Macet!

What was supposed to be a 40 minutes journey turned into an nightmare 2 and a half hours in the car. Today's car ride was Murphy's Law at its finest.

We left the mall at 3pm and came to an absolute standstill in the CBD because some hot-shot government official was driving through and the police literally block off the entire stretch of road (imagine blocking off the entire stretch of Shenton Way just because say, Vivian Balakrishnan was visiting one of the offices there) for about an hour. Everyone basically sat in their vehicles and fume. By then, it was 4pm and office workers started steaming out in hordes because everyone is trying to get home to break fast with their families. Without any traffic jam, it usually takes us about 15-20 minutes to get home from the CBD. To add insult to injury, it started raining! When it rains in Jakarta, traffic (for some inexplicable reason) slows to a crawl even if it's just a drizzle.

It was about an hour later when we caught sight of the lane that leads to our house but the traffic wasn't moving. I can see the turn just 20 metres ahead but we're stuck in such a bad jam that the cars were stationary bumper to bumper. Took us another 20 minutes to travel that fateful 20 metres. I think towards the end of the car ride, Jamhuri (my driver) was about to pull his hair out in frustration.

I swear I'll just sit at home from now on. No more car rides for me!