Central Java's Cultural Twin Cities

We had scheduled an overnight bus to Central Java for the night after our Bromo sunrise hike, so we had most of the day to kill. Walking around Cemoro Lawang in the middle of the day, we realized the entire village had completely emptied out: most visitors come up in the evening, spend the night, and see the sunrise in the morning, booking it back down to town by midday. We ended up having to wait over an hour to scrape together a group big enough to make it worth it for one of the vans to take us down to Probolinggo. We'd only seen the road up to the village in the dark, so it was nice to be able to admire the view on the way down: beautiful mountains in the distance, farm plots alongside the steep road, and lovely little guesthouses here and there that looked like ski lodges. In Probolinggo, we still had a few hours to wait, so we wandered a bit through town and finally had dinner at one of the many food stalls near the bus station. When the bus pulled up, it became clear that it would not be a comfortable ride: we'd opted for the cheaper local bus, but only because the ticket agent had told us that the express bus (with air conditioning, reclining seats, a toilet, and dinner) was too expensive. We found out later that it was only another 8 dollars, which we would have paid for the comfort, so lesson learned. This bus was so packed that people were sitting four to a seat, and on top of luggage in the aisle. It was almost unbearably hot, and it was raining outside so all the windows were closed. Somehow (probably out of exhaustion from the last few days of sunrise wake up calls), I managed to fall asleep and did sleep well until around 5 am, when I awoke to discover that the bus had mostly emptied out during the night.

We reached Solo about an hour after that, and I said goodbye to my traveling buddy (we were splitting up for the day, but would reconnect in the evening) and hopped out. I sat in the Solo bus station for an hour or so, waiting for the day to begin, then left my backpack with a security guard there so I could freely explore without it, and grabbed a cab to the center of the city. Solo used to be the seat of the Javanese Mataram Kingdom, which in the 16th century split into Solo and Yogyakarta. Though Yogyakarta retained some of it political autonomy as a kingdom after Independence and is now the provincial capital of the Daerah Istimewa Yogyakarta (Special District of Yogyakarta), Solo did not, which, many agree, helped to preserve the city's Javanese character and protect it from Westernization by tourists (except me, apparently). This is primarily why I was driven to take the day to see Solo - I was curious about what seemed like untouched Javanese culture.

In the courtyard of the Kraton

It was still too early to check out any of the sights (nothing opened before 9), so I set out from the main road to find breakfast and see the town the way a resident might. Although the main road was bustling with becaks (bicycle taxis) and commuters, the side streets were narrow, winding and paved with cobblestones.The wrought iron street signs and lampposts and the charming little pastel-colored store fronts gave the town a very European feel (apart from all the batik sellers) - the Dutch influence on the island, I suppose. I found a little homestay where I had a delicious breakfast (and fresh, homemade bread) and waited there for more things to open. Just before 9, I made my way to the Kraton, or palace - Solo's main attraction. Just inside the palace, a huge market was just opening, with people selling everything from T-shirts to water guns, and thousands of beautiful and brightly colored batiks. I followed the tall, white wall to the main gain, which was painted a beautiful light blue. Just opposite the gate was a red and brown pavilion, with gold trim and marble floors. Inside the gate, the main palace ran around a small courtyard. The walls were all powder blue and white. Most of the grounds were closed to tourists, but it was nice to look around outside. Oddly, there were Greek statues all around the courtyard, and (less oddly) paintings of past and present sultans and royal family members hung on the walls. I was the only western tourist there, but there were a handful of local tourists, one of whom told me that the paintings were all done by the prince. The rooms of the palace (no longer in use as a royal residence or center of government) have been converted into a museum, where more paintings hang around a collection of Hindu art, some gorgeous masks, and "wayang kulit" (leather shadow puppets: my favorite things in Java).

Greek sculptures in the Kraton

Kraton wall

Kraton wall

Portraits in the museum

Entrance pavilion at Istana Mangkunegaran

I left the Kraton and headed for Solo's second palace: the Istana Mangkunegaran, which is still where the prince and his family live. I was required to have a guide to tour the inside, but since I was the only tourist there, it ended up being a private tour of the building, which was very interesting. The guide was extremely knowledgeable about the structure itself as well as the pieces on display inside. The Istana is, in my opinion, far more beautiful than the Kraton - decorated in the same light blue color, but with painted batik patters on the columns and the walls, and with beautiful marble floors. The museum houses collections of the prince's jewelry, coins, medals, and weapons, along with things he has acquired from various trips abroad. We went out through the garden, which was beautiful and sunlit, and humming with the activity of its avian residents.

