Indonesia Hot -

To call Indonesia "hot" is to state the obvious, but to understand how it is hot is to understand the soul of the archipelago. It is a heat that is generative and destructive; that creates the richest soil and the deadliest eruptions; that makes the food addictive and the traffic unbearable; that makes the people tough, patient, and ready to party as soon as the sun dips below the horizon. Indonesia isn't just hot. Indonesia is the fire.

The tropical heat lowers inhibitions. Clothes are thin, skin is exposed, and the proximity of strangers in the heat creates a specific social chemistry. In Jakarta’s Kota Tua (Old Town), thousands of teenagers gather on the weekends, not to drink (alcohol is expensive and frowned upon), but simply to sweat together, to spray each other with water guns, to walk in circles. The heat justifies the hedonism. It is too hot to wear a jacket; it is too hot to be serious; it is too hot to be anywhere but outside, seeking the breeze. Because the heat is so omnipresent, the Indonesian relationship with "cold" is almost fetishistic. To be dingin (cold) is to be wealthy. It is the feeling of walking into a mall where the air conditioning is set to "arctic blast." It is the es jeruk (iced sweet orange juice) that arrives dripping with condensation. indonesia hot

Walk through a padang restaurant in West Sumatra, and you will see glass cases lined with beef rendang (which uses chili as a preservative as much as a flavor) and bright orange ayam pop . But the true heat is in the raw, ground chili paste— sambal . There are hundreds of variants: Sambal Terasi with its fermented shrimp paste stench; Sambal Matah from Bali, a raw explosion of shallots, lemongrass, and bird's eye chilies; Sambal Ijo (green sambal) from Padang that burns differently, a slow, creeping heat. To call Indonesia "hot" is to state the