We flew into Jakarta, the capital of Indonesia on the evening of 23rd February and into crazy heat and traffic! Jakarta is a massive city, the greater metropolis of which is home to over 20 million people. It’s a lot to get your head around so, with only one day there, we had to pick and chose our sights the next day.
There are some impressive Communist looking statues built by a previous dictator, the national monument in the centre being the most impressive, size-wise. We visited the nearby glistening, white palace of the President and sat down to lunch at a West Sumatran restaurant. As is the tradition on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, the man brought us 15 plates, most of which were balanced on one arm at the same time, of various items we didn’t recognise. We sampled most of the dishes and you only pay for what you eat. Next on the list was the Taman Mini Indonesia Inda which, as the name suggests, is a park representing all the cultures within Indonesia. The country includes over 17,000 islands (only 6,000 of which are inhabited) which each have their own culture and identity. The park is one of the most surreal places I have been. It’s absolutely huge and took us a few hours to walk around (still with sore legs from the mountain). It’s as if it was built in the 80’s to draw huge amounts of tourists but now it’s a little run down and quite deserted, playing Indonesian music out of tannoys to empty streets- quite odd. Jonny and I were two of only about ten tourists in there! The park includes tens of museums, full-size remakes of the architecture found on each island, a skycab, monorail, tens of restaurants...the list goes on. We looked around some of the mocked-up houses, the interesting museum of Indonesia and the animal parks. Jonny got to pose with a Komodo dragon and a reticulated python- I even stroked it! We saw lots of other snakes and turtles and visited the aquarium too.
That night we ate great street noodles in a steamy, hot little street stall with a drumming parade passing beside us. This was the night that Jonny discovered the Indonesian dessert of Martabak, a kind of thick pancake, folded in half with a filling of chocolate or cheese. He was addicted, in fact I would say he’d fallen in love, he couldn’t stop talking about it and every day after that in Indonesia we had to go on the hunt for Martabak! Early the next morning we caught the train to Yogyakarta (pronounced Jogjakarta) which was a full 8 hour ride away. The scenery was amazing with bright green rice paddies and small villages. We turned up in Jogja in some serious rain and found our little hostel...we were very pleasantly surprised!
Jogja has a decent tourism industry, due to nearby sights, but has managed to remain pretty traditional. It’s a very arty city and feels a little hippy-ish. We loved it immediately with a maze of small, thin alleys running through the city, each with restaurants, mosques or just glimpses of interesting Javanese everyday life down them. Our hostel was more like a hotel with a beautiful bedroom, air con, a hot shower and huge bed for a very reasonable price. The cherry on the top was definitely the included breakfast in bed of chocolate and banana pancakes!!
The next day we walked to the Kraton, which is the existing Sultan’s palace, as we’d caught wind of there being a dance performance that happened only once a week. Once we reached the complex of one-storey marble buildings and open courtyards, we bought our tickets and took front row seats around a slightly raised, covered platform in the centre of the main courtyard. There was a huge Javanese orchestra with big gongs and drums who started the music before the dancers came out. The performance is called the Ramayana ballet which depicts a story central to the Hindu faith (not that I know what the story is, I will find out!). The ballet (not as we know it) was absolutely mesmerising; every tiny movement of the feet, hands, eyes and heads was perfected to the tiniest detail with maximum concentration. The women’s faces, outfits and jewellery were beautiful and it’s hard to capture the atmosphere they created in writing. The final dance was a man in a bright red mask (I think he depicts a demon king) creating the most incredible shapes with his body. It was magical. Having been introduced to Hinduism, we moved on to a 9th century Hindu temple called Prabanan. It has been seriously damaged by a couple of earthquakes in this seismically active part of the world, but the part that stands is still very impressive. The stone triangular temples stretch high into the sky and are adorned by thousands of reliefs of the Hindu canon. Inside the main temples are carvings of the central gods of Hinduism- it was very interesting, even in the heavy rain! We had a look around the nearby Buddhist temple too, which the masses of tourists seemed to have forgotten about as we were the only two people there, and returned to Jogja.
