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Published: June 18th 2008
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Mas Agus silversmith
Jenni is hard at work on her elaborate creation I’ve certainly benefited this week from the shopping and dining savvy of the group of Americans I’m working with - I’m arriving right as they are arranging to head home and so I’ve tagged along on several shopping expeditions. And Yogya is the place for fun shopping in Indonesia. It’s also the place for poor quality mass-produced tourist junk, so you need to be smart about it. Another girl from my university who is working on this project was in town with her sister, and so we attacked the fun Yogya markets en force loaded with shopping savvy.
We visited a silversmith shop where you can make your own jewelry. It’s run by a lovely young Indonesian guy who speaks excellent English and has a calm and friendly “artiste” demeanor. And a ponytail. And by shop I mean a room off of his house. I made a ring that didn’t quite turn out professionally, but perhaps I can return and try again! It definitely was fun, and certainly crafty.
We also headed to a boutique shop that has developed an industry of producing stingray leather goods. They use the skin either from bycatch rays that would be otherwise wasted,
Soldering!
my dad informs me I misspelled soldering and wrote something quite rude. oops!! or the skin from those harvested for food (it wasn’t quite clear which one). So, it’s supposed to be a good sustainable sort of exotic leather good. I was skeptical at first, but the things they make really are quite beautiful. When we arrived at the shop there were hardly any other people there. However, after not much time of browsing, Indonesians began flooding through the door. And I mean flooding! We looked outside, and three or four coaches were lined up with people streaming out. Turns out they were a tour group of Datsui employees from Kalimantan and Sulawesi. Of course, a torrential downpour began at this exact moment, so there was no escape. We cowered in the corner, trying to avoid having our photos surreptitiously taken, and wishing that the AC could compensate for the crowding. After they left, the shop was completely ransacked, but we found ourselves lovely stingray trinkets all the same.
And finally, Jenni and I wandered off on the ultimate shopping adventure. Indonesia is famous for its wayang shadow puppet shows - these are traditional Javanese performances that are accompanied by the gamelan orchestra, the percussion orchestras of Java. The characters all come
from Hindu mythology. Yogya very proudly hangs on to Javanese traditions and culture, and there are wayang performances every night throughout the city. Jenni was really interested in purchasing an authentic wayang puppet, not one of the chintzy ones you can get in the tourist markets. Well… While we were eating dinner here one night, one of the Indo’s was of course talking to us and telling us all about our compatible auras. He then told us that his relative was a master puppet maker and makes them for the sultan (there is a sultan with a palace here in Yogya…) and that he would take us to his house to look at the puppets. Well, a couple days later, off we headed off on our adventure. Of course, it wasn’t actually a relative, but this really was a legitimate puppet maker, and he had a shop set up for selling puppets to Europeans. We spent a long while admiring them; they are made of buffalo leather, are ornately painted, and have amazing intricate carvings throughout that cast beautiful shadows. It takes a month to complete one. We did both come away with our own puppets, which weren’t cheap, but
certainly well worth the investment.
So, shopping aside… I’ve had a great time this week getting oriented to Yogya. I’m frantically scribbling down the Bahasa Indonesia phrases I hear from Jenni so that I won’t be totally useless once she leaves. We’ve been learning how to get our way around by becak (rickshaw), and finding the cute cafes throughout town.
Indonesia is certainly an interesting country. Here is the most biologically diverse place on earth with tremendous natural beauty that Westerners pay loads of money to come see, and most Indonesians would rather spend all of their time in malls and arcades. While it is a Muslim country, religion does not seem to be terribly important. There’s plenty of western influence to relax the strict Muslim ways. So, despite the fact that many women wear jilbab and most women dress conservatively, massage is tremendously popular everywhere. Spas are tucked in everywhere. And, there is an Indonesian beer! And it’s good!
Jenni headed off this afternoon, and I chose to stay one more night at our wonderfully cute guest house so that I can wander around and do the tourist thing. And tourist I was! I allowed myself
to be brought to a batik art shop. Batik and art are huge in Yogya, and there are galleries for budding artists everywhere. Again, I had my aura read, this time by a batik artist who smelled rather pungently of vodka. He says I seek to be happy in life, which is true, but that I am always hiding and covering my aura from others, which I’m not so sure about. Then he had me try to interpret all of his abstract art, and particularly enjoyed trying to get me to explain the sex scenes. Oh, the fruitcakes you find while traveling! I found a couple of others while wandering through the shopping markets on the street. I’ve been invited by three groups of Indo boys to go see bands tonight. Now, I’m seriously considering taking one of them up on it. To quote a fellow traveller: "A fruitcake is never alone"!
This is going to be a drastically different experience this summer than the one I had last year I Bangladesh. Westerners are still interesting, but not really a spectacle. It’s kind of a relief to not attract a huge crowd wherever I go!
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