Birdcage outside Istana

Palace garden

After a great day in Solo, I headed to Yogyakarta, about an hour away by bus. I had a little trouble finding the guesthouse: I followed so many people's wrong directions that I got completely turned around. With no map or wifi, and after it started pouring and I was completely drenched, I finally grabbed a becak. The driver apparently didn't know the place any better than I - he asked several people on the way, took me to the wrong place, and finally deposited me at the guesthouse, soaked and shivering. Meeting back up with my travel buddy, we spent the evening exploring Yogyakarta by night. We had dinner on the main shopping street, Jalan Malioboro, and walked the length of it to see what was happening there. A lot: street vendors selling all sorts of things for tourists as well as locals, and food stalls set up with blankets on the ground for people to sit upon at the low tables. Exhausted, we headed back to the guesthouse and fell into bed, completely exhausted.

Prambanan main complex

Yogyakarta is one of Java's most visited cities. This is due, at least in part, to its proximity to two major temple complexes: the Hindu Prambanan complex and the Buddhist Borobudur temple. While tours to both abound and are easily booked at one of the millions of tourist agencies along Jalan Malioboro, we decided to head solo to Prambanan, which was incredibly easy. We hopped on one of the city buses, took a 40-minute ride to the last stop, and then walked a couple of blocks to the temple. Knowing we'd visit Borobudur the following day, we decided to buy the combined ticket (good for two days, and a lot cheaper than buying the two separately). I was also able to use my (expired, but no one commented) student ID for a 50% discount, so the whole thing was reasonably cheap. We also decided to hire a guide to take us through. I wasn't too impressed by him, and he ended up leaving us at noon because he needed to pray (fair, but I thought he might have told us that when we hired him at 11). The Prambanan complex is made up of several different temples, but the largest and most impressive is Candi Prambanan. We walked through that one first. It was massive: three main structures rising from the ground, surrounded by piles of rubble and stone blocks: the remains of 200-odd stupas damaged by the 2006 earthquake. Although reconstruction has begun, and the 8 main temples have been rebuilt, it is slow-moving, and highly unlikely that it will ever be completely rebuilt. The first temple we entered was the largest: the Shiva temple, dedicated to its namesake god. We climbed the steep stone stairs, to look out over the grounds (I can't imagine how it must have looked when all of the temples were intact). The stone work was still fabulous, though: the outsides of the structures are covered in upside-down lotus leaves, and inside the chambers of Shiva's temple are batik-desisn carvings. The first two chambers house statues of Shiva himself; the second, his son, Ganesh; and the third, his 8-armed wife. All around the temple are reliefs depicting the story of Rama and Sita. We climbed back down the steps and headed to the Brahma temple, which was much smaller than the Shiva temple. It contains only one chamber, housing a statue of the four-headed Brahma (four heads for the four main elements of the world). From there we went to the Vishnu temple. Similar in size to the Brahma temple, it also contained only one chamber, with a statue of Vishnu.

We left the main complex on a trolley that circles Prambanan to see a few of the other, smaller temples. Unfortunately, it started to rain, so we only briefly hopped out to see the Sewu temple, a pretty big complex, guarded by two statues at the gate. It was well-preserved, and I would have liked to have explored, but the rain was getting heavier, so we decided to take refuge in one of the covered food stalls just outside the gates of the temple. We trudged through the rain back to the bus stop and returned to Jalan Malioboro.

By the time we got back to the city, the rain had passed entirely, so we decided to spend the rest of the day out and about. We walked through the Water Palace, a series of old canals. There's not much to see there, but it did lead us out to peer over the roofs of the neighborhood. Then we headed back to the guesthouse. We had a nice dinner on one of the side streets near Jalan Malioboro, and then went to bed.

Activity on Jalan Malioboro

Inside the Water Palace

Rooftops from the Water Palace

Gate at Taman Sari

The next morning we headed out at 3:30 am for another sunrise - this one over the Borobudur temple complex. Unfortunately, it was raining, so no only did we fail to see the sun come up, but also made the mud stairs more like a slip and slide, and we clung desperately to the ropes that served as hand rails to make our way up. Once it got a little bit lighter, we could see the mountain tops rising like islands out of the misty fog, but the only thing we could see of Borobudur was the very top of the temple peeping up through the haze.

The eastern wall of Borobudur

From there we headed to the temple itself. At 6 am, it was just opening, but there were several school groups, full of kids begging for photos with us. Thankfully the rain seemed to have cleared up, although it was still pretty cloudy. We walked to the base of the enormous stupa and were completely blown away. It was so massive,  and gorgeous even from afar. We approached by walking down a long path lined with flowerbeds, with the temple looming in front of us. As we climbed the stairs we admired the view from each level. The temple consists of six square terraces and three circular terraces, which wrap around the central stupa. We walked straight up on the eastern wall, and then spiraled our way back down, trying (unsuccessfully) to take in the sheer size of the place, and astonished at the detailed wall carvings. The loveliest parts, in my opinion, were the bell-shaped stupas that dotted the upper terraces, with Buddha statues placed intermittently among them. As we worked our way down, we looked over the reliefs that cover the walls of the temple. It would have been nice to have had a guide to talk us through the stories depicted there, but it was fine to just wander through and admire them. The museum at the bottom, though small, gave us some idea of the purpose of the reliefs: they depict the three Buddhist worlds (the world of passions, the world of forms, and the formless world).

