Yogyakarta Trip Report
 

I flew from Jakarta to Yogyakarta on Wednesday morning, May 10 on Garuda. I didn’t want to pay “Western” prices, but because I didn’t know the impact of the Waisak festival (Buddha’s Birthday) on demand, I also didn’t want to wait until I arrived in Jakarta. So I made my flight arrangements several weeks ahead of time through Gita Travel (www.gitatravel.com). They were very easy to work with through e-mail. Payment was through Western Union and my ticket was delivered to my hotel in Jakarta on my arrival.

I really enjoyed the design elements of Jakarta’s Soekarno-Hatta Airport (CGK) —the combination of reddish brick and polished metal and wide concourses leading to stand-alone gate “houses.” There were manicured gardens between each of the gates and well stocked aquariums in the middle of the waiting areas.

The airport at Yogya is a small affair, with one baggage carousel. I had read that this area turns into a zoo and about the importance of being vigilant with one’s baggage, but I carried-on my bag, as did most of the passengers. I moved to the taxi booth and paid 140,000 rupiah (about 9000 rupiah = $1 USD) for a ride to the Ibis Malioboro hotel. Driving through the city, Yogya quickly gave me a very positive vibe. It reminded me of the feeling I had going through Cuzco after several days in Lima. With Malioboro being the main drag, traffic slowed as we approached, but it never really got congested.

I booked the Ibis with Travelocity at a rate of $35 a night. Though I arrived around 11:30am, my room was available. The room was large, clean and well-lit. The TV had about 35 stations, though no CNN. The Ibis physically adjoins the Malioboro Mall, a five-story modern mall, complete with a food court and children’s play area on the top floor. Another nice feature of the Ibis was the internet café just off the hotel lobby. The mall had a lot of brand name shops with what I would consider factory store pricing, maybe 1/3 to ½ of what you’d find in an American retail mall.

After lunch, I took a walk up and down Malioboro to check out the hawker stalls. You don’t have to go very far before the t-shirts, batik clothing and flip-flops begin to repeat. There are three main scams going on here, and if you spend any time at all on the street, you will run into each multiple times. First is the hawker who attempts to establish a relationship by cluing you in on the big Independence Day parade at four o’clock. (Independence Day is in August.) Second is the tout who would like to bring you to a “traveling” batik artists’ exhibition that will be leaving town in a matter of hours. Third is the tout who offers to take you to the government-sponsored batik exhibit which is only open two days a week, yesterday and today (irrespective of which day you happen to be there). These guys compete against each other, so each will gladly tell you how bogus the other two are. Personally, I like to interact with vendors and try really hard to show a different side from the Ugly American trip, so even after the third or fourth time, I just played along for a bit and then separated in a way that allowed some dignity. The best touts are the ones who take the time to try to establish some common ground before they spring their pitch on you. To be honest, I even followed one of the touts to the roving artist show, because he had a cousin at Berkeley (who knows?) and just to see what batik art looked like. It was actually pretty interesting, though way overpriced.

Back at the hotel, I went over to the travel agent’s office to arrange a couple tours. Most of the trip reports I read indicated that one agency was as good as any other. What the Ibis travel agent featured were individual tours with all-day access to a driver for about 400k rupiah. This is about the same price reported in other trip reports, so no surprise there. They recommended one day for Borobudur and one for Prambanan, where other reports stated it was easy to do both in one day. Then I asked about a tour to Borobudur on the day of Waisak, and the agent just laughed. He said there would be hundreds of thousands of people there and it would be impossible to get close. He claimed that he tried personally the previous year and couldn’t get anywhere close, even on his motorbike. Well, that just didn’t ring true. If it was impossible to get there, how do the other hundreds of thousands of people get there?

So, I thanked him and left to look for other opinions. I figured there would be a cluster of options on Jalan Sosrowijayan, where a lot of the hostels and home accommodations are located. Sure enough, I found quite a few and went into one that looked particularly professional (www.yogyes.com/great-tour). I told the agent that I was looking for some tours and he showed me his brochure of offerings. I asked about Waisak, and he furnished a sheet describing their “Waisak Special.” The price, including dinner, was 130k rupiah. I was still thinking that 400k/day was standard, so I suspected that they accidentally lost a zero. But, sure enough, the price was correct. Then I looked at their brochure more closely, and their all-day tour to Borobudur AND Prambanan was 65k rupiah. The agent explained that these were group tours and that the tour is cancelled unless they have two paying customers. I thanked the agent and took his brochures to put together a plan.
More to come...

