Jakarta's Glodok in the Wet: Jamu Healers and Kopitiam Thunder

Rain hit the corrugated awning above Jalan Pancoran like a drum kit nobody asked for. I was standing under it with a plastic bag of jamu kunyit asam turning warm in my hand, watching a guy on a Honda Vario hydroplane through a puddle the size of a kiddie pool. This is Glodok in the wet season — December through February, roughly — when the old Chinatown trades its usual diesel heat for a grey, dripping closeness that smells like clove cigarettes and wet cardboard.

Most Jakarta guides will send you to Kota Tua, the Dutch colonial square ten minutes north, and leave Glodok as a footnote. That's backwards. Glodok is the older story, the messier one, and it rewards you more if you show up without expecting it to perform.

1. Getting there without overpaying

TransJakarta Corridor 1 drops you at Glodok station. Tap your Flazz or e-money card — Rp 3.500 flat fare from anywhere on the network. From the station, walk south down Jalan Pancoran. That's it.

Grab drivers will quote you Rp 40.000–60.000 from Gambir station for a trip that takes longer than the bus because of the one-way system around Kota. I've done both. The bus wins every time unless it's after 10 p.m., when frequency drops and the sheltered walkways get dark.

2. Pantjoran PIK vs. Pantjoran Glodok — the real one

There's a sanitized "Chinatown" experience out at PIK, the reclaimed-land suburb in North Jakarta, with red lanterns strung at photogenic intervals and air-conditioned food courts. Skip it. It's a mall wearing a costume.

The actual Pantjoran is here, along Jalan Pancoran and the lanes that branch off it. The Dharma Bhakti temple — or what's left after the 2015 fire — sits partway down the street with its blackened beams still visible behind the reconstruction scaffolding. Incense smoke drifts out to the sidewalk and mixes with the rain.

The density is what matters. Within two hundred meters you pass apothecaries selling dried seahorses by weight, a shop doing nothing but rubber stamps, three gold dealers, and a woman who's been selling fried tahu isi from the same cart since at least 2016 when I first walked through here. Rp 2.000 per piece. She doesn't have a sign.

Stay in Jakarta

Top-rated hotels near Jakarta

Best locations · Verified reviews · Free cancellation

View deals

Expedia →

3. Jamu ladies and the turmeric question

The jamu gendong sellers — women carrying bamboo baskets of bottled herbal tonics — are harder to find in Glodok than the internet suggests. Wet season mornings, they tend to work the residential alleys east of Jalan Kemenangan rather than the main commercial streets. I found one on a Tuesday around 8 a.m. near Gang Gloria, selling beras kencur (rice-and-galangal tonic) and kunyit asam (tamarind-turmeric) for Rp 5.000 a glass.

Here's where I'll disagree with the wellness-tourism crowd: jamu is not a miracle. It's a cold, gritty drink that tastes like someone juiced a garden. I like it the way I like black coffee — for the ritual, not the supposed healing properties. The turmeric will stain your shirt permanently, which is its most reliable effect.

If you want the bottled version to take home, Toko Jamu Nyonya Djawa on Jalan Petak Sembilan sells packaged sachets. More consistent. Less romantic.

4. Kopitiam thunder

Wet-season mornings in Glodok's coffee shops have a specific sound: rain on zinc roofing so loud you have to lean across the table to order. The kopitiams here serve kopi tubruk — ground coffee dumped straight into hot water, no filter, grounds settling at the bottom like silt.

Kopi Es Tak Kie, Jalan Pintu Besar Selatan No. 92, is the one every food blogger photographs. It deserves the attention. The space is narrow, maybe eight tables, with ceramic-tile walls that haven't changed since the 1920s. A cup of kopi susu runs Rp 18.000. The toast with kaya jam is Rp 15.000 and arrives on a steel plate that's older than anyone in the room.

But Tak Kie gets a line by 9 a.m. on weekends. Walk three minutes south to the less-documented Kedai Kopi Lim on the same street. Cheaper by a couple thousand rupiah, no wait, same tubruk method. The chairs are plastic. The coffee doesn't care.

5. Petak Sembilan and the temple circuit

Jalan Petak Sembilan runs parallel to Pancoran, one block east — the spine of old Glodok's temple network. Vihara Jin De Yuan, rebuilt after a 2015 fire, is the largest, and during wet season the courtyard fills with rain that pools around the stone bases of incense urns. The combination of smoke and wet stone is singular.

Don't try to do every temple in one go. There are at least five within walking distance and they start to blur. Jin De Yuan and the smaller Dharma Jaya on Jalan Kemenangan Raya are enough.

Last time I was here in January, a funeral procession came through Petak Sembilan with a paper-mâché house the size of a sedan, meant for burning. Traffic stopped. Everyone waited. Nobody honked, which in Jakarta qualifies as a supernatural event.

Stay in Jakarta

Top-rated hotels near Jakarta

Best locations · Verified reviews · Free cancellation

View deals

Expedia →

6. Where to eat when it won't stop raining

Wet days push everyone indoors, which means the good warungs fill fast. Priorities:

Pantjoran Tea House, Jalan Pintu Besar Selatan No. 92B, serves dim sum-influenced snacks and Chinese-Javanese fusion dishes in a restored shophouse. The kwetiau goreng is greasy in the right way. Budget around Rp 35.000–50.000 per person.

For bakmi, Bakmi Aboen on Jalan Mangga Besar Raya has been doing the same thin egg noodles with char siu since the 1970s. A bowl of bakmi ayam is Rp 30.000. Cash only.

Skip the seafood restaurants along Jalan Mangga Besar that advertise in English. They're tourist-priced and the fish sits longer than it should. If someone hands you a laminated menu with photographs, walk out.

7. The apothecaries and dried-goods alleys

The lanes between Jalan Pancoran and Petak Sembilan are lined with traditional Chinese medicine shops — glass jars of dried longan, goji berries, sliced astragalus, and things I couldn't identify and didn't ask about. Prices are negotiable but not aggressively so. A bag of dried red dates runs around Rp 25.000–40.000 depending on grade.

These shops double as informal social clubs. Old men play chess in the back. Cats sleep on sacks of dried mushrooms. Nobody will pressure you to buy anything, which is refreshing after the sales energy of Tanah Abang market.

One shop on the north end of Gang Gloria sells fresh-ground white pepper by the kilo — Rp 120.000 last I checked — and the smell alone is worth the detour. Sneezing optional.

8. Leaving before the afternoon flood

Glodok floods. Not metaphorically. The area around Jalan Jembatan Batu and the canal can take on 20–30 centimeters of standing water after sustained afternoon rain, especially in January. The flooding is usually passable by foot if you're in sandals and don't mind wading, but it shuts down some of the smaller alleys and makes the TransJakarta walkway slippery.

Plan to arrive early — 7 a.m. if you want kopitiam and jamu, 9 a.m. if you just want to walk — and clear out by 1 or 2 p.m. The afternoon downpours tend to start around 3 p.m. and the drainage hasn't improved much despite years of city promises.

A morning here is enough. Don't stretch it.