TRAVEL IN JAVA.

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 230, 28 September 1929, Page 16 (Supplement)

TRAVEL IN JAVA.

HOTELS AND FOOD. HUMOURS OF TIPPING. THE LANGUAGE DIFFICULTY. (By Frederick Stubbs, F.R.G.S.) The principal tourist hotels are very large, covering many acres of ground, with accommodation ! for from 100 to 200! people; As a : rule there; is no upper storey, the rooms opening on to long broad verandahs'. Each, guest Will have a large well-furnished bedroom with furnished verandah, and qipt© frequently private bathroom and toilette. The bed is enclosed in mosquito netting, which is put into position by your room-boy at about 4 p.m. As a rule the bed is provided with pillows and sheets only, but there is always a "Dutch wife" in .the bed which, I hasten to explain, is not a lady, but a hard bolster which is placed lengthways in the bed and is. supposed to keep you cool by elevating the sheet a little. How it came by this name I have never heard, but it is invariably, spoken of thus in the East. There will always be abundant electric light, and nearly always running water in the basins. The bath consists of a cement floor, with shower bath and a huge "copper" of water which you throw over yourself by means of a dipper. A native looks after your rooms and your washing; brings your early cup.of coffee and shaving water (as early as you please); gets any mending done; sees to your welfare generally, and usually waits on you at table—which is a great convenience, as he gets to know your requirements. It also avoids the necessity foi a double tip! The dining room is usually large, central, and open on two sides to the fresh air. In the largest hotels there will be an orchestra. There are no smokerooins or drawing rooms, and stranger still, no bar, and seldom a billiard room. Dutch Food. But ifc is in the dining room that the British visit6r frequently finds difficulties. The Dutch food is-very different from ours, much richer, fatter, with lavish use of gravies, sauces, etc. The Dutch complain that English dishes are too dry. • The meat is frequently tough, the tea stale, the bread new.. .Hot milk—not cold—is served with tea and porridge. The waiter usually pours the tea into your cup, adds milk and sugar according to his taste, and then takes them away. Is it because he knows how much sugar and milk you require better than you do, or because he is afraid you might pocket them? The toast is usually just warmed bread. Poached eggs are always served on a cold plate, as are also hot meats. Boiled eggs are frequently cold. ' Fruit is served at every meal, and finger bowls are brought to rinse the fingers. Breakfast is usually at 8 o'clock, lunch at 1 p;m.,-dinner at 8 p.m. At 4.30 tea is brought to your verandah. The most .famous and popular dish in Java is served at lunch. It is known as the Rjistafel, or rice-table. First a large soup plate is placed in front of you, then a procession of 12 to Iβ men will pass before you, each bearing a separate dish, first a steaming bowl of boiled' rice, then, fish,' , duck, chicken, hard-boiled eggs, curry, shredded coconut, green vegetables, bananas, cucumbers, forcemeat, sausages, condiments. It is • tha hugest, most. remarkable "dish" I ever tasted, pleasant to the palate, but requiring the digestion of an ostrich or a Dutchman. It is much beloved by the latter, and I myself enjoyed it occasionally—but, oh, the after-effects! And I never took more than half, the ingredients. Reader, if you are. at all dyspeptic, beware of Riistafel! ■ You rarely get vegetables with hot meats. With poultry, canned fruit, not vegetables, is served. If you are not on the look-out, the waiter will take away your plate before you have finished, and he does this so. quietly (he has no boots) that the first thing you know about it is that it has disappeared. There are many kinds of cold meats; at breakfast cheese is always served; there is seldom porridge, and the Dutch do not take eggs and bacon. There is- a good deal of halfcooked meat and fish*

Tipping. In the dining room, the waiters frequently outnumber the guests. ineir meals are taken anywhere, and one sometimes sees them sitting on the floor, a heap of boiled rice on a banana leal in front of them, which they eat with their fingers. Tipping it not extravagant. You give from 1/8 to 3/ per week for your room boy, and the rest would be covered by another 1/. A frieiid of mine staying at the Hotel des Indes, Batavia, saw an American tourist give a waiter 15 guilders .(25/) for two days' service. The waiter grinned with pleasure, but fearful that a mistake had been made, and that the money would be demanded back, promptly disappeared and was not seen again for ten days. One sees some strange things at the hotels. At Bandoeng I saw a boy brushing the curtains with a gold-backed hat brush. I should have liked to know where that- brush came from. Amusing Mistakes. Hot water is used neither in wash-ing-up nor laundry; dishes are washed under a tap, placed in a rack to dry, and later polished with' a cloth. The native servants (men) are very polite, and usually perform their duties well. •Nevertheless many misunderstandings arise owing to language difficulties. You try in vain to make your requirements known. You ask for your boots, e.g., and your man will bring tea, you request him to open the shutters and he will fold your trousers, and so en a hundred times. Hβ simply cannot tuiderstand why any human being should object to stale tea or cold eggs, or be unable to shave with tepid water. If water has once boiled it must be "hot." I am.not sure that I have not met with a similar delusion in European countries. Being dark-skinned, with bare feet, a native is hardly visible in a poor light, and is by your side without a sound or motion to make you aware. You are nearly always under interested surveilance. Apart from difficulties of language and food, however, the principal Javanese hotels are comfortable, adapted to the' climate, and reasonable in their charges.