Makassar - the Monument of Mandala

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Monday, 23rd September 2013

The night before, we were still debating whether to hire a car and visit the hill station of Malino.

Researching from the internet certainly did not reveal too much information. We were told that there was a waterfall, some tea plantations and probably some cooling weather. Sometime back, we did the tea and strawberry plantations in Bandung and decided it just wasn't too worthwhile to make the 72km winding journey to see the same thing in Malino. Spending half of our time journeying to and from our destination certainly wasn't our cup of tea, at least in Makassar.

Finally, our Malino idea was scrapped. Following an idyllic breakfast, we decided to spend some time at the hotel pool as the weather simply grew too hot for us to venture outdoors.

After lunch at Black Canyon, we managed to find time to visit the Monument of Mandala in the late afternoon. This is a miniature when compared to the National Monument in Jakarta. Access to the top of the Mandala was closed and the moument looked as though it had been shut down for a while. There were school kids hanging within the compound when we visited. After a brief photo stop, we headed back to the Gelael Supermarket before staying indoors for the rest of our time.

Coto Makassar, a traditional Sulawesi stew served at the hotel café was probably the highlight of the evening. With a generous serving of mutton cubes, the flavourful soup went really well with plain rice.

Against the setting sun over the Makassar Strait, this was an ideal way to wind up our trip to this East Indonesian capital. We survived our four days in Makassar with no traffic lights and pure footwork. I was glad that my training on the busy streets of Saigon came in rather useful during this trip.

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