Yogyakarta: August 2015
I’ll start by saying, I had really high expectations of Indonesia. It has been in the top three for years, and I was so excited to finally visit. Never go in with high expectations…
Yogyakarta, indonesia.
Singapore felt like a vacation, and we were now back in SE Asia. We decided to bypass Jakarta, since it just seemed like another big city. Instead we headed straight for Yogyakarta or Yogya for short. The “Y” is pronounced like a “J,” so it sounds like, “Jōgjakarta. Very confusing for us in the beginning. We decided to try out an Ibis Hotel. They were so helpful in Laos, and we never forget an act of kindness! While not a fancy hotel by any means, it’s clean, modern, and gets the job done. As we walked around the town, the people were very friendly. Everyone was always smiling, even if they had nothing to gain from us. Just happy, friendly people. Very nice. We tried the local soup place across the street.
Noodles for the meatballs.
There were these questionable meatballs in the soup. Let’s just say that was a first and last for us. We walked the noisy streets and found ourselves in a mall, where they sold weasel coffee for $8 a cup. No thank you.
The next morning, we set out for the train station. We had a long journey ahead of us, and wanted to make sure we had tickets and were ready to go. We also booked a tour to see the temples- Borobudur and Prambanan. We went to a few different tourist offices, and they all offered the same thing for about the same price. So, we went with the first one. Here’s what our tour was sold as: Sunrise and visit at Borobudur followed by a visit to Prambanan. Here’s what actually happened…
waiting for the Sunrise
We woke up long before the sunrise, and the van was late picking us up. No big deal. We drove with our group for about an hour. As we were driving, we passed by a hotel who’s name was familiar. I had read about this place…There was a group of asian tourists crossing the street to enter the hotel. Why is a group of tourists entering this hotel at 5am? And then it hit me… this was the hotel I had read about that backs into Borobudur. I had read blogs where people said this was the way to see the sunrise from inside Borobudur. Okay, so we were close…or so I thought. We clearly weren’t going to see the sunrise from inside Borobudur but when they put the two words together (sunrise-Borobudur) it gives an impression that the two are linked somehow. I was thinking it was maybe like Machu Picchu, where you stand above the ruins and look down on the site while the sun comes up. NOPE. We kept driving, and driving, and driving. I’m thinking, we are so far from the site. Where are we going? When we finally stop and walk up the hill to the viewing point, we are joined by at least 100 other people. All looking just as confused as us. Some of the other people in our van were upset that we weren’t at Borobudur. I guess they had the same misleading hook-line. At the top of the hill, we could see the sun rising in the distance between the mountains. Where was Borobudur? Well, down in the fog of course? Could we see it?
Sunrise near Borobudur
At one point, we may have been able to see the highest point. But it was so far away, you needed a really good zoom to snap a decent picture, or binoculars. This would be the first of many disappointments in this country. We sat there while the sun rose. We were most unimpressed, and would have rather slept in.
On to Borobudur. Borobudur is the largest Buddhist temple in the world. The walls are covered in thousands of relief carvings.
Borobudur Temple. Indonesia.
There are several perforated stupas all around, each with a sitting Buddha inside. That was really cool to see. The structure is massive and a bit overwhelming. There are stairs which allow you to ascend the temple, mimicking a pilgrim’s journey. As we walked around and to the different levels, we noticed many local children taking with the tourists. They were speaking English and doing some sort of school project. Of course, they picked out only the white tourists, many of which could barely speak English themselves. I got a kick out of eavesdropping.
Local students.
As a side note, I had read a review written by a Canadian guy. He was complaining that the place is filled with these kids who constantly stop you for an “interview.” He was harassed so much, he couldn’t even enjoy his time there. Interesting.
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We were given a time to return to our van, so with 15 minutes left to spare we decided to walk back. Mind you, it only took us about 5 minutes to walk there. We ended up being late for our van and had to take a big generic bus. We were not happy about this arrangement. But here’s why we were late. When we exited, we followed the exit signs. The signs lead you through a maze of shops. We never once even slowed down to look at anything and it took us almost 25 minutes to get back to the van. Just when we thought we had arrived, there was another walkway with stands on either side selling their shirts, statues, and other souvenirs.
Never ending exit.
Let’s just say that when we finally arrived, we were pretty fed up, and then we were kicked out of our nice comfy van into a hot sticky bus. In the future, if anyone decides to visit Borobudur, either give yourself 30 minutes to get back to your vehicle, or walk to the front of the temple and exit the way you entered.
Our sticky bus decided to make an unscheduled stop. Great. There was a stupa to see, but you had to pay extra. No one did, but since I’m sure the driver gets some sort of kick-back, we all had to find some shade and wait around. The day was not going so great, until we arrived in Prambanan. We were not feeling too excited about the place, and to be honest, just wanted to get back home.
