I did my undergraduate study at Institut Teknologi Bandung (ITB) located at the city of Bandung. Locals often call it as the Indonesian MIT. ITB is also a multi-campus, meaning they have different sites across West Java. In Bandung, I was based in its central campus, ITB Ganesha, close to the city’s center. To the city’s border, a charming twin of the campus was built on Jatinangor. ITB Jatinangor was huge with parks and lakes. During my freshman year, I often dreamt of studying there so I could run there daily. This is a short documentation of our ambitious 22K run to explore our other campus.

Before the run

Pretty sure I was inspired by freshman year students who were sharing their running journey in Twitter. By the new system, they must spend their freshman year in Jatinangor and they had to record their training with Strava for the general sport class. I saw someone attempted a run between ITB Ganesha and Jatinangor and thought, “Hey! I can try that too. Even better, I know Tio can do it.”

Tio was an important friend during my undergraduate study. I might remember it wrongly, but we started to get to know each other at the running tracks of Bandung through a mutual friend, Jeffrey. I spent many mornings and evenings running with him, followed by a visit to our favorite food stalls around the city. You know you found someone special when you could talk about anything nonstop with them.

At the beginning of my stay in Bandung, I sometimes did my runs alone. Arbi and Albert were some of the people that I first met on the the campus’ running track. Arbi was a weight-lifter for sure, but he still took time to do his cardio. Albert was more of a cardio guy because of his family who routinely run at their home city, Bogor.

By the end of my study, the four of us–the active run enjoyers in our major–were bound to take on this challenge. I also invited Marcel, our traveler, to join us at ITB Jatinagor.

Two days before the big day, I ran a 6K to test my speed and it was not that bad. The day before, I had a usual day of doing research at STP building–a coworking space from our campus’ bussiness. At night, I hung out with other math friends to eat at a nearby Japanese food stall. I spent sometime chatting with Dania back at STP until it’s almost 10 PM. It was a great night and I walked rushly back to home while preparing breakfast and the running logistics.

“Muka lo kayak bantal” (“You have a pillow face”)

We put a target to gather in front of ITB Ganesha at 5.30 AM. I walked and jogged a little there as a warm up. My friends truly being playful told me that I had a pillow face. Clearly, I just woke up so I could just pretend to be annoyed.

We ran down from our campus to the south, cruising through the empty Juanda Street before using the main road of Bandung.

Our running journey

When I ran alone around the city, I was capable to manage my navigation system: reading the map in advance and remembering them. However, when I ran with Tio, my brain just flushed all of those skills. Maybe it’s because he’s always been the reliable one on the street: the guy who cycles everywhere for sure knows how to navigate the city. I checked my Google Maps for once or twice, but mainly I let Tio led us the way. I knew he could out run all of us, but during these slow runs, he tended to be the one who checked up on each of us and led the team.

When you’re running close to the high way, the gas stops are your water stations. I remembered eating bananas on our first gas stop as some of us took turn visiting the washroom. Eventually after an hour, we were able to see a mountain which I’m guessing to be Manglayang Mountain. It was a striking view coming from an urban area where buildings were your furthest view, to such a big mountain.

Almost another hour after seeing the mountain, we stopped by a gas stop again. I remembered sitting by the front of the stop while waiting for my friends.

The track was getting harder as we’re closing to ITB Jatinagor. The elevation gain was getting more obvious. However, we pushed through it and I’m proud for everyone’s effort.

Exploring Jatinangor

As I mentioned, my dream was to visit the running track circling the lake in the campus. Hence, the first thing we did was to visit that track and I did one lap around it!

Afterwards, we walked around the campus. It was huge, far larger than what we had in Ganesha. I remembered sitting on a bench close to a garden. I should have taken more pictures, but unsurprisingly, the only picture that I took was a poster on our sexual violence hotline. I was immersed on the issue of sexual violence within our campus environment.

Pretty sure we also visited the only mall close to the campus and grabbed lunch there. We also stopped by a nearby famous noodle shop to grab another meal. You tend to eat a lot after a long tiring run. We finally took the bus to get back to the central of Bandung. While walking to the bus stop, I think an inside joke was born as Albert kept asking me, “Are we there yet? How much distance left do we have?” I said, “This is my siksa kubur.” For context, siksa kubur (translating to “grave torture”) is an Islamic theological concept about the punishment that a person receives in their grave after death, before the Day of Judgment.

Aftermath

As we arrived at the center of Bandung, we took our last round of drinking in Mee Hao, our local favorite curry noodle shop. After parting ways with Arbi, we visited Levana and William who’s studying on a nearby coffee shop, Tomoro. I ended the day by buying steamed bread with Tio on the street. I had a strong after-thought on how grateful I was to have friends like them. We could talk endlessly for hours during our run and somehow it didn’t feel awkward and boring. Even after our day, I still closed it with Tio close to where I was staying. Any mundane activities are fun when you’re with the right people.