Tales of the Great Durian

Website design By BotEap.comThe Durian is a controversial fruit; loved by many, while others are disgusted by its strong odor and strange appearance. Jakarta, one of the largest and least-known cities in Southeast Asia, is nicknamed the “Big Durian.” Tales from the Big Durian is a collection of true stories and experiences that cross the lines of “normalcy” and takes readers into the surreal life of a megacity torn between Western modernization and traditional beliefs.

Website design By BotEap.comThe book begins with a short story about differences in cultural beliefs, where locals prefer skin-whitening creams to exposure to the hot tropical Indonesian sun. It leads to a collection of weird and funny stories mixing expats and locals together, leading to a chaotic mix of misunderstandings, which end up just as confusing as they were at the beginning.

 

As you travel through a sprawling ultramodern city towards dilapidated tenements and shacks of the poor. Where a society lives on the brink of earthquakes and floods, while millions of people somehow find a way to make a living.

 

On the streets of this bustling city, luxurious shopping malls clash with hawkers selling everything imaginable, and Porsches battle East Asia’s most dangerous buses for space on Jakarta’s congested highways.

 

The stories are often “human” stories; the anonymous street food vendor outside a Western-style bar, or the residents of a dilapidated apartment block, which has a reputation for being haunted. People that exist, but they are often nameless characters that make the city of Jakarta so interesting.

 

Each page invites you into a very real world, you can experience it first hand by flipping through a variety of stories, that confuse you, bring joy or just disgust.

 

Welcome to the surreal and yet very real world of the “Great Durian”.

 

“Tales from the Big Durian” is available in eBook form, through Fultus Books.