YY II: False Alarm & Winding Wonosobo

Cheese Influence
Swiped from williamnyk.

For your information, Jogjakarta's timezone is WIB - Waktu Indonesia Barat. GMT+7. What this is means is, Kuala Lumpur's time runs faster by an hour. Being the lazy bastard that I am, I did not reset my watch and my iPhone was missing the "Set Automatically" setting for Date and Time. And so, I stupidly set my iPhone alarm for 4:00am the night before. With BoB blaring in cool morning air that it suddenly hit me that it's only 3:00am WIB!!! Arghhhhhhhhhhhh... No wonder there was no morning call. Immediately jumped into bed, burrowing back into KH's warmth. At the alotted time, we got up and did a mandi kerbau before heading to the lobby. Collected our Borobodur sunrise tickets and complimenatary torchlights and followed the guide to Borobodur. The air was cold and mist was everywhere. It was very quiet and the trek up the wet and uneven stairs in the dark jolted me out from whatever grogginess I had earlier felt. Nobody else was on the top. Around us, floodlights illuminated the ancient stone structure. As the sky became lighter, more tourists arrived but the sunrise was nowhere to be seen. POD already had his DSLR camped out at the East gate but all he captured so far was faux sunrises simulated by the floodlights. By 6:00am, it was obvious that we had missed the sunrise due to the heavy mist that morning.





Disappointed, we headed all the way down and tried to retrace the steps of the pilgrims of old-- start at the East gate and circle the shrine in a clock-wise. We tried to look for the bas reliefs that we learned about during the audio visual presentation the night before. With so many on the walls, it was quite lucky that we at least recognized several. One was of Buddha's mother, Queen Māyā having a dream about a white elephant descending upon her before she conceived Buddha. And another two more about Buddha's past life as a quail against a forest fire and a giant turtle who sacrifices itself to the people whom it saved. It was all very beautiful, but when you see sculpture after sculpture and etching anter etching... it starts to get a bit tiresome. Hehe. One of the repeating motifs that one sees is that of Kala-Makara. The Time God's head adorns all the arches representing the threshold between time and eternity. Finishing 4 concentric circles, we finally arrive at the stupas, each containing a buddha with a specific type of mudra. A pair of Japanese girls were seen giggling and trying to touch the Buddha's shoulder because their guide told them the belief that by doing so, a woman would quickly find a husband. :S. It's quite ingenious that the diamond patterns of the stupas were accomplished with stones carved like 'X's.



At the top was a beautiful view of the mountain landscape and we took our time cam-whoring there. By 8:00am, we were ready to descend the giant mandala. Made a beeline for the coffee house. Had bakmi goreng and fried rice that seemed to be a staple in the following hotels as well. Chock full of MSG goodness. Also had an omelette and later some free snacks that came with the sunrise tour-- banana fritter with shaved cheese and a chocolate muffin with cheese topping as well. Dutch influence?! By 10:00am, we had to check-out so we went back to our rooms. For some reason, the early morning air made KH very horny... so horny that we did not notice Pak Gadot knocking on our door. Hope he didn't hear anything. :P. Next on our list was Candi Mendut and Candi Pawon, two lesser shrines that pre-date Borobudur. Spent the most time at Mendut as there was a Buddhist Monastery there. Unfortunately, my camera ran out of juice there. :(. Can you imagine a monastery that is an amalgamation of Chinese, Japanese, Javanese and Christian influences? It was my first time seeing Buddhist images in stained glass.



Like in Bali, we were brought to a silversmith, Anson Silver. Beautiful silver filligree, but the price was also as beauiful. Had a chance to look at how their artisans worked. They all wore plain-coloured Ts with large characters, kinda reminded me of a Pusat Serenti. :S. What was most interesting was the use of lerak to polish silver. Just by peeling the skin and brushing it, bubbles actually appear that can be used on tarnished gold and silver. Lunch was at Sekar Kedaton, a high-class restaurant serving local food at not-so-local prices. Though expensive, I really enjoyed the Iga Brongkos (a dark beef stew) and bebek bakar (BBQ duck). We were due to be in another town later that day, so we headed off. Seperti ular kena palu definitely describes the road to Wonosobo the best. Side mirror to side mirror narrow. And Pak Gadot had to floor the accelerator each time he had to handle the sudden inclines. We all just slept in the car with our heads lolling left and right. On arrival at Wonosobo, we were greeted by the sight of a giant abandoned mansion. Looked kinda like Capitol Hill. Amazing.



Surya Asia Hotel in Wonosobo was quite pleasant. Our rooms faced the coffee house that was located smack dab in the middle of the building. It was kinda like an arcade with its natural lighting and it also came with a water feature. The air in the city was quite cool, so the rooms did not have air-conditioning. Feeling adventurous, we decided to walk out to see if there was anything to do in the town. By the time we reached the city center (the biggest ), the number of eyes trained on us was getting pretttttty uncomfortable, so we decided to double back. Dinner was at Murni Rasa Seafood Restaurant just opposite our hotel. It was quite a gamble seeing that it had zero customers! But it paid off. Food was good. The lady boss did the cooking herself. A scrumptious meal of salted egg frog legs, fu yung hai, stir-fried kangkung and fried chicken. Back in the room, KH and I actually watched "Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun Li". A B-grade bonanza. I never liked Kristin Kreuk. And the cable TV was so adorable-- at certain intervals, a payment reminder would flash in the middle of the screen... looks like Surya Asia Hotel had some outstanding bills to pay! Another early morning the next day.... See the pattern? Why do I have to get up so early on my holiday?! :P