We spent a week in central Java. During that time my good travel karma ran out: I caught a nasty flu and went to recoperate in a guesthouse swarming with bed bugs. Nevertheless this week was a highlight of the trip despite my sorry condition. I've been avoiding writing this post because there's so much to cover it's a bit daunting.
To begin: in everything from food, music, dress, and transport, Yogyakarta was a major departure from trends and traditions in mainland south east asia. Our first night we walked the length of Malioboro and came accross these totally weird street performers (note the batik, the turbans, and the dancing skeleton):
A major attraction for Aaron was the gamelan music. We caught two performances in the kraton at the Sultan's palace (Aaron also spent a morning at a gamelan rehearsal during our two day visit to Solo - I was in bed with a fever). The first featured Ramayana dancers and the second Java's famous shadow puppets (coincidentally performing the same story we watched in Luang Prabang). Each of these were really just short excepts from longer pieces that can stretch many hours (8 in the case of the shadow puppets).
The instrument was played by roughly a dozen men, mostly middle-aged, dressed in batik sarongs and turbans with pointy ear flaps, and carrying wooden daggers in their belts. Their attitude was pretty casual. Those whose gongs were not featured until many minutes into the composition sat nearby chatting and drinking tea while the others got started. Others got up for breaks mid-performance.
The Sultan's palace was an interesting spot on its own. It's carved wood decorations, tin roofs, and open air gazebos reminded me more of Hawaii than anything we've seen up until now.
In the last four months we've grown used to the attention we get by virtue of being foreign and pale-skinned, but the interactions here with student groups were on a whole new level. happily for me, it was the first place Aaron was deemed equally intriguing.
We also stopped in the Sultan's Water Palace (apparently the architect was killed to ensure the secrecy of the location of a hidden boudoir).
But the kraton - the walled royal city- was better than either of the palaces. Inside the huge white walls a maze of residential street winds around the Sultan's quarters. The houses are modest, but their surroundings are utterly charming (as usual I'm an easy mark when it comes to bouganvillia...).
Though considerably less picturesque, the streets outside the kraton were also full of foreign consepts. For starters, like Cambodia, motorbike traffic refuels at roadside stands like this one. But Jogya's known for having a pretty colorful variety of transport options. Couples can go by hand-painted bicycle rickshaw. Families (or couples with huge backpacks) can take a horse-draw carriage. Last but not least, smart money goes on the air-conditioned Trans Jogya bus line (3000 rupiah, or $.027, one way). We were in town the week before national elections (12,000 cadidates on the ballot, 125 million people voting, and only manual tabulation means we won't know who won for a couple months). That meant however we traveled we were riding alongside mobile political rallies - huge processions of motorbikes carrying party flags accross town.
Another highlight was the bird market (which actually sells bats, frogs, cats, dogs, kimodo dragons, bunnies as well):
And of course, the food. To be honest, the combination of travel fatigue, the flu, and some questionable local specialties meant I wasn't totally adventurous here. We spent a ridiculous number of meals at Via Via, a traveler hangout with excellent Balinese microbrews. My favorite discoveries were street food carts shaped like boats (they sell eveything from nasi goreng to fruit shakes) and a custardy pancake called srabi.
Less appealing (except for the bragging rights) was nasi gudeg, a traditional dish made from jack fruit, preserved egg, and buffalo belly fat.
As interesting as Yogyakarta was, the best day of the week was spent out of town at the Hindu temples at Pramaban and the ancient buddhist stupa Borobudur. Prambanan has seen better days, and after Angkor we were a tough audience. Still, not too shabby:
Borobudur, on the other hand, was easily a high point of the entire 7-month trip. We watched the sun rise from behind the giant smoking volvano that sits between Borobudur and Yogyakarta and quickly disolve the morning mist.
Borobudur is a massive step-pyramid.
The base levels are square, and covered in reliefs depicting life in 10th century Java.
The top three tiers of the stupa are round, and we watched monks make a careful loop around each one on their way to the top.
Stone buddhas sit inside these bell-shaped structures on the top three tiers. The morning sun lit their faces through the carved stone covers. The monks stopped at each buddha on their way around the complex.
The morning was a magical one and made the week in Java a highlight of the entire trip.
xoxo Jessie
