By James

After a three flight slog via Jakarta we finally arrived in Yogyakarta on the southern coast of the island of Java. Our journey involved boring waits in airports, sudden rushes to planes that were not officially announced and lots of different groups of umrah and hajj pilgrims who were all dressed in the same colours. Complete with colour coordinated bags, shirts, dresses, hijabs and even scarves- they looked for all the world like different supporters from different football clubs heading to away games, which all happened to be in Mecca.

We stayed in a place called Hati-Hati (which means ‘look out!’ in Bahasa, the official language of Indonesia’s many languages) and it was where we based ourselves for our visit to the temple sites of Borobudur (Buddhist) and Prambanan (Hindu).

On our ‘orientation day’ that we have in each new country we get to, we headed out to get money and SIM cards. To find SIM cards we headed into the strangest shopping centre I have ever seen. There were three floors: the basement was given over to laptops, the mezzanine was full of mobile phones and the top floor was kitchen appliances. As we still had our computer and were well supplied with blenders, we went to the ‘phone floor’. On it we were greeted by a ridiculous over-abundance of kiosks, all selling phones. I do not exaggerate when I say there were nearly 100 little shops there all selling the same thing. As a market, it just didn’t make any sense!

I picked one at random and started the vastly over-complicated, confusing process of getting a SIM card.  Whilst we were battling to understand their different options I had been spotted by the manager. He came over and asked me to pose with him, holding the new Samsung Galaxy 8 and looking impressed. We didn’t stay long enough to see it put up, but I am now on the side of a billboard somewhere in Yogyakarta, helping to sell phones!

Afterwards, we went off for a cup of tea in a cafe and were accosted by two very sweet university students, who proceeded to interview us for the next 30 minutes. It was lovely to feel so interesting!

After a day of orientation/rest and recovery, we were picked up at 3am by our driver Toto and headed out to the sunrise lookout point over Borobodur an hour north of Yogyakarta. We arrived at a spot that was heaving with locals, looking to make a quick buck off of the gullible tourists (this became a theme for our time in Java that grated ad nausium). We trudged up to the summit and a lovely Chinese man taught me how to take better shots of sunrises. Below is my best attempt.

We headed into the main park at 7am, and made our way through the Tourist Entrance (10x the price of the local ticket), received our cup of Welcome Tea (I’d like to see the Tower of London adopt this approach. We like to think of it as our national drink, after all!), and started up to the main edifice.

Borubudur was built in the 9^th Century by the local Sailendras dynasty and was abandoned in the late 10^th/early 11^th Century, after a series of volcanic eruptions. It was not rediscovered until Governor General Thomas Stamford Raffles (he who founded Singapore) ordered a Dutch engineer to explore the site, towards the end of the 19^th century. The temple itself blends the Indonesian indigenous cult of ancestor worship with the Buddhist concept of attaining Nirvana. The journey for pilgrims starts at the base of the four sided pyramid and rises up the three ‘layers’ to the final platform. The monument’s three divisions symbolise the three ‘realms’ of Buddhist cosmology: the world of desires, the world of forms, and the formless world. The final platform is Nirvana, where 72 Buddhas sit, protected in bell-shaped stone stupas.

Eager not to miss the sunrise, we boosted up to the top platform then worked our way down.

One our way down we encountered groups of school children on trips and families. Every time we met a group of Indonesians, we were made a great fuss of and were forced to pose for multiple selfies, on multiple phones. This was amusing at first, however, after the tenth group it began to grate, and after the twentieth group, we had had enough. It was lucky that I was wearing sunglasses, otherwise the dead, defeated look in my eyes may have ruined their photographs…

After breakfast (little buns we’d bought the day before) and a quick wander around the Samudra Raksa Museum of Naval Exploration- where we saw a reproduction of the ship that carried Javanese sailors all the way to Africa- we met Toto and headed off to Prambanan. (He didn’t sing ‘Africa’, in case you were wondering!)

On our way to Prambanan we stopped off at what is locally known as the Chicken Church. Commissioned by Daniel Alamsjah, who said he had a vision from God, he attempted to build a place of worship in the shape of a giant dove looking over towards Borobudur. Although the funds ran out and it looks like a demented chicken, it was still a lovely place to visit and a great viewpoint from atop its head.

After a hot ride and a brief nap, we arrived at Prambanan temple complex on the outskirts of Yogyakarta- a simple, if imposing series of Hindu temples, the largest honouring the trinity of supreme deities- Shiva, Brama and Vishnu.

We had just climbed up to the top of the first one, Vishnu I think, when I was spotted by a gang of 13 schoolgirls, all under the age of ten. At this point Chloe had completely had enough of posing for selfies, so did her level best to disappear into the darkness of the ten foot square room we were in. Unfortunately, her ninja skills still leave a great deal to be desired and she was discovered.

They all stopped and stared at us in a very awkwardness-inducing way until what appeared to be one of the leaders of the group, a short girl of nine, caught sight of Chloe and, opening her eyes wide in amazement, said ‘Oh. So beautiful!’ After such a cute compliment she was honour bound to take a photo.

(Honestly, I’ve been saying that for years and do I get an awkward group photo? No.)

We left the main complex and went exploring, finding a less frequented, yet we felt, more interesting ruin- Candi Sewu.

(Not to scale)

After such a long day we passed out back at the hotel for a while, then went out to Warung Spesial Sambal (sp). Sambal is a spicy, chunky sauce that is used to flavour rice and meat on one’s plate. This restaurant had over thirty varieties of sambal to taste and the food was lovely.

The following day we visited the rather disappointing Water Palace, which was the Sultan of old’s bathing house. I don’t know if it was the time of year, but the small amount of water there was slimy and disused. It made what should have been a beautiful building, very disappointing and shabby.

When we left we were interviewed again (apparently it’s an end of year assignment) and we made our way to the main shopping street, Maliboro Road. There we were interviewed for the third time and bought some very tasty little paste cakes. Unfortunately I was too slow to get a photo, but I did bear witness to a lady tending to a barbecue on which she was cooking chicken sate kebabs, decide her current location wasn’t profitable enough and put the whole operation, smoking hot barbecue and all, on her head and walk away. Such confidence in her own sense of balance; I would have been horribly disfigured by hot coals…

After a quiet meal we packed up and moved hotel to one close to the station for our very long journey East to Mount Bromo.

Until next time.

All our love,

The Backpack Duo x