There's no such thing as a free lunch...Or is there?

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It's official. The next president of Indonesia is former army general Prabowo Subianto. Quite how the next five years will pan out is anyone's guess but hopefully the foreign pundits who always bring up his dodgy human rights record will be proven wrong. Nonetheless, on policy making, Prabowo's popularist move to literally offer the poor 'a free lunch' every day of the week does not augur well for the future. Such a policy - if it ever came to fruition - would cost a phenomenal amount of money and likely lead to huge inefficiencies (food waste) and poor incentives (make people lazy). Another concern is Prabowo's strong nationalist bent. Thus, in the possible event that he finds himself with his back against the proverbial wall in the face of stern economic challenges, there is a big chance that he will simply scapegoat foreigners. But he will have to be careful. Construction of the new capital city, Nusantara, for example, is highly dependent on foreign in
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Gokul Resto Jakarta

WTF moments come thick and fast in the Big Durian.

And this time it’s served up on the proverbial plate by Groupon Indonesia in collaboration with a non-descript little resto in the Pasar Baru district of Central Jakarta.
 Pasar Baru Jakarta
Groupon, as you probably already know, is a growing internet company which offers discounts at restaurants, hotels and also for goods which you buy online and are then posted to you.
The restaurant discounts are usually pretty good – up to around 50 percent – but the idea is the restaurant benefits by getting tons of promotion and new customers through its doors.

Hopefully, the customer will have a good experience and they will want to come back. And also pass on the word to their friends as well.

But this is not always the case.

As I found out on Saturday.

Now I’d never heard of Gokul but decided to try the Groupon offer as I love authentic, quality Indian food and because I often find myself in the Pasar Baru area.

The restaurant was easy to find but perched up on the fourth floor of a music shop is not exactly the sort of place you are going to accidentally find.

Inside it’s bright enough with lots of large windows but feels a lot like an office canteen.

We order the food.

About 15 minutes later it’s brought over and what surprises me is that the portions are tiny.

I call back the waitress and mention this to her.

And then in a totally deadpan voice she calmly tells me:

“For these 50% Groupon price offers we are serving smaller portions. Usually the servings would be about twice as large.’”

WTF!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Too stunned to even reply.

Hahaha!!!!!

As for the food, it was definitely nothing to shout about at all.

Although the skyline of central Jakarta was pleasant enough…

Jakarta skyline

Gokul Resto
Wijaya Musik Building 4th Floor
Jl. Pasar Baru No 12.
Telp: (021) 381 0492

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