Pramanan Temple. Indonesia.
Prambanan is the largest Hindu temple in Indonesia. There are three main temples, representing- Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva. As we entered the temple grounds a teenager approached us and asked if we wanted a free tour. We were skeptical. He had a badge, and said he was in school and studying to be a tour guide. He comes to the temple after school, to practice his English-guide skills. Javier and I told him we had no money, which was mostly true, and he assured us, it was truly a free tour, and he was just happy to practice his English. We reluctantly said okay. This kid was great. He tried really hard, and knew his stuff (I think). Either he’s a really good actor, or he really is practicing.
Our guide in Prambanan.
The temples were beautiful. Very intricate in their designs and carvings. Each temple holds a god in the middle. He walked us through two of the temples, and as we were going through the third, we arrived at a portion of the wall with carvings, and he started to point and laugh. We didn’t get it at first, but he was point to a penis. Apparently, this portion of the wall is about procreation and fertility. He kept giggling, which made us giggle. As we were exiting, another guide, an older man, points to a carving above the doorway and says, “Do you know what that is?” We said, “No.” He says, “It’s a vagina.” “Oh,” we say. The kid starts laughing again. The older guide gives us a little backstory on the temple, and we looked at the kid and said, how com you didn’t tell us that? He says (with his hands on his head, red faced, half-laughing, in a high-pitched squeaky voice) “But I’m just a child!! I don’t know anything about that stuff!!” I believe him. The kid made our day, after that, it was back home and early to bed. It had been a long day.
Performance of Indonesian dancing
We visited the Kraton (Palace) as we were told there was a performance every Sunday. The performance hadn’t started yet, so we took a tour of the grounds. I wasn’t all too impressed, although, from the painted portraits on the walls, the royalty used to put these pointy decorations on the tops of their ears. At the risk of sounding culturally insensitive, it makes them look like little elves. The palace is the house of the former Sultan of Yogyakarta. Today, it serves as a museum of sorts and a Javanese cultural center. After a quick walkthrough, we could hear the music, and followed it to the performance. It was traditional Indonesian dancing. On one stage, the men and women were practicing. There was music and singing performed by a group of men and a woman singer. The students practiced, with their teachers walking amongst them making adjustments here and there. The other stage was the main event. When we arrived, there were three men performing. I’m not sure which dance they were doing, but they had tall, gold, shrine-type things on the tops of their heads, and did this very unique thing with their necks. It was all about hand and head movements. Very precise. It was sort of mesmerizing. We watched for a while, before getting hungry and returning to our neighborhood for lunch. On our way out, a group of young girls overheard us talking and stopped to ask us questions. A first for us!
On the walk back, we stopped by the central market for lunch. As we walked through, I had to stop at a stand selling old cassette tapes. Talk about throwback.
Yogyakarta, Indonesia.
The next day, we did laundry and ate at a tiny bistro across the street. It was so small, we didn’t even notice it at first. We didn’t eat much, more of a snack, but they had this vegan chocolate bread. We bought a piece to try, and were in love! We ended up buying four more loaves for our train ride the following day. What I would do for the chocolate bread now… For dinner, we went to where the backpackers hang out. There was a place we had found after our tour earlier, and liked it so much, we decided to return. For our entire stay in Yogya, we had been oscillating between two places for dinner. Not very exciting, but neither is Indonesian food (in our opinion). On our final night, we sat and ordered. As we were waiting for our food, we saw an Indian couple that we had seen all over town. It started with the tour. Even though we didn’t speak to each other, we were on the same tour, and therefore recognized one another at different parts of the city. We would politely wave to one each other, but that was it. The restaurant was packed, and they were in for a long wait. We had two extra seats, so we asked if they wanted to join us. They were a little surprised, but accepted. We chatted all through dinner and got to know one another. They found out how long we had been traveling, and had lots of questions. We asked about them, and they told us we would probably find them strange, but they were newly-weds, but have only known each other for a few months. He lives and works in Singapore, and they met through an Indian dating website. After two weeks of talking, they, and their families, met face-to-face, and started planning a wedding. They were married two months later, and at this point, they had been married for about 5 months. It was kind of wild to think that in the time we had been traveling, they had met and married. To each his own, I say. Dinner was very pleasant and it was really nice just to have people to share it with. It’s rare these days we get to share a meal with others.
Borobudur, Central Java. Indonesia.
We ended our night early and had an early train to catch to Surabaya and connect to Probolinggo, where we would have the worst experience thus far on our trip. 🙁
To see more pictures of Indonesia, click HERE.