Indonesia – A Summary

October 23 – November 12, 2013

Three weeks in Indonesia. A nation of countless islands, hundreds of languages, different people with different cultures and religions,…. To say that we didn’t even begin to scratch the surface would be an understatement. We only visited Bali and Java.

I love Bali.

I went there for about 6 days, 18 years ago, and stayed in Legian and Ubud.

Legian probably didn’t change that much apart from getting even busier. Kuta wasn’t my scene then and never will be. This time I (we) stayed in Seminyak and I liked it, but 2 days is more than enough. If I ever make it back there (and I do hope so) it will be to raid the clothing stores.

Ubud I did not recognize at all. I remembered it as a smaller township, with artisan shops, some in smaller villages a ways out of town. The place has grown immensely. The smaller villages now seem to be absorbed by or joined to Ubud. But I still liked the place.

I imagine that this will be the fate of Amed (the 10 villages making up that region) in about 10-15 years. Which will be a pity in a way. Amed had that real sleepy, relaxed feeling about it.

I guess it’s safe to say that I am no fan of Java’s big cities (I guess that is quite something coming from ‘a city girl at heart’; I preferred the smaller, less busy places like Malang (still pretty big but with a more provincial feel to it) and Borobudur.

But. I also realize that I didn’t even begin to scratch the surface of the places we visited. After the doing the ‘obligatory’ tourist thing we weren’t left with enough time to go and explore further ‘in’ (except in Malang, where we did go for a wander away from the big streets).

Here, more so than in Bali, I got the impression that every house, building or stall that we passed sold the same: prepared food (nasi/bakmi/mie goreng, water, coke,coffee,…) of all kinds, some items of clothing or small things, or more specialized things like carvings (wood, stone) in certain clustered areas, and a lot of junk. It became ‘more of the same’ a lot of the time. Now, I do realize that had we gotten off the main roads a bit more, we would have seen a different Java: more fields and less built up. Malang and surrounds gave me a different glimpse of Java. So for that we did miss Sterlin sorely: with our car we can easily get off the beaten path, take alternative roads and routes and stay where it feels right to stop for the night.

There is so much more to see and experience in and of Indonesia and hopefully some day I will be able to come and see more of it, and re-visit a few favorite places.

Favorite places each for their own merits to me:

  • Seminyak and Ubud.
  • Malang: a very pleasant surprise with few tourists.
  • Mt Bromo and surrounds: spectacular.
  • Borobudur: both the township and temple.

Disappointments (to put it strongly):

  • Yogyakarta.
  • Bogor: it was nice to get a glimpse of a different style of residential area (around our hotel), but the city wasn’t much. The ‘famed’ botanical gardens’… well…. maybe it was the wrong season, but suffice it to say I have seen much nicer ones.

This maybe updated as I think and mull over things more….