That night we wondered down one of the little alleyways and found a restaurant that offered cobra and python...of course Jonny couldn’t resist! I tried some python and it tasted alright-a bit like pork but the texture of fish, very odd. Jonny mopped up the snake mêlée and then made the mistake of getting chatting to the owner. The owner drew his attention to the ‘Devil Drink’ on the menu. He claimed that the mixture of cobra blood, red wine, bone marrow, veins and gall bladder was miraculous for the health (claiming that he gave it to his uncle who was unable to walk and within two weeks he was on his feet!). He offered to drink one if Jonny did and said he drank it all the time and loved it. I made the mistake of joking that the owner was addicted to the stuff to which he replied, suddenly dead pan, ‘I’m not addicted to anything. I used to be a heroin addict. I’ve been in prison twice’. I felt pretty stupid! I don’t know whether it was out of social faux-pas panic, to break the atmosphere or due to the challenge that Jonny came out with ‘I’ll have one!’. With the entire restaurant crowding around, Jonny downed the drink, stumbling on the gall bladder but with the fear of the bile burning his throat, quickly swallowed it in one! Revolting! But in classic Jonny style, he put the glass down and said ‘Wasn’t that bad that’. We finished the evening with a Luwak coffee, the famous Civet cat poo coffee that we’ve wanted to try for ages. I think it was about £1 for a big cup but is the most expensive coffee in the Western world. A pretty satisfying evening!
I went to sleep 26 that night and woke up 27 years old on 27th February, to pancakes, candles and a rose for my birthday. It was a lovely surprise and I kept the pampering coming by going for some seriously cheap but good reflexology. After that we set off for Borobudur, an amazing Buddhist temple just outside Jogja. The site was a fascinating stack of six concentric circles each with very detailed stone panels depicting the enlightenment of Bodhisattva with sitting Buddhas in nearly every space you looked at. The temple culminated in two top layers of sitting Buddhas encased in bell shaped stone structures. We took hours going round and round and looking at all the images and then sat at the top and watched the sun going down behind the two prominent volcanoes in the near distance. That night we went for dinner at a lovely restaurant where we sat in a wooden carriage, that someone like the Sultan would be carried in, and ate great food. I had a brilliant and memorable birthday made even more special by the fact that my second nephew, Oli James Bennett, was born in the UK on the morning of 27th February! Very special and I can’t wait to meet him J
The next day, due to the cheap price of my reflexology, Jonny went for the same treatment. I had face tapping and ear candling instead. Face tapping was like facial acupressure and ear candling was where they put a lit paper cone in my ears and it cleaned them. It was totally gross but everything was so loud afterwards! We had a great lunch and then went shopping in the famous silver jewellery area, Kota Gede. I couldn’t find anything I liked and time ran out before I had to meet my teacher for the silver jewellery making class I’d booked. My teacher, Agus took me to his studio and I had a one on one, 3 hour lesson of how to make a silver ring. It was excellent to be able to work the silver and my end product was my own personalised ring embossed with XXVII to remember my 27th and the day Oli was born. It is really beautiful and I am so pleased with it. I said my goodbyes to Agus and met Jonny to get the night train back to Jakarta. We were both sad to leave Jogja and said we’d love to go back one day.
We flew direct to Kuala Lumpur that day and the pampering really began!! As I write this I am sat in our deluxe king size bedroom in the Shangri-La. The hotel is absolutely stunning- we feel like kids in an adult world. When we came to the room I had a birthday cake waiting for me and Jonny’s dad has very kindly arranged for us to have breakfast in the hotel while we’re here. It really is the height of luxury and the staff can’t do enough for you. Obviously I have turned into a pikey and have already started stealing the free toiletries, hair brush, even the sewing kit! The night we arrived we decided we would have dinner in one of the four restaurants in the hotel. We ordered a whole Peking duck and the man told us it was too much for two people, as we’d ordered Dim Sum starters and scallops too! We said he had got us wrong and that we could definitely handle this much food. He was right, we were defeated! The lady wheeled out the biggest duck you’ve ever seen, head still on, and carved off the amazingly crispy skin that another waiter then dipped in Hoisin sauce and wrapped in pancakes for us. You don’t make your own pancakes in the Shangri-La, no no. We ate about 10 each and then they brought the duck meat main and the noodles...we were stuffed, but it was amazing.
On our first full day in KL, we went up the observatory tower and looked over the city. For lunch, we wandered down to China Town and Little India for some street food and atmosphere soaking. After a sauna and swim at the hotel we went for a Japanese dinner. The restaurant was a totally new concept on us where you chose from a buffet of raw ingredients and then cooked it yourself in a boiling pot on the table. I got a little obsessed with the all you can eat sashimi and had around 30 pieces of raw salmon!
This morning we had our first breakfast experience- wow! There is literally every possible type of food on offer- Chinese Dim Sum, Japanese sushi, Indian curries, meats, cheeses, pancakes, chocolate fondues. Needless to say we felt sick afterwards when we made our way to the Batu caves outside the city. Inside is an interesting Hindu shrine with bright and colourful temples and many mischievous monkeys. We’ve just polished off a Shangri-La afternoon tea and will now retire to the pool area...I could get used to this and am trying to make the most of it before our return to hostels in Northern Thailand.
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