Borobudur

Yesterday I landed in Yogyakarta and my host picked me up from the airport to go to the homestay in Borobudur. The husband Ika and his wife Yani made me feel very welcomed. I was hungry from the travel and they cooked me tempeh and tofu with rice. It was delicious. They also gave me fruits such as papaya and banana from their parents’ garden. The breakfast was also delicious, they went to the market to buy some typical snacks made with rice, coconut and brown sugar. Ika is very open-minded, he was a teacher and likes to know everything about other cultures. He brought me to his friend that produces coconut sugar, where they explained how to harvest and produce it. I am always struck by the kindness and humbleness of these people, I think it’s something in their culture and I am very grateful I could experience it. Ika told me that he wishes his son will become first of all “good human being”. This is totally different from our capitalistic society which is mainly focused on building a career without caring about the humanity of people. I think we can learn a lot from them.
In the morning I have also visited the famous Borobudur temple. We climbed up and the guide explained us the story of the construction and renovation. The temple depicts the story of Siddhartha, which later was called Buddha. It was built with volcanic stones from Mount Merapi on the 