be answered? And when my question received a negative answers from "someone who pays for answers" 7 odd years ago,what SHOULD BE my attitude towards it? If my attitude is no good,my focus on my initial question becomes distracted and there we go...exchange of abusive words,quarrels etc starts coming in. And this is what i meant by NEGATIVE posting,as positive postings includes asking the right questions and be humble and respectful towards even aggression when i know i am new and here to only seek answers (knowledge) as a newbie. Solution is simple,focus on the thread title & my question. As for the rest,simply ignore or decline politely.There is no point in slapping each other's face.

Now comes the part of Spoiling the playground. The whole world is babbling about newbie spoiling the playground,but no one's been doing anything about it except keep penalizing them.And that's not going to prevent them from killing the playground. I am being honest here,if i go to Batam without reading or equipped with knowledge provided from this thread by senior bros here,i would have paid 60k for a taxi every trip and another 200k-300k for booking a taxi whole day to bring me around joints to find girls which will cost another 10-20% more than normal for the girls i booked. And i will also be booking hotel rooms at S$67.00 - S$70.00 instead of a flat S$51.60.(same hotel,same room comparison) Food will cost 10% more if my taxi driver brings me along,massage special service will cost 30-50% more. Who knows,my arrogance (if i choose to be) may lead to even worse tour disaster if i were to bring in,eg. Dried Sea Horses from Batam to Sillypore if no one tells me it's not legal and a permit is required. The funny part will be after getting chopped,i will still come here to this thread to show off that i pay 50% extras or even double for everything in Batam thinking it's a premium service i am getting and had a brainwashed "good" time, hoping to see other's following my steps or to pity me...lol.

My solution,as i move along in Batam,i noted down my trails with guides for an easier navigation thru clicking and reading my signature info instead of having to read 1700 pages of this thread. Better i one person read 1700 pages than every newbies also read 1700 pages,right? Consolidated the most basic infos and some important ones where newbies like myself tends to ask MOST and than put them in a Guide Format like below :

First Timer Batam Walk-Through Guide from a Batam Newbie's view

It becomes a win-win situation for all now as this thread have lesser newbies asking repeated questions today,and you start seeing newbies will ask "more sophisticated questions" where the seniors feel more obliged to answer them. Newbies are also sharing more of what they found new in Batam (example Kost in Batam),and the MOST important of it all is,with the increase number of newbies becoming more intelligent when cheonging Batam,the likelihood of them getting Chop Carrot Head becomes less ,hence it also lessen the chance of newbie spoiling the playground. Not forgetting we will in turn have lesser pizzed off seniors who has to keep "spoon-feeding" the new. Win-win,right?

Now,let's get back to the title of the thread as mention above in 1st paragraph. If this thread is not name as Batam Info Thread but instead the TS of this thread add a question mark to the end and call it "Batam Info Thread?"...it would be an entirely different thread meaning. Or if the TS writes it as Batam TCSS Thread or even just Batam-Nagoya/NED...the title itself will become difficult to stayed focus on. Without having a focus point on a thread,very likely anything and everything can be within topic title...and that will includes not sharing quality information, arguments, quarrels,fights,abuse etc etc.So long all the arguments, quarrels,fights,abuse etc etc has the Batam word in it,they will be within topic. Feel free to look at the rest of the titles of this International Field Report Forum and try locating the focus point in their thread titles.

Hehehe...while i do understand where you are coming from when you talk about thread ownership, still i need to share my point of view with you : In real life this is the internet world and we are in a public Forum,other than the owner/administrators who pays for the Forum,nobody actually owns anything here. Get pass this point and one will feel better.

I always remember long ago someone did say this,while sharing is caring...but indiscreet sharing can be scary. And i agreed.

[xiongmao]

Originally Posted by Siawlang

Bring soap

bring soap for ????

[SEAJ]

Originally Posted by xiongmao

bring soap for ????

You're kidding - right?!

LOL
SEAJ

[xiongmao]

Originally Posted by SEAJ

You're kidding - right?!

LOL
SEAJ

just curious about his reply....maybe he replied in jest, in return it confused us..

[SEAJ]

Originally Posted by xiongmao

just curious about his reply....maybe he replied in jest, in return it confused us..

LOL - OK.... let me add further to your confusion by asking a few pointed questions...and in jest too of course!!

What do guys do when all alone and horny?
What's "at hand" and feels closest to nookie especially when covered in nice foamy soap lather?

