Foreigner explores Medan, Indonesia. 🇮🇩

Everyone told me to be careful in Medan. "Watch out!" the said. Well there wasn't much to watch out for except friendly, smiling locals who wanted to chat and take selfies with me.

The guidebooks all tell you to skip Medan. "There's nothing worth seeing there." "It's only worth staying overnight if you have arrive late at night.". A city is always very interesting to me though. Okay it doesn't have a Disneyland or ruins of ancient buildings, but I like to see how ordinary people are going about their daily lives more than visiting tourist traps anyway.

I started off with a visit to Centre Point mall, finally getting a SIM card. With that I was able to use the GoJek app and no longer have to negotiate with the Becaks (Indonesian motorcycle rickshaws). It's also handy being able to pull up Google Maps when you're exploring by foot.

At the mall there's a "street food" food court where you can enjoy authentic Indonesia hawker food in air conditioned comfort (and pay much more for the privilege, but it's still cheap.)

I walked from the mall to Lapangan Merdeka, a big city park where I watched the local kids train to dance in a BTS style and read a poem about Indonesia's independence struggle. That's what I mean when I said you don't need to find massive popular tourist attractions to find something interesting in a city.

From there I walked to the mansion of Tjong A Fie, who was the richest man in Medan a century ago. His family still own the building but most of it has been turned into a museum, which, as museums go was very interesting. It helps a lot that a tour guide is assigned to you for free when you buy the (cheap) ticket.

I ended my afternoon exploration of Medan with a visit to a royal palace known as Istana Maimum. There you can hire traditional Malay clothes to wear for only 20,000 Rupiahs while you explore the palace. I was very sweaty by that point because of the insane humidity and walking around all day, but I still put the costume on and tried not to pass out from the heat.

00:00 $8 Hotel Room
00:00 Becak Haggling
03:16 Centre Point Mall
04:17 Hawker Food Court
09:06 Park (Lepangan Meerdeka)
21:34 Sharing Ice Cream
29:28 Tjong A Fie Mansion
40:06 Maimun Palace
56:30 Selfies

💗 Help the channel grow by liking, commenting and subscribing. If you want to be extra nice please share my video with your friends on social media.

📱 Instagram (Live Story Updates): https://instagram.com/Daleroxxu
📱 Facebook (Shorter Vlogs ~5 minutes): https://www.facebook.com/Daleroxxu/
📱 TikTok (15 - 60 Seconds Vlog Clips): https://www.tiktok.com/@dalephilip
📱 Twitter (Not using this for much): https://twitter.com/Daleroxxu

Видео Foreigner explores Medan, Indonesia. 🇮🇩 канала Dale Philip