We had one of those weird “I thought I was starting to understand this place but I guess not” moments this weekend that I had to share. I am sorry no pictures accompany this post, but use your imagination, it will be fun.
This weekend was pretty low key in the grand scheme of things. We were in Jakarta and spent most of the weekend playing Settlers and Carcasonne (another game like Settlers that has take the Ultimate group by storm.) Before settling into board games and margaritas, at the suggestion of our friends Drew, Melanie and the recommendation of the Jakarta Javakini (source of all things cool in Jakarta) we decided to check out Midas, the “Magic Restaurant”. Supposedly Midas has magicians that come to your table and do tricks while you wait for your meal. Although something a 10 year old might like, since we were about to play board games and we would be coming from the local putt putt, it seemed appropriate. I think we were all expecting a bunch of birthday parties and cheesy pulling quarters out from behind ears and we were all interested in seeing the menu items supposedly named cleverly using magic trick names and famous magicians.
So, first off the bat, the place is clearly not meant for kids. I would describe the atmosphere as swanky. Everything is draped in red and it feels very NYC lounge style bar. Seated inside, it was just our table of 6 and another table of about 10 women clearly celebrating something. We ordered some apps and asked the waitress for the “orang magic” (magic person) who arrived right with the apps. (Hence making apps hard to eat, but we let that go.) He did a couple card tricks and it was cute and all, but that turned out to be the end of the magic. Food was fine, a bit on the pricey side, although that is what you get when you order things with (not so) clever magic trick names. As we were finishing up, we were remarking on the disappointing amount of magic. Suddenly there was a shrill whistle. Excited for more magic we look around…Where is the magician? Will he appear in a puff of smoke? Nope. But something did appear - from a secret spot behind the bar appeared a pretty close to naked woman who proceeded to dance on the bar….somewhat provocatively I might add. And there were 4 of them. Each taking their turn strutting their stuff on the bar, twirling on the pole….how had we missed that stripper pole at the end of the bar? All I can say is it was weird. Don’t get me wrong, the men did not mind, but even they seemed thrown off. It was all just so unexpected and out of place…
Perhaps the definition of magic got lost in translation somewhere? Or maybe after we left on of those women was sawed in half? I am guessing not…but maybe….