Ooooops.....LOL
SEAJ

[xiongmao]

Originally Posted by SEAJ

LOL - OK.... let me add further to your confusion by asking a few pointed questions...and in jest too of course!!

What do guys do when all alone and horny?
What's "at hand" and feels closest to nookie especially when covered in nice foamy soap lather?

SEAJ

oh ok i got it......thats a nice one...haha

[nitecrawllerr]

Originally Posted by xiongmao

oh ok i got it......thats a nice one...haha

Hes indirectly telling that bro this weekend ghost town. Most charbo all balik kampoing. Just bring soap (actually hotels got also) to DIY.

[SEAJ]

Oh WOW – thank you for your long detailed reply, which I for the most part totally agree with, but just want to point a few things out.

Originally Posted by nono1973

Thank you once again for your compliment. And thx for sharing the DOs and DONTs of a thread too. From my opinion,it really depends on the title of a thread as well as the title of the Forum holding the Thread. ……..
http://sbf.directory/showthread.php?t=66580

Please note that there are many other threads with similarly focused titled too, but most if not all also at times veer off to other directions/directions; which IMHO is perfectly OK, if it does not degenerate into quarrels, or worse, the thread being hijacked by nefarious characters with their own evil agendas i.e. stealth agents who keeps on snaring newbies into their cons etc.

In fact, I’d suggest that anybody who’d insist that all threads MUST follow certain topics/format is not only dreaming, he’s actually limiting others from discussing topics that’s of interest; what’s wrong with more participation? No problem if a guy wants to STEER towards WHATEVER topic he wants to discuss by posting up his own questions etc. – but to insist that the title topic must be strictly followed? Really? And I’ve seen many threads with several topics all being discussed at the same time.

And if you say that this makes it hard for readers to then get to the meat/information they’re after, welllll…. Just look at this thread itself….1,767 pages! It’s gonna happen one way or the other!!

Ok,now comes the part from the senior's point. ………? No wonder the seniors are mostly pizzed ….. Not fair from the eye of the senior's point of view,isn't it?

Why pissed? If he don’t want to reply, then he shouldn’t!
And not turn the thread into a battleground where he’s asserting his “ownership” just because he had contributed to it in the past. I always say that a poster is only as good as his last post!

Now comes the attitude of me being a newbie asking questions. When i ask a question,am i demanding that my question be answered? ……...

This is of course a problem in most forums – newbies OR WHOEVER asserting their supposed “rights” or whatever…whilst it’s only the owners who has ALL the rights!

Now comes the part of Spoiling the playground. The whole world ………..

My solution,as i move along in Batam,i noted down my trails with guides for an easier navigation ………..

First Timer Batam Walk-Through Guide from a Batam Newbie's view

And my kudos to you for coming up with this guide….which brings up the question as to why in the world would seniors here actually state that they are NOT willing to share their knowledge with others here.
If they’re not gonna share with us, then what’s the point for them to be on here? What, just to tell everybody that they’re so full of knowledge, such a Taikor and that everybody else must kowtow to them? And if they really ARE wanting others to NOT spoil their playground, shouldn’t they instead inform others how to NOT become carrot head by fully disclosing what are the prices, which places are good and deserve to be patronized etc?

….

Now,let's get back to the title of the thread as mention above in 1st paragraph. If this thread is not name as Batam Info Thread but instead the TS …………..s.

As previously, NOBODY owns a thread except Boss – period! And just because a thread is titled one way or the other, it’s unrealistic to expect that such topic must strictly be adhered to as conversations have a tendency to always veer off, which like I said, IMHO, nothing wrong with that.

Hehehe...while i do understand where you are coming from when you talk about thread ownership, still i need to share my point of view with you : In real life this is the internet world and we are in a public Forum,other than the owner/administrators who pays for the Forum,nobody actually owns anything here. Get pass this point and one will feel better.

I always remember long ago someone did say this,while sharing is caring...but indiscreet sharing can be scary. And i agreed.

Totally agree and I always say – that anybody and everybody have the right to say, do, post anything and everything they like.

No skin off my nose, but I still hate it when somebody organize others to gang-up against ANYBODY, and then muster up armies of clones to mass zap – very usually anonymously – and zap the innocent/hapless victim to oblivion. I question the motivation of these people who would take the trouble to actually do such things on here - IMHO, must NOT be anything good.

SEAJ

[GoForIt]

Rate 9280 @bcs mall