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Published: April 24th 2018
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Coming back late afternoon after the temples meant every opportunity to get straight out and explore the local area. No rest for the wicked ?
My roomie Matthew from the USA but lives in China for 3 years already, went to explore the local streets. To be fair he’s been here for 4 days already so he was pretty much my tour guide which was superb AND of course being the tourist attraction I have become, it made the stares and selfies a bit easier to digest! Lol ?
We roamed through the hustle and bustle of Yogyakarta, batik stalls, food stalls, souvenirs - all in its abundance!!! How do they all make money when they sell the same thing?! ? Naturally everywhere you go there’s a McDonald’s and a Burger King and a Pizza Hut bla bla bla but OF COURSE I opted for local food, but not just any old local restaurant... oh come on ... it’s got to be street food ? You can’t get any more authentic (some might say brave - to those people I say “where is your sense of adventure?!) than good old street food! The seller we chose had the cutest cart
ever, made in the shape of a small boat and boy did he whack out the food quickly! And here is where my Indonesian lessons began... so apart from when you actually see a picture if the food, how on earth are you going to figure out what to order? Aha! ? Time for a quick Indonesian class in food. EVERYONE knows Nasi Goreng (ok maybe not Mama?), so Nasi = rice and Goreng = fried. So at the temple I ate Nasi Pecel (rice with veggies & peanut sauce). Ayam = chicken & Soto = soup. So with those key words in mind the menus are now a piece of cake. For dinner I chose Ayam Bakar... let me leave that one with you to figure out ??
I’ve also now got to grips with the VALUE of money here. Working in thousands is well, a bit confusing at times, especially when you give someone 10000 when you should have given 100000. Good job it wasn’t the other way round!!! Lol
Oh, I totally forgot to mention that yesterday whilst walking around the temples a sense of sheer dread filled my vains when I realised I’d been walking
around Borobudur for a good 30mins if not more with my back pack open and purse in full view ? Luckily Indonesia is FRIENDLY & HONEST despite noticing a few shady characters following me which actually prompted me to look in the first place! That could have been a recipe for disaster but it wasn’t so no drama!
Anyway, now I understand the value of their money (dinner yesterday cost me ooooh a whole US dollar!?), I was a bit taken aback by the $3 lunch I had to pay at the airport ???). Damn I knew I should have gone out on the street for food before I left for the airport ?!
But in the morning I was a bit busy you see; after a leisurely breakfast on the beanbags by the jacuzzi (fruit followed by pancakes), I made my way out in the relentless sun to go to the water palace and the sultans palace. To be fair it has been cloudy but boy am I glad of the clouds because it’s 32 degrees and humidity of 91%!!! Naturally I got lost along the way (10mins in the opposite direction ??) but I found my way
eventually, after an Indonesian guy stopped me to ask where I was going and when I told him the water palace, his face was a picture “oooooooohhhhh wrong direction” he said ?? (classic me!). I saw him later on again in a shop when I was buying water and he asked me how I liked the water temple and then where I was going next - what a lovely man he was ☺️
So, the water palace cost all of $1 entrance fee and was about 4 different sites to visit (yep you guessed it, I got lost in the back streets going from one place to the next and no there were no signposts for all you smart a**’s who were just about to ask (I know who you are ? and nobody likes a smarty pants ?). Then it was another $1 entrance fee for the sultans HUGE palace/grounds and I managed to get a taste of Javanese music inside the palace (right time, right place)?.
Glad to be leaving the hustle and bustle of let’s say the big city smoke. I’m hit, sweaty, feel like a tramp but every time you step out the shower it’s
back to square one! ?.
Time to take some clothes off, no seriously 32 degrees & 91% humidity (you have to be covered here, it’s a Muslim country so a vest & shots is just a no, no!) AND time for a cold beer please (again, can’t here, it’s a Muslim country and 15/5 is Ramadan so it’s getting close).
Let me just leave you with my last little story of the day. My taxi man Rachmat, from when I first arrived, had come to collect me from the hostel as pre arranged via WhatsApp (its BIG over here as are selfies ... every-few-seconds?) and I’m waiting outside looking for this taxi, little did I know that he was just pulling up in his lowered Honda Civic estate (don’t ask ??) with extra large exhaust pipe and blacked out windows fully equipped with sound system no less (his private car). Oh my life, I almost wet myself TWICE! Once when I saw his bad boy car and almost the second time on route to the airport when we were stuck in traffic and his car was vibrating so badly ?????????????????
Needless to say I had to take a
picture when I got to the airport although it doesn’t do it justice AND yep you guessed it Rachmat already asked for a selfie whilst we were stuck in traffic. I told you I’m going to be an Instagram star over here in Indonesia ????⭐️??
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