Valley of the Kings – Prambanan

Oh boy, I’m back. Sorry for the hiatus but time sure does get away from me. Have you noticed how much faster time flies these days and not just when you’re having fun; or is it just I’m getting older? Anyway, here is the next part of our adventure in Yogyakarta. (It’s pronounced “Jdokjakarta” also known as Jdokja. I know how much this helps you )

Off we went to Candi Prambanan, the largest Hindu temple complex in Indonesia. Candi means stone monument, shrine, or mausoleum. Prambanan lies about 10 miles outside of Yogyakarta in the center of the Valley of the Dead, or Valley of the Kings because these candis are considered to be royal mausoleums. The main complex consists of eight buildings.

These three are the tallest and the main shrines. The 47m tall central Candi, Candi Siva Mahadaeva, dedicated to Shiva the Slender Maiden, is flanked on each side by slightly smaller ones and are placed in a north-to-south line. On the north is Candi Vishnu, and south is Candi Brahma.

Opposite the three main structures are three smaller temples that housed the “vehicles” of each of the gods; a bull (nandi) for Siva, a gander (hamsa) for Brahma, and the sun-bird (garuda) for Vishnu.  By the way, the name of Indonesia’s airline is Garuda. Only nandi remains today and you are able to enter the shrine to see the bull statue. It was too dark inside to get a good picture though. The shrines are elaborately decorated with carvings and sculpture details, even gargoyles.

Away from the main structures on the temple grounds are ruins of many smaller temples and stone figures.

Even from here we could see Mount Merapi!

We timed our visit to Prambanan late in the afternoon so when we were done here we would head to the adjacent Trimurti Theatre for dinner (the night shot above is taken from our table), and an open-air performance of the Ramayana Ballet; staged on moonlit nights between May and October. We caught one of the moonlit nights! And to prove it was truly open-air, a little bat crashed into Rachel during the show and landed in the empty seat next to her!

It’s a modern version dance-drama of a traditional Javanese story that is also told in bas-relief sculptures adorning some of the temples. In a nutshell, the drama is about a father’s contest to find the right husband for his daughter. While she’s out in the forest with her suitor and brother, they come across a deer. She wanted the deer captured, but before her brother and suitor go to chase it, the brother draws a magic circle around his sister to keep her safe; but despite the power of the circle, the daughter is kidnapped by the suitor’s rival, who has disguised himself.  The daughter is saved from the rival (by a white monkey), but the suitor now no longer believes she a virgin.

In the battle scenes against the suitor’s rival, there was even an archer on stage who shot real arrows!

In order to prove her virginity and holiness, she is asked to burn herself. She proves her holiness when she not only does not burn but becomes even more beautiful. Her suitor then accepts her as his wife. They live happily ever after! The End.

The costumes were beautiful and the dancing graceful. But the finale was spectacular when they set the stage ablaze!

And I now know why this portion of the story is only performed when they can have it in the open-air!

Foodie Fun!

Trying to work out what to do when, no activity was scheduled for the morning after Borobudur. Although we contemplated shopping at the nearby market, we spotted a poster in the hotel for an Indonesian cooking class. That peaked our interest, so we signed up. It was the three of us plus a Japanese couple. Mick intended to spend his morning poolside but spent it working with Garuda Airlines on our return flight to Singapore

We gathered in the lobby at 9 am, piled into a van and went shopping with Chef Totok. Living overseas in Asia for many years, we were used to these types of markets; though there were a couple of ingredients that I had never seen, like candlenut – which I suspect is a relative to our chestnuts; and beautiful brown speckled, blue Swan eggs!!!

Below are fish in baskets ready to take home and fresh turmeric, which we don’t often find in our markets back in the States.

Back at the hotel we were given our recipes, a package with apron and toque (that we got to keep), and a kitchen towel, which they took back (darn!). The “kitchen” was set up outside in a little alcove surrounded by foliage and a canopy of pretty batik.

The two prettiest sou chefs:

After we completed each recipe, we went over to the open-air dining area where a table was set up with juice and water, and our creation was brought to us for tasting.