Thursday morning, I started with the breakfast buffet at the Ibis. It was rather disappointing, at least compared to the terrific breakfast buffets I had at the Sparks Hotel in Jakarta. After breakfast, I headed back to Great Tours to do my booking. First, I booked tickets for that evening’s performance of the Ramayana Ballet, 150k for the VIP ticket and 40k for hotel pick-up and drop-off. Next was the one-day tour to Borobudur, Mendut and Prambanan. There had not been another booking for this tour as yet, so I paid 130k to ensure it would go. This was still 1/3 the price of the hotel tour. Finally, I booked the Waisak tour for Saturday.

With that out of the way, I strolled down to the Sultan’s Palace (or Kraton) at the south end of Malioboro. Of course, becaks are available and omnipresent, but I prefer to walk. (On a side note, it amazes me how you can turn down one becak driver, and another one, watching from 2 feet away, then makes me the same offer of a ride.) Admission to the Sultan’s Palace is 20k and includes the services of an English-speaking guide. Honestly, there isn’t much to look at, basically a couple outdoor, roofed pavilions. One of them holds a couple displays of traditional court dress. What I enjoyed much more was the opportunity to spend an hour or so chatting with the guide about anything you can think of—history, life in Yogya, life in the USA, religion, wives, politics, etc. This particular guide was also an agent of the government batik show, which was closing for good later in the afternoon (wink, wink). He jokingly told me all about the other two scammers and how I needed to avoid them and only deal with the government show. This is also the first time I heard the term “Coca Cola batik.” It seems that the traditional color of Yogya batik is brown. So, if you buy the cheap, rip-off batik clothing, the color washes out at the first washing, producing “Coca Cola” in the rinse water.

Continuing south, there is the Water Castle, where the harem was kept in times past. It was kind of run down, but interesting nonetheless if you have a good imagination. Next, I headed back up north, where there is small, but interesting museum on the other side of the athletic field from the Sultan’s Palace. If I recall, the entrance fee was 7k. Next door is a shadow puppet museum which is interesting if you haven’t seen the much larger puppet museum in Jakarta. If you have any thoughts about buying a shadow puppet and you are looking for quality, this is the place to come. The quality is orders of magnitude better than the hawker stalls on Malioboro.

Walking back to the hotel meant more shopping and buying snacks from some of the food hawkers. The hawkers are a good way to sample a lot of different items. If you don’t like something, you are only out 50 cents or so.

I made the mistake of eating dinner before the van picked me up for the Ramayana Ballet. I had read about a dinner that was available at Prambanan prior to the ballet, but I couldn’t pin down the details enough to put it into a plan. The driver picked me up at my hotel right on time, with one other passenger already in the van, a fellow from Germany. We literally raced through the streets and I’m guessing the reason was so that we would have time to eat before the performance. The dinner was a buffet served in an elegant, outdoor pavilion. It smelled great! There was a varied selection of dishes. I believe the price was around 70k. I really regretted being full, though I did take the opportunity to enjoy the ambiance with a Bintang beer.

The performance is held in a small outdoor amphitheater directly in front of the Shiva temple. It’s a stunning location for a performance. My $15 VIP ticket entitled me to bring in my camera without paying the 2000k fee (maybe 25 cents) and also scored me a goody bag that included a can of coke, a couple packages of cookies and a small bag of trail mix. A sheet with a synopsis of the Ramayana story is also provided. As I feared from reading other trip reports, I was the only person sitting in the VIP section, the first 7 rows, center stage. But just before the start of the show, another half dozen people showed up in this section. The amphitheater is small enough and all the sight lines are good enough that there is no real need to go for the VIP seats.

The performance itself is mesmerizing, with a swirl of colors supported by the gamelan orchestra. While the dance is performed, the story line is projected in English on two large screens at the edges of the stage. The performance I saw was the full, though abbreviated story. The other option is to come on four consecutive nights for the unabridged version. The first act ends in spectacular fashion when Hanuman burns down Rawana’s city. After cleaning up the stage, the shorter second act covers the monkey army’s battle with Rawana’s forces and the moving reconciliation between Sita and Rama.

