WHAT’S YOUR POISON? DINERS FLOCK TO RESTAURANT WITH KILLER COFFEE
Death has not stopped customers from pouring into one trendy Jakarta eatery, and some have even been attracted by a morbid curiosity
Sitting near the bar at a trendy Jakarta restaurant, Bhian Saraswati, 24, said she was not afraid to eat her roast chicken and mashed potatoes.
“I don’t have enemies,” she said. “I like to come here because I can have a smoke after lunch or when I have a cocktail.”
At a nearby booth, Philip Lie, 27, sat with three friends who were visiting Indonesia from Sydney, Australia. He chose an iced cappuccino, rather than a Vietnamese iced coffee — the beverage that has intrigued visitors drawn to the cafe after a young woman drank it and died of cyanide poisoning.
The case of the “coffee murder”, as the local news media calls it, has set off morbid curiosity here in Jakarta and beyond.
And it has brought robust business to Olivier, the restaurant where the young woman died in January, possibly poisoned by her friend and dining companion.
“It’s like a tourist attraction,” said one waitress, speaking in hushed tones because the staff was under orders not to discuss the murder.
“Since it happened, business is booming,” another waitress said.
Guests frequently ask to sit in the booth where the woman sat. Some take selfies. The bar once ran out of the iced coffee she drank.
“Everyone wants to taste that drink,” said Mr Lie, who works at a machinery company in Jakarta. “It’s the happening place right now.”
Olivier, which opened in the Grand Indonesia Mall last year, is decorated in a European style, with tiled floors, a dark wood bar, and a glass ceiling and walls in the main dining room. The waiters wear ties and crisp white vests, and plants throughout the room give it a lush, tropical feel.
The restaurant attracts young urban professionals and hipsters, and is often packed on weekends when the mall fills up. The menu offers a wide selection of teas and coffees, and a mix of Asian and European dishes such as mussels in spicy lime leaf and coconut broth, and spaghetti arrabiata.
The victim, Wayan Mirna Salihin, met her friend Jessica Kumala Wongso in the late afternoon on Jan 6. The women, both 27, had attended university together in Australia.
They were joined that day by a third friend, whom the Jakarta provincial police have identified only as “Hani”, and who remains a witness in the investigation.
According to the police, Ms Wongso arrived at the restaurant about an hour before Salihin and Hani, ordering drinks for herself and her companions. Salihin arrived and took a sip of her coffee, and then complained to her friends that it tasted strange.
Within a minute, Salihin collapsed and went into convulsions. She was rushed to a hospital, where she died a few hours later.
The police conducted an autopsy on Jan 10, and investigators said the results showed that Salihin had died of cyanide poisoning.
Ms Wongso was arrested on Jan 30. She is an official suspect but has not been charged, the police said.
The local news media has speculated that Ms Wongso may have been in love with Salihin during their university days, and that she was angry that Salihin had recently married her longtime boyfriend.
Salihin’s father, Dermawan Salihin, said on a television show that there had been a sexually suggestive text message from Ms Wongso to Salihin shortly before her death.
Ms Wongso’s defence team denies the allegation. Her lawyers have accused the Indonesian police of trying her in the court of public opinion while neither producing evidence showing she had poisoned Salihin nor giving a motive. (The police have ruled out Salihin’s husband as a suspect.)
On a recent day, patrons at Olivier debated who the murderer could be.
Windy, 25, a bus driver who, like many Indonesians, uses only one name, was visiting the restaurant for the first time.
He said he was not convinced that Ms Wongso was guilty. “It could have been her husband,” he said. “In my view, the poison may not have been created that quickly.”
At another table, Nina Annisa, 19, and her friend Nabila, 21, were more suspicious of Wongso.
“She has a tough, almost remorseless face,” said Ms Annisa, who along with her friend is majoring in hotel management at the Sahid Institute of Tourism in Jakarta.
Both women, visiting Olivier for the first time, acknowledged that the death had lured them there during a break from lessons at their nearby campus. “We just wanted to learn about the place, to check it out,” Nabila said.
Gonni Setiawan, who owns a small healthcare clinic on the Indonesian island of Batam, also said he was intrigued by Salihin’s death, but that visiting Olivier had not been his choice.
“My friend wanted to see the place,” he said, pointing to one of his two companions as they took an escalator downstairs to do some shopping.
“It’s booming news — everyone wants to know about it,” Setiawan said, adding that he was not impressed by the coffee. “I think the whole thing is a bit overblown.”