The highs and the lows of Yogyakarta

On Tuesday morning I continued travelling solo and boarded a train to Yogyakarta ,a city 8 hours to the east of Jakarta that was recommended to me because of it's temples. I knew nothing else to expect and hoped for it to be less busy, dirty and loud than Jakarta. The journey was quite scenic and at time very beautiful, passing rice fields and volcanoes. It rained for pretty much the entire time, as it started during the bug storm in Jakarta it seemed perhaps my train was traveling with the storm! When I finally arrived the heavens truly opened and the streets were flooding-it doesn't take long when the water falls in sheets like this. My taxi journey increased in price in seconds and in the short walk to get to the car I was soaked right through. (I have a local simcard so that I can use apps to book transport like a local, therefore getting fair prices without negotiation.)

The continued into the night but I had eaten nothing that resembled food all day-the train station and train having poor provisions, so I made a dash out to dinner at a restaurant recommended by my host because it and vegetarian food and vegetables. However it also had lots of meat and my difficulty was defining which option on the menu was meat and which was vegetarian. I spent a long while googling the menu options to make my choice! Without Marla for translation local food proved quite difficult. But I managed it and ended up with a delicious dish of tofu in spicy peanut sauce, served with solid rice cubes and cabbage and a side dish of garlic chilli spinach.

The next day I went on a wander to explore the city, my hostel being in walking distance of all the main attractions. There is an old area with small pedestrian streets lined with art galleries and shops. Many of the walls have street art on in batik style-the location art and textile fashion. It was a great place to get lost and found myself beginning to enjoy the city. I visited the water temple, which is a beautiful building that an ancient king built for bathing and leisure. Then I continued to walk through backstreets to find my way to the bus stop. The walk was really enjoyable, many of the streets are lined with plants that they have grown out of all sorts of random containers-a good example of recycling. And stalls selling tempting food dotted along the way, but I was saving myself for hopes of a sit-down lunch to break up my walking.

I then took a bus to one of the famous temples-Perambanan, the largest Hindu temple in the world. It is 17km out of the city and can be accessed on public bus. The journey there took me 45 minutes and I arrived at 1.50pm, after a short walk to the temple I arrived at around 1.58pm, paid for my entrance, walked through the gates and at around 2.02pm thunder broke and the heavens opened. When I say heavens opened it was more like all the world's oceans had been picked up and dropped upon the temple and were going to continue falling until they were back in the ocean.....it was the wettest storm I have ever experienced. And I was supposed to be viewing an outdoor temple! People were rushing out as I rushed in to find some place of vague shelter, but as it was so clear that the skies weren't going to clear any time soon I figured I was going to get soaked at some point, so I may as well just get wet and see what I can. The temple consisted of many buildings with shrines to various god's in. I visited 2 of them whilst the place was flooding....so I soon surrendered and waded through the water to find my way back. I eventually got back to the bustop dripping wet. No waterproof would be capable of defending skin from that water, I was completely saturated. Then I got on the bus back to town, disappointed at having spent money and time on something I head heard wonderful things about but could not see.....it went downhill from there. The bus was heavily air conditioned, I was already cold and now I was freezing. My hands and feet turned white and were painful with the chill and as I had not yet had lunch I was getting angry. The journey took twice as long to get back, I eventually made it back 2 hours later at 5pm. It was the lowlight of my trip so far, I was far from happy. Some local people tried to chat to me on the bus and a times I did my best to be friendly, at others I just scowled. A journey best forgotten!

The rain was relentless and when I got off the bus I decided I should just carry on in it, I was booked into a yoga class 3km away but I didn't see the point in drying off to get there because there was no way to stay dry in this weather. So I walked to the yoga class and by the time I was there I could feel my fingers and toes again, the motion had warmed them up. I had some dry clothes tied in a plastic bag within my backpack so I could do the class in something dry at least. The class ended at 8pm and the rain was still going and I needed dinner because I had only snacked all day. So I got a taxi to the place near my hostel, but had to wear my wet clothes because my yoga clothes would not respect Muslim culture. After another successful delicious vegetarian meal I walked back to my hostel. As I entered the owners told me I looked very sad and tired, so I grumbled about my day, took a shower and went to bed! This was 9pm, so for 7 hours now I had been soaking wet.

