Le Chien au Cafe

I am ready to report the one thing I never thought would happen living in Jakarta.



Don't mind my Saturday look, we're just here for a baguette...or four.

At a recent party I learned that there is a café in this city that allows dogs. If you need a reminder, Indonesia is not a particularly dog-friendly place. Muslims consider dogs dirty (something about them willingly licking their own asses).

While too polite to say anything, I can tell that some of our Indonesian friends are quietly horrified that we allow Stanley to sit on our couch with his dirty paws and dirty mouth. Bringing him to a place for eating? Unheard of. This would be like if I called up TGI Friday's and asked if I could bring in my pet rat.

Anyway I was cautiously excited about this café. But I needed to know if this was all a ruse. I rehearsed how to say, "can I bring my dog to your café?" in Indonesian and rang up the place, feeling really silly about the question and fairly certain the answer would be, "lady, you crazy."

Instead, the person who answered the phone said, "Sophie Authentique bonjour!" And somewhere in my heart my dream of taking Stanley out to meet the people grew tenfold. Here I was, having a full on discussion IN FRENCH in Jakarta of all places. And when I asked the man if I could bring my dog, he said, "oui madam. bien sûr." That's right, bien flippin sûr. Stanley, freshen yourself. We're headed out for croissants.

A rare outing with the WHOLE family.

This is how we discovered Sophie Authentique, a legit French café right in our neighborhood that serves a macchiato that can snap awake any parent in the Saturday slump. A place that makes its own paté and is not afraid to put a quiche Lorraine on the menu (pork is also a no no here). Stanley was surfing fallen croissant crumbs faster than you can say, "quel chien chic!"
We got a few stares from patrons but mostly people were curious and smiling. The staff didn't even flinch. I'm already imagining the chic outfits Stanley will refuse to wear when we stop by Sophie's for a weekend pain au chocolat. This, my friends, is what we call a game changer.