Part 3
Friday began with another uninspired buffet breakfast at the hotel and being picked up by the tour’s minivan. The guide, Mr. PiePie, informed me that another couple had also booked, and he refunded me 65k rupiah. My fellow tourists were a Dutch couple who were nearing the end of a year of travel. Mr. PiePie provided excellent commentary on the hour-long trip to Borobudur. Great Tours also provided discounted entrance tickets ($8.50 vs. the normal $10). At the ticket office, we decided to share the cost of an English-speaking guide, 45k rupiah. The guide didn’t add much that I hadn’t already read, but was able to direct us to some of the more interesting reliefs. I had previously been to both Angkor Wat and Bagan, but it is difficult to compare the three. Each offers something unique that the other two do not. With Borobudur, it is mass. In fact, the downside of Borobudur is that it is difficult to let it all register from up close. The most impressive photos of Borobudur are taken from a helicopter. The guide walked us up to the top of the monument, and once there, his tour ended. A couple of the most interesting reliefs were located on the down side (Buddha’s enlightenment and the ship that carried Buddhism from India to Java), so it was unfortunate that we had to find them on our own and not have the benefit of a proper commentary. We headed back to the minivan at the appointed time, wading through the sea of hawkers. The downside of these hawkers is that their persistence can be annoying, but the upside is that the Borobudur hawkers have merchandise that you will not see elsewhere in Yogya. There is a collection of hawker stands on the grounds on the way back to the parking area, so my advice is to put off the hawkers that surround you as soon as you exit the monument area, and make purchases at the stalls where you can do so with a little more thought.

From Borobudur, we made the requisite stop at the silversmith factory and showroom. The merchandise was interesting and reasonably priced. No hard sell either. It was interesting that the owner asked if we had been to other silver shops and when I mentioned Taxco, he was aware of its reputation.

After the silver shop, we stopped at Candi Mendut. This is a small temple where folks were setting up for the Waisak festivities on Saturday. From Mendut, we drove to Prambanan and to a restaurant (not included) across the street from the entrance. The Dutch couple ordered soup and I had the gudeg. After lunch, we went to Prambanan, where Great Tours again provided discounted entrance tickets. We decided to tour on our own without the guide service. Prambanan is a complex of both Hindu and Buddhist temples. Though the buildings are much smaller than Borobudur, it is more impressive in a way because it is easier to take it all in. At Borobudur, I almost felt like an ant climbing around a carcass. At Prambanan, I got more of the explorer vibe. After Prambanan, Mr. PiePie offered us the option of taking the batik factory tour, but we unanimously opted out.
More to come...

Part 4
Saturday—Waisak
The minivan arrived at the hotel around 11:30am. This time I shared the tour with a young Australian who was 5 weeks into his year of travel, 2 retired gentlemen from Singapore and a Japanese lady who was working in Singapore. Mr. PiePie was again our guide and he brought along another guide to make sure none of us got lost in the throng of people. Instead of the hour-long drive, Mr. PiePie informed us that we needed to take the back way through mountains and jungle because the main roads would be closed. This would get us to Mendut in about 2 hours. Surprisingly, there was little traffic along the back roads. After the predicted 2 hours, we arrived at a road-block that was within a quarter mile of Candi Mendut. These guys really know their business! It became more and more crowded as we got closer to the temple. As we got to within 1000 yards of the temple, it was almost impossible to walk. Mr. PiePie warned us to keep our hands in our pockets, with a firm grip on our valuables. We slowly made our way to the giant gum tree in the field next to the temple, where several thousand people were chanting prayers. This area wasn’t as congested as the street leading up to it, so it was possible to circulate. Temporary pavilions had been set up in this area, with canvas canopies and carpeting over the grass. Many of the participants were from large tour groups of Buddhists who hold conventions in Indonesia in the days leading up to Waisak. You could tell which group they were with by their polo shirts.

The prayers ended around two o’clock, followed by a meditation. About halfway through the meditation, the guides rounded us up so that we could move into position alongside the road to see the head of the procession to Borobudur. There were thousands of people lined up all along the road to Borobudur. As you might expect, with Indonesia being about 95% Muslim, most of the spectators as well as marchers were Muslim. They participate in Waisak because it is part of their cultural heritage.

We staked out a good vantage point on high ground about a kilometer down the road. The procession was scheduled to begin around 2:30, but there was still a lot of traffic in both directions on the road. Mr. PiePie explained that in the previous year, there was no traffic whatsoever. The Waisak event is sponsored by a different group each year, and this year’s sponsor was not very affluent. Consequently, police attention was less than dedicated. No worries, though. By three o’clock the head of the procession reached us. After allowing appropriate time for dignitaries to pass, we then joined into the procession.

