Blogs from Java, Indonesia, Asia - page 4

I was on exchange study in Indonesia last year (2018, from Jan to May). I didn't blog about it last year and I also didn't think there were much to share about. In view of my days as a university student are numbered, my final exam of my last semester was over 2 weeks ago. Now I am still staying in my university hostel in campus, I will be a working adult 2 weeks later when I start my first real job. With the little days I have here, I am reminiscing the exciting life of these 4 years of tertiary study. I flew back from Jakarta to Singapore on 31 May 2018 right after I finished my exam in Indonesia. I remembered rushing to the airport after exam because my internship in Singapore will start ... read more

By 6:00 we were at the train station awaiting our locomotive’s departure. The station was not well marked as far as which line was going to Surabayaor when. We eventually figured out where we needed to be. The train itself was quite nice. Kristy had paid extra to be in the executive cabin. The ride to Surabaya from Jogja was about five hours. Along the way, we passed many smaller towns. We made stops in towns large enough for a train station. There were many rice paddies and a few cornfields alongside the tracks. In the distant horizon, we could see large volcanos which were largely obscured by clouds. During the journey, Kristy read about gun dog training and posted several pictures from Jogja to Facebook. Brad played on his computer and watched his kindle fire. ... read more

Our first day in Jogja we didn’t have any set plan. We loosely planned to see what there was to see in town and venture outside the city on the next day. We spent the morning googling and searching trip advisor to figure out what to do. First up was a haircut for Brad. He had not been to a barber for a couple weeks before our wedding. We stopped at the url=https://www.google.co.id/maps/place/52+Barbershop/@-7.818303,110.368112,15z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x0:0xd8efd06b30d37f79!8m2!3d-7.818303!4d110.36811252 Barbershop. We had to wait a while before Brad got a haircut that took nearly an hour. The final product was superb and cost about $3.50. After that, we took a car over to Malioboro street which is a well-known shopping destination. There were some conventional malls and stores that lined the market filled streets. We walk... read more

After a pleasant overnight stay in a lovely hotel in Malang that was once a Dutch colonial building, we say goodbye to comfort and head off to visit Mount Bromo, one of the many hundreds of volcanoes in Indonesia. Our new driver Tommy offers us a quick visit to the Malang bird market, a street with hundreds of small and mostly colourful birds for sale. Owning caged birds are a symbol of prestige in Indonesia, and seeing them is OK, but we don’t like the sight of half a dozen rabbits squashed up in a small cage and are downright appalled at the sight of two tiny monkeys dressed in sweaters trying to escape their cage. Tommy takes the back routes to Tumpang, which finally afford us a sight of the real countryside. The villages are ... read more

We decide to skip the 3am departure to watch the sun rise over Borobudur, and instead allow ourselves a lie in till 6am, which allows time for breakfast and a very brief glimpse of the volcano before it vanishes back into the mist. Borobudur is an hour’s drive away, and August takes us on the back routes which are far more scenic and rural and much quieter than the highway. All the guide books say it’s vital to get there before 7.30am when the tour parties arrive, as it gets appallingly crowded. We are nervous that our need for sleep may result in a dreadful visit fighting off the crowds, so are pleasantly surprised, not to say relieved, when we arrive to find a peaceful car park and nobody ahead of us in the ticket queue. ... read more