Indonesian Borneo & Java

Asia » Indonesia
September 30th 2008

Published: October 28th 2008

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Lisa n Toby

Kenyah Dayak girls dancing

We crossed over the border from Malaysia to Indonesia in Borneo. There are hardly any tourists there and we were quite a novelty to the locals with everyone saying, "Hello mister" and waving at us from motorbikes. A tribe there does traditional dancing in a highly ornamental long house. Cool duds too!

We flew to Java and visited the most awesome temple ruins, Borobudur. It was built between the 8th and 9th century and has nine levels and four sides. Pilgrims to the site would walk around each of the nine levels and meditate on the intricate relief carvings. The first level tells the life story of the Buddah and the rest are allegorical tales of animals doing stupid, human-like things. For example, one tells the story of a cat that tried to trick some mice into believing that he was a mystic so that he could more easily catch the mice. The mice told him that all mystics wear a bell around their neck and so he must wear one to be a true mystic. The moral of the story is that those who use trickery will likely be tricked themselves. I just thought it was funny that cats

Boys dancing

All the boys in the village joined in this dance with the littlest one at the end only a toddler with a tiny shield and kris (short handled dagger.)

were wearing bells over 1,000 years ago.

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One cool cat

Imagine being old and everyone finds you incredibly interesting instead of just wrinkly.

Borobudur

Buddahs

There are 4 sides to Borobudur and the Buddahs are in 4 different positions, all the same on each side except the ones inside the stupas at the top are in a 5th position.