We made Indonesian spring rolls for our first course:

Our main course was a fried fish. Chef Totok had us each filet our own fish. Then after seasoning and dusting the pieces of fish with cornstarch, it was deep fried. We kept our fish “skeleton” and deep fried it to use in the plating.

Then came dessert – crepes but not crepes. They were very fluffy, the insides were almost like an egg-white omelet or souffle. As you see, I’m already rolling it. So you don’t cook it til it’s set. In fact, you put more batter into the pan than you would for a crepe.

Yogyakarta has no real restaurants. There are many of those little local eateries/stalls, but are not for the tourist’s stomach. You almost have to eat in your hotel or another hotel. Yogyakarta is a large city but it’s an “Indonesian” city. Except for the tourists, who are usually accompanied by their tour guide, we saw no ex-pat community in our travels.

It was a real treat to take cooking classes in the country of the cuisine. Chef Totok was trained in Bali, and had a very good command of English. We give it two spatulas!

Reaching Nirvana

We started our journey to Borobudur, an hour’s drive from our hotel in Yogyakarta, at 4:00 AM to see the sunrise over Gunung (Mount) Merapi. Merapi is an active volcano and is always smoking. You have to look closely to separate the trail of smoke from the clouds. (It was also quite hazy looking East.)

Borobudur, the world’s largest Buddhist monument, believed to have been built in the late 7th, early 8th century, 300 years before Angork Wat, and 200 years before Notre Dame. A century after Borobudur was built, it was mysteriously abandoned; then in 1006 Gunung Merapi erupted burying Borobudur in volcanic ash for centuries.

Erin captured this shot with her wide-angle lens.

The rediscovery of Borobudur began in 1814 during Thomas Raffles stint as governor of Java (before he founded Singapore). He visited Semarang and heard that there was “a mountain of Buddhist sculptures in stone” in the area. Raffles conducted a massive clearing operation of an overgrown hillock of trees that was scattered with hundreds of andesite blocks. After finding and uncovering the elaborate structure, he didn’t dig further so it wouldn’t be damaged, but left it unprotected, so for almost another century it suffered from decay, plunder and abuse. Many of the stones were taken by villagers; and priceless sculptures ended up as decorations in the homes of the rich. Many of these irreplaceable Indo-Javanese art pieces are now in private collections, and museums around the world. The official restoration project didn’t get underway til 1973 and ten years to complete!

The temple of Borobudur is constructed on ten levels, and represents a mandala, a geometric aid for meditation; or sometimes referred to as the “wheel of life”. This is a replica of a bird’s-eye view of Borobudur. We all wished there was some of way to see it from above. We were on the eighth level, the middle ring, looking out towards Merapi.

The 1400+ hand carved relief panels on the walls that surround the stupas (bells) is the only existing complete story of the life of Buddha and spans over three miles in total length. You enter the temple from the east and ascend the terraced monument circumambulating each level, clockwise.

In each niche, in each direction, there are 92 Buddha statues, with or without its head.

Each of the 72 stupas, at one time, contained a statue of Buddha, but during the restoration it was found that many of the Buddhas had been stolen, or its head removed during the time it was left unattended. There are no carvings or decorations on the levels of the stupas.

And several of the “bells” are missing, rendering a statue of Buddha to appear it is sitting in a hot tub!

Some of the stupas were constructed with stones cut in an X pattern and forming a diamond cut-out pattern; other stupas were constructed with notched square blocks forming square cutout.

There is one stupa with a fully recovered Buddha sitting in the lotus position; for women, if you can touch the Buddha’s heel, your wish will come true. For men you must reach the Buddha’s hand and run your finger down the finger of the Buddha’s hand in its mudra (position). I can’t find a rendering of how the Buddha is holding its hand to give you a better idea.

We gals could not reach the heel, here is Rachel trying her best! But Mick reached the finger so we asked him to ask that all of our wishes come true!

The very top stupa, the largest of the stupas has no cut-outs, no door and is empty inside. This top stupa represents Nirvana. Everyone reaches it in their own way, and you reach Nirvana when you have no more desire and no more want.

I imagine it’s no easy feat. I’m not even close!!!