A mobile food stall was also placed at the entrance of the cluttered alley

Alleyways in residential areas are often cluttered, but the clutter in the alleyway I passed in Jakarta was quite high. There were mobile stalls at the entrance and several pots and pans on the ground on the other side of the alleyway. It was so cluttered that it made me wonder if, perhaps, this was not an alleyway, but the entrance to someone's home.

At the far end, I could see a couple of women gathered and chatted. They seemed to be enjoying themselves. As I was watching them from afar, one of the women came walking towards me. I expected to be approached by a strange foreigner, but that was not the case. She grabbed a container on top of a parked mobile stall, poured some water into a cup, and walked back to the back without giving me a second glance. She was just thirsty, apparently. It's not that she hadn't come to talk to me.

In Jakarta, children are drawn to cameras, but few adults are curious enough to come up to me. Nobody asked, "Where did you come from?" When I was asked that I usually replied with another question, "Where do you think I came from?" However, there was no opportunity here to ask that question.

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