I had arranged to go to the other famous temple for sunrise, but when I woke at 3.45am it was still raining! So I told the guy who was taking me we should go back to bed and go later in the day. It was a good decision because when I woke a few hours later the rain had finally stopped and we took the 1.5hour journey on his scooter in dry conditions. The temple is Borobudur, the largest Buddhist temple. It was a nice journey there, last rice fields and volcanoes. The temple was worth the journey and finally I understood why people come to Yogyakarta. The views were spectacular as the temple involved walking up many steps and it was surrounded by mountains and volcanoes. It was very busy and I was a bit of a celebrity-peoole asking for selfies with me and school children wanting to practice their English. I entertained it for a while but soon got fed up of conversations that could go no further than 'how are you?'. In Asia sometimes a safe white person you just have to be impolite otherwise you would never get anywhere, they are too interested in you. I stayed at the temple about an hour enjoying the views and the sculptures built into the wall, but I was nervous about getting wet on the way home and so didn't stay as long as I would have otherwise. Thankfully though we made it back completely dry and for the rest of the day there was only a few drops of rain. I was beginning to have a little bit of hope I would not have to stay in after 2pm everyday.

I then took a walk through the market and ate far too much street food. I just wanted to taste a bit of everything! I had stringy fried egg on sticks, Tempe and vegetable salad, chili tempe and spinach and some soy dumpling dessert. I was totally stuffed! I walked it off around the textile market which was colourful, but so compact it was impossible to view anything properly. They had crammed as many stalls as possible pretty much on top of each other, I've never seen somewhere so tightly packed. I continued walking all the way to my yoga class and then after yoga I walked to a road that comes to life at night. There is a grassy square lined by a road and the road is filled with converted VW vehicles that have be adorned with lights and play awful children's music or pop music. The cars have been converted to run on peddles, so people peddle laps of the square in these bizarre vehicles. There is also lots of food stalls, it a place of much activity. I'm glad to have seen it and mostly glad that finally it was not raining in the evening. By the time I got home I had walked 15km, I was tired by happy this time after a good day out.

This morning I woke up late and missed my chance to view the palace, the last thing I wanted to see in the city. It closes early because it is friday- Allah day. Instead I met a guy from couch surfing who took me out of the city to a beautiful viewpoint, called Jurang Tembelan that overlooks a valley in the forest. We sat at the viewpoint chatting off a couple of hours and then went for lunch, but unfortunately he took me somewhere western because he didn't seem to take me seriously when I said I love local food and the spicy stuff. But I had my first salad for ages and did quite enjoy the fact is as eating vegetables that aren't fried. He was a very interesting guy, 28 year old who was looking to change career and move to Bali. He is brought up Muslim but lost his faith many years ago, but still has to pretend or else his parents would be devastated. It was very interesting hearing his experience and he taught me a lot about Java and Yogyakarta. It was a great final day and unlifted my whole experience here. I had been wondering why I was staying so long, but now it was worth it.

I am now on a train that travels overnight to Bunyawangi, which is on the far Eastern coast of Java. In the morning I will take a boat to Bali and here I have booked a 4 day yoga retreat, as a great for my birthday. It is in a very remote part of the island, within a village. The retreat focuses on yoga and cultural experience, so we stay with a local family and get fed local vegetarian food. We do a yoga class in the morning and the evening and then in the day there are cultural experiences, which I expect to be crafts and music as they are commonly practiced in Bali. I have told the retreat owners it is my birthday and they have given me a small discount and told me they will help me celebrate. But mainly it is my treat to myself to not have to think about anything for a few days, to be absorbed in nature and to practice yoga.Read more