Of late, Jeremiah has been taking bacaks, the Indonesian version of the trishaw, quite a bit over the past two weeks. One is supposed to haggle with the bacak operator the cost of the ride before the start of the journey.
A typical exchange would be as follows:
Jeremiah: Ke Galleria Mall, berapa harganya?
*Confused look and after a pause* Becak Operator: 20,000 Rupiah
*Shakes Head" Jeremiah: Mahal sekali! [Very expensive]
Berapa harganya literally means how much is that. However, Jeremiah just learnt today that it should only be used for goods. For services, one should use berapa onkosnya . When Jeremiah asked berapa harganya , the becak operators could have interpreted the question as how much their becaks cost. Hence the confused looks.
Oops.
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