Wheelchair travel in Indonesia: Anthony’s original adventure

After crossing Marble Bar near Port Hedland I am well into my seven hour flight from Melbourne to Jakarta on Garuda Indonesia. It’s an isolating experience - the hostesses not engaging with me. I wonder whether they’ve ever interacted with disabled people - as such a daunting prospect for them.

Once landed and met by tour company - “Access Indonesia” - and Indonesia’s only accessible van in the entire country, it is clear the archipelago is impoverished. Furthermore, on Jakarta’s streets (Indonesia’s capital) disability isn’t evident.

Searching for answers it isn’t hard to see why. Indonesia’s capital isn’t made for pedestrians in wheelchairs. Footpaths are either non-existent or inaccessible - no way up or down, starting but abruptly ending with stairs or broken to the point of not being a footpath. Roadside is my only option mostly and I’m up against the throng of streaming motorbikes and constant horn blaring.

Fortunately I can retreat to my stay.

At the Borobudur opulence abounds. Chandeliers adorn ceilings and a grand staircase winds majestically up multi levels.

Here too are issues. Although ramp access into its lobby is a start, some lifts can’t carry my wheelchair’s weight. Likewise, room electricity is intermittent.

My mind races. “To breathe I rely on a powered ventilator.” For immediate relief - so much poverty, nil welfare - no TAC equivalent can bail me out with a generator. It’s unsettling.

But there’s more to Jakarta than it’s problematic infrastructure and welfare supports. It’s the people here that make up for the lack there of.

For my time in Jakarta I have diligent and selfless Wasito, my driver, who saves me from tackling the city’s made-for-car/motorbike roads. He treats me to Indonesia’s lively culture. At Kota Tua I drop by the old town.

With a makeshift rickety ramp welcoming people in wheelchairs to Jakarta’s Wayang Museum, a random passerby helps push me up the slope.

Dedicated to Javan Wayang puppetry, marionettes of all kinds line the walls. One, the Javanese Wayang Kulit puppets have a leather make-up. Made chiselling the parchment with fine tools and aided in movement with carefully shaped buffalo horn handles and control rods, they are decorated in beautiful hues.

Later... - squeezing into a narrow doorwayed musty, pokey and chock-full room of all things puppetry I see Aldy. Meticulously and proudly he revels in parading every step of assembling a puppet. A highlight here - I am shown the royal treatment - a private impromptu shadow puppet performance - “Bayang Wayang” - of figures manipulated between lamp and screen...with me a character in a good versus evil story!

Another performance is in the highlands, three hours drive from Jakarta. The bubbling boiling mud, wafting steam, intense radiating heat and burnt ash smell that is Tangkuban Perahu is an awe inspiring experience. Emitting sulfur fumes and one of 127 active volcanoes in Indonesia I am able to wheel right up to a low fence and peer down into its heart. In much cooler air, Tangkuban Perahu is the only volcano in Indonesia where you can drive up to it’s very rim. It has a peculiar shape - something that bears a resemblance to an upturned boat - it’s name - referring to a creation myth ending in tragedy where love is swept away from a misunderstanding.

Apart from marvelling at two authentically Indonesian charms, the country’s misgivings are tossed aside by fully functioning modes of public transport and again other generous folks. At a newly built subway at Istora station conductors stand proudly ready to serve - laying down ramps with exuberance. The same goes for the city’s tourist buses where an official at a rank horse trades between three rides as to which one can take me before an automatic ramp pops out footpath bound.

When not using disability friendly services, on safari, fortunately I have two able carers and “Access Indonesia” who all chip in to sling me up a staired safari truck. This before my trusty driver Wasito, as always, is a constant as we hit the road back.

Although transport has been good to me, I lament not being able to self-explore more, being left to my own devices. Maybe next trip.

For now it’s time to go.

Once back in Melbourne and disembarking from my flight, transferring back into wheelchair, the entire Garuda Indonesia crew stand agog, not averting their awestruck gaze until I am finally comfortably strapped in, able to wheel away. Disability is new ground for them... it’s not something they see in their homeland.