Just earlier this month, I had my very first visit to Indonesia and of course, being totally foreign to it ( not really actually because being Malaysian, we are some what used to Indonesian), I was really looking forward to begin my short adventure in Indonesia.
Our very first encounter with anything Indonesian began right at the door of our airplane. Since it was a flight going into Indonesia, for all the obvious reasons, all the flight attendants were clearly Indonesians. There was a bit of a loud conversations going on in Indonesian right at the entrance of the airplane where there was a bit of a mixed up about where to store the baby's stroller in the aircraft. At that point, I realized that Indonesian speaks super fast and I wonder if the stewardess was being loud or angry or everyone in Indonesia just talks that way, which I doubt it is. That short drama done with, we found our seats and the plane took off.
Since we were travelling on a budget, most of us didn't check in our bags and that saved me about RM40 for the total ticket price. But actually, that is not even an issue that I'm trying to bring up here. The next thing we knew, we were queuing on the Foreigner lane at the immigration. I read some travel tips on some websites which mentioned that for smooth process at the immigration, try to look for immigration officers that doesn't look like he's going to eat you (which can be tough to come by if you are going into Germany), he or she looks nice and friendly or if you can catch him/her flashing a smile to that person at the counter, then probably that is the lane you should be queuing up to.
I randomly picked a woman officer behind the counter probably because it was the only two lanes available anyway and you have to pick one. While at the queue, I saw some people putting their four fingers on the fingerprints detector while others didn't do that which was something odd and new to me. Probably I haven't travelled that much to places in South East Asia that the idea of having your all five fingers on both hands saved in another country's immigration database is something that I got me saying in my mind, " Man, these people are serious dude!".
Then it comes to my turn. Apparently, for anyone who is a first time visitor into Indonesia, it is mandatory to do all the five fingers on both hands fingerprints detection inclusive of a face image too. There is an instruction card placed just above the fingerprints detector machine but the immigration lady was obviously hustling everybody and there's no way for you to read the instructions properly at the counter.
First, you will be asked to put your 4 fingers of your right hand minus the thumb at the detector which I dutifully did. Of course my hands decided to slip out of the detector and the next second, the lady was repeating in an irritate voice for me to put my hands back again. Next was the 4 fingers of your left hand minus the thumb and then, both thumbs together ( I think or was it separately, I can't remember) and finally look at the tiny camera at the counter. And then I thought I was done but no.
Our first destination was addressed at this place called Malang which you had to fill up on the form. Confidently, seeing that I'm a Malaysian, the immigration lady spoke Indonesian to me. Thankfully, I understood her questions and told her that we are staying overnight at Malang because we will be at Bromo tomorrow morning. She also asked if the next person behind me is my friend and of course it wasn't. My friends were lining up just behind that woman and of course I was too eager to get through the immigration that I had walked away and only realized that probably I should mentioned that the other two behind the line, we are travelling together. Anyway, all of us got through fine at the immigration, grab our bags and off we go looking for the rest of the gang who had flown in on an earlier flight.
This post could go on again about the how you will be literally shoved a bunch of telephone sim cards at your face right at the entrance of the airport. Just a reminder for you, these people are pretty persistent about selling their stuffs and yes, they will want to hang around you even you have clearly said, you didn't want a sim card. So the best options is to simply ignore them until they flee for their next victims (oops, customers).
So there you go, if this is your first time visiting Indonesia, do expect those fingerprints and face detection right at the immigration counter. Just in case you do not speak Malay or Indonesian and didn't have the time to read the instructions for the fingerprints detection, I hope this post will help.
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