One day, a letter arrived at siesta.
From the tropics — Indonesia.

What began as a simple conversation about food slowly unfolded into a more intimate space: weaving across memory, familiarity, and the quiet ways culture travels through distances.

Following our previous story with a writer from Spain, this marks siesta’s second collaboration with an international contributing writer.

A quiet reflection on Japan, from Jakarta — written by Jakarta-based food & lifestyle writer Sharima Umaya.

Read in Japanese here

Written by Sharima Umaya

Edit and Japanese translation by Natsuko

Twenty three years ago, I was a little girl wandering through the busy streets of Tokyo, trailing behind my family members into a game center in Roppongi. I remember the glow of the machines, the overlapping sounds of laughter and arcade music, and the feeling that everything around me was slightly more vivid than real life. Tokyo felt like a wonderland to me, where the anime I grew up watching suddenly had a physical form. 

But my connection to Japan didn’t begin with that trip… Years before I was born, Tokyo had already been part of my family’s story. 

Mama Sharima in her Tokyo kitchen, back in the 1970s

My mother lived there for almost a decade in the 1970s, while my father, other than his work, was also a karateka who won a gold medal in a national championship in my home country and often visited Tokyo. Looking back, it feels as though my familiarity with Japan was not something I learned, but something I inherited. 

Growing up in Jakarta, Japanese culture was never distant. Anime was shown on most national TV, my father also occasionally brought me school supplies from Pokemon Center and Sanrio during his business trips. Now speaking about food. Sushi and sukiyaki were among my favorite meals as a child. My first encounter with nigiri happened not in Japan, but in Jakarta, at a restaurant called Ippachi. There was no hesitation, only curiosity, trying to understand the texture and taste of raw fish. That curiosity stayed. 

Today, I am a food and lifestyle writer based in Jakarta. I began writing about food in 2015, initially contributing short reviews to food directory platforms like Zomato, Foody.id, and Qraved (similar to Tabelog in Japan). At the time, writing was something I did on the side, alongside a corporate career. 

But over the years, my relationship with food and with writing deepened. In 2019, I started contributing to a food media focusing on food culture named Top Tables, which later became Feastin.id, and found myself drawn not just to the act of eating, but to the stories behind it. 

I eventually left my corporate job in 2024 to pursue writing fully. What compelled me was a realization: much of food writing in Indonesia often stops at the question of taste—what is good, what is worth trying. But what stayed with me after each assignment was never just the dish. It was the people and their obsession with doing something well, repeatedly, over time.

The memories I had with my father, who frequently brought me to various restaurants, also lingered. They all became core memories, and I have this fear of forgetting the details of the places we visited. Japanese restaurants were on heavy rotation among the places we went. In that sense, my growing interest in Japanese food felt like a natural extension of what I was already searching for.

Both Japan and Indonesia share a deep respect for craftsmanship. In Indonesia, we see it in traditional cooking methods, in the way recipes are passed down, and in the patience required to create even a single dish. 

In Japan, this manifests through an almost meditative attention to detail, often described as the Shokunin spirit. 

I saw this firsthand during my visit to Kesennuma last summer. 

Kesennuma, Miyagi, Japan

I met a few artisans; one of them was Mr. Takeshi, an oyster farmer who dedicated his life to producing the most plump oysters. To date, it was the sweetest oyster I have ever had in my life.

As someone who also cooks Japanese food (especially preparing bento for my husband), I find that making each element in a bento requires patience.

Bento

For instance, when I make pickles for the side dishes or prepare grilled fish with miso or shio, the flavors become much more intense after resting for two days, and it is worth the wait. In Indonesian cuisine, the famous rendang offers a similar lesson in patience. The dish is cooked slowly over hours, allowing the coconut milk and spices to gradually reduce until they cling deeply to the meat, transforming both its texture and flavor. 

Japanese cuisine has been deeply embedded in urban Indonesian life for quite awhile. Across different social and economic backgrounds, people are familiar with a wide spectrum of Japanese dining: from casual, yatai-inspired meals to high-end omakase experiences featuring ingredients flown in directly from Japan. When I spoke to representatives from the Japan National Tourism Organization and the
Japan Foundation at an event earlier this year, they expressed genuine surprise at how knowledgeable and adventurous Indonesian diners have become when it comes to Japanese food. 

Like 'Ichigo-ichie': More and more niche Japanese concepts are finding their way into English titles.

At the same time, like many parts of the world, Indonesia is also highly responsive to trends. The recent rise of matcha is a clear example. Over the past two years, the market has seen an influx of matcha brands, ranging from more accessible options to premium, carefully sourced varieties. 

On one hand, this reflects a growing interest and openness. On the other hand, it raises questions about how deeply this interest is understood. In many cases, matcha is consumed as part of a lifestyle, a visual marker of taste, rather than an entry into its cultural and artisanal roots.

Yet, beyond its vibrant green color and distinct bitterness, matcha carries with it a long history of cultivation, preparation, and ritual. To fully appreciate it requires more than just consumption; it requires attention.

It reflects something I recognize, not only in my upbringing, but in the way I have come to see food through my work. It’s a respect for process plus a belief that craft matters. If my connection to Japan began as something inherited, passed down through family, memory, and early exposure, then my relationship with its food is something I continue to build, through each plate I consume and story I listen to.

Perhaps that is why Japanese food has never felt foreign to me—not because it feels foreign, but because it never really did.

This brings me back to what continues to draw me to Japanese food.

For Sharima, food represents family, early memories, and the people who share it.

Beyond its precision or aesthetics, it is the philosophy behind it that resonates most deeply with me: the idea of honoring ingredients at their peak, of allowing seasonality to guide what is served and how it is experienced. There is a confidence in this approach: nothing is forced, nothing is excessive. You can taste it in the subtle sweetness of salmon when it is in season, or in the almost unreal depth of flavor in a perfectly ripened melon. These are moments that remind you that food, at its best, does not need to be complicated, it only needs to be understood. 

   Sharima Umaya @sharimaumaya

Special thanks to Rachel from @kikkaya.wagashi

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