Early morning crowds at Borobudur 

One of the guards of the temple

Bell stupas at the top

The temple, like most of Central Java, is surrounded by
 mountains and active volcanoes

From the top

We headed back to Yogyakarta, where we had the whole afternoon, since we'd gotten to Borobudur so early. We headed to the Kraton - the Sultan's palace. It was simple, like the palace in Solo, but charming, with lovely accents on the white walls and batik patterns painted onto the lampposts. One pavilion was especially gorgeous: black with gold accents and beautiful chandeliers hanging from the ceiling, with the whole thing encased in glass. The various chambers held portraits of the sultans as well as silverware and glassware. The courtyard itself was nice, too, though not as green as the garden at the Istana in Solo. It was filled with trees, several lampposts, and the quaint but pretty buildings, including the spectacular stage where the dance performances are held.

Students working on their batiks

We had a typical Yogyakarta lunch of nasi gudeg (a rice dish made with jackfuit, coconut milk, palm sugar, and an array of spices, and traditionally served at low tables on the floor). Walking along the street, we met a street vendor who told us he was a musician who played with the shadow puppet show held every evening. After talking briefly to him, he suggested we check out the Batik Art School. Someone else had mentioned that too, so we decided to take his advice. He walked us part of the way there, and when we asked someone else for directions, he walked us the rest of the way. This second helpful person was thrilled to hear where we were going: he was so excited to meet tourists who'd heard about the school. When we got there, we met one of the teachers, who introduced us to two of his students as they sat working on their batiks. He talked us through the (tedious) process of dyeing and painting and coating with wax and dyeing again, explaining that each color must be done as a separate layer. He gave us a chance to look around the fabulous pieces in the gallery: students' work as well as instructors'. Some were very simple patterns, while others were incredibly detailed pieces.

Batik gallery

That evening we went to see the puppet show. It was all in Javanese, and it was much longer than I'd anticipated (over two hours), and the room was absolutely freezing, but it was so fun: I love the shadow puppets, which are fabulously hand painted (although you can't tell from their shadows alone, obviously) and I knew the outline of the story (the same Rama and Sita story that I'd encountered several times already). Our musician friend had already warned us that the music would be in a very different style than the dance I'd seen in Bali, despite the story being the same. He'd said that the Balinese cuisine is spicy, and their music is fast, which is why Balinese people are rushed and hot-tempered, but Javanese cuisine is sweet, and the music is slow, which is why Javanese people are more relaxed and helpful. Stereotype or not, this had already proven true in terms of food and people, and the music was indeed much slower and calmer.

Puppet-maker hammers holes into one of his puppets

The next day was our last in Yogyakarta. We wandered through the local market, which was absolutely packed and wild, with people haggling and shouting: just what a market should be. There were miles of batik fabric, barrels of handicrafts, and a couple of people breaking apart huge blocks of rock sugar. Then we continued on to the Sonobudoyo Museum, which houses a collection of Javanese art, including gamelan (Javanese dance) sets, shadow puppets, and stone work. While having lunch at a stall on the street, someone sat down next to us, asking where we were from, how were were liking Yogyakarta, and where we'd already been. He asked us where we wanted to go next, and we really didn't have any ideas, so we asked for a suggestion. He pointed us to the shadow puppet workshop, and even got us a fairly priced becak to take us there. The puppet workshop was incredibly cool: we watched one man hammering tiny holes into the unpainted leather, and compared his work with the finished product, where all the details really popped. A second puppet-maker was carefully painting the wing of one puppet, and he told us that the painting can take up to a full week for a single puppet. We paused at another stall for a cup of tea, and the owner told us about a silver workshop: he also found us a becak to take us there. The workshop was very small, and not as interesting as the Batik school or the puppet workshop, but still a nice way to spend a half hour. We headed back to the center of the city, where we had a great last dinner and went to a bar with live music before turning in for the night.

Solo was something of a last-minute decision. There wasn't a whole lot there, but I had a nice time wandering in the streets and seeing the palaces. It was more than worth the day trip there. Yogyakarta was one of the highlights from the time I started planning the trip. I'd heard and read such good things, and knew that the temples were must-do's. The city itself was such a fun place to be: the people were incredibly kind, the tempo of the place was slow and relaxed, and the culture there was fabulous. We did the right thing by taking it a little slow, spending several days in town and giving ourselves time to just explore the streets. I'd go back in a heartbeat.