The route of the procession was a bit less than four kilometers. The entire length was lined with onlookers at least three deep, often more. It is difficult to estimate how many people were involved. My guess was around 300,000, but one of the guides told me it was closer to a million. It was a slow walk to Borobudur. Though the temperature was in the mid-nineties, there was a nice breeze and occasional cloud cover. The marchers moved in a very orderly manner, with no pushing or crowding. It took us about 90 minutes to reach the Borobudur grounds. The ceremonies at that point would take place in a large open field in front of the monument. We situated ourselves on a hilltop at the back of the field as the grounds filled in with celebrants. Marchers continued to file in for nearly two hours after we arrived.

Over the previous two days, Mt. Merapi, the nearby active volcano, was covered in clouds and only visible at the base. But Saturday afternoon the clouds evaporated and Merapi was revealed in all its glory.

About 100,000 people gathered in the field to listen to addresses by the President of Indonesia and a chief monk. Following the addresses were two sacred Buddhist ceremonies that ended just after nightfall. Note that no access to the monument is allowed on the day of Waisak. As the ceremonies drew to a close, we moved to an open-air restaurant on the grounds. Our little group of five had a great time learning about each other over our meal.

After dinner, we joined into the chaos of hundreds of thousands of people looking for thousands of buses so that they could exit out of a handful of gates. It sounds worse than it really was, maybe because our driver parked very judiciously. We were out of the grounds within a half hour and back on the road. The drive through the mountains provided an additional view of Merapi’s fiery cone in the night sky.
More to come...

Final Thoughts
The recent earthquake near Yogya wedges its way into all the good memories I have of my time there. I truly wish that the people I met are well. Because virtually everyone I met is dependent on tourism, I am additionally concerned about their ability to provide for their families in light of the disaster. Mr. PiePie related that there was already a noticeable decline in tourism as a result of Merapi’s impending eruption. I hope that anyone who had been planning to visit Yogya takes the time to really dig into the status there before changing plans.

Many of my friends and family were concerned about my going to Indonesia, based on the Bali bombings. At no time did I ever feel in danger. In fact, at no time did I ever feel the slightest bit of hostility. When people asked where I was from, most seemed surprised when I told them I was American. I assume that means that they see many more Europeans than Americans. That’s too bad, because travel provides the opportunity to show on a personal level that Americans aren’t wild-eyed warmongers and to learn that Indonesians aren’t infidel-hating fundamentalists. A particularly good time to get to know the local Yogya people is in the evening. Around nine or ten, many of the warungs fill with students, sitting around eating, with some playing guitars. I was always welcomed into these impromptu communities and invited to have a seat. I understand that this goes on far later in the night than I was able to attend.

One last note, I focused on the ancient temples, with some food, culture and shopping because that’s what I’m into. There are many other attractions to this area such as the Dieng Plateau, tea plantations and the beach at Parangtritis.

Thank you for this wonderful report. I feel like I'm back in Jogja!

When I was there many years ago, one of the ways you could tell the VIP section at the Ramayana Ballet was it was the only section with cushions on the wooden benches. At the time, they were doing it in a smaller pavillion, as the VIP section was a mere two rows, and there were only four rows on each of the three sides of the stage.

I'm looking forward to more of your report.

looking forward to more

Thank you for the wonderful trip report, Chiguy.

I also hope that anyone who had been planning to visit takes the time to research the status there before changing plans. We are still planning our Central Java visit at the end of the month, but we will be avoiding Yogya and the areas closest to Merapi.

chiguy, loved the report. A sense of humor plus a sense of wonder goes a long way in Indonesia (and much of the undeveloped world).

Ericka, does that mean you won't go to Borobudur? Merapi's quite volatile right now so I'd have to agree that it's best to watch carefully, but I can't imagine doing Central Java without Borobudur.

No, we're still planning to go to Borobudur (Losari and Amanjiwo, specifically). Both resorts indicate that they, and the surrounding valleys, are in locations away from historical gas cloud eruptions and lava flow and do not expect to be in any danger.

Our own research using Google News indicates that in the last few (centuries?) the volcano has been building up lava domes which collapse and then send gas clouds and lava down the mountain sides, not straight up in the air as would be expected of the truly cataclysmic events of much earlier times. We so hope that they get everyone off of the slopes of the mountain before that happens next.

Our trip is not until June 28, so we will be keeping a watchful eye until then!

Really enjoying this report.

Gill & Tony.