On The Road: Glenn Wool's first time in Indonesia

Glenn Wool, No Lands Man, Indonesia background

Tim Clark15 November 2012

For those who haven't had the pleasure of seeing the live show, Glenn Wool's new DVD No Lands Man revolves around a very interesting experience at the hands of Indonesian immigration.

With that in mind SSP asked Mr Wool to recollect his first experience as a young 26-year-old Canadian comic heading to the orient for the first time with his On The Road, read on:

I'm in an Indonesian airport again for maybe the 10th time in my life, which is ten times more than I would ever have thought I'd be, if you were to ask the teenage version of myself to guesstimate that sort of number. Though I used to spend most of the time in classrooms wisely staring out windows hoping that a plane would go by so I could imagine myself on it, far away from the thundering boredom of mandatory French classes in the Canadian school system. I never had anything against Jakarta, but it just never popped up on my radar as a significant destination.

Now it is, and I miss it if I’m away too long. But it hasn’t always been easy. This is where I did my first ex-pat gig that was booked from London. I had to fly three different connections to get to Jakarta and, when I landed, I wasn’t told about the little story I needed to tell just to get into the place. If I said anything about working in the UK they would have turned me around then and there and I'd have had to fly the whole journey in reverse, never to be allowed back again.

Luckily, the gentleman at the border didn’t feel like speaking English that day so he just decided to wave me through. How much damage could a hippie with a hangover do in a city of 20 million?

So I was left on the other side of security with the far more immediate problem of having no one there to pick me up. I know now that Jakarta traffic is notoriously unpredictable, but I didn’t know it then. So I was left to wish that I'd written the phone number down of the guy who was supposed to pick me up, or even just his name. Ah, the joys of being 26 years old. You can’t even see 3 flights into the future.

I decided to have a cigarette and beer before I hit the panic button, and can I just say that for all the bad press alcohol and tobacco get, they sure do stave off panic attacks for a good half hour when you really need it. Anyway, I digress. The guy showed up and off we went into the night to do my first gigs in the archipelago of Indonesia. I've been back on numerous occasions now, with adventures that included a near romantic interlude in Balinese customs, a local gangster trying to get me to smoke weed with him in an airport lounge, to mixing with diplomats!

I've had some of the biggest laughs (and hangovers) of my life in that great country. It’s always interesting and that's why I love it.

Glenn Wool, No Lands Man is available from Monday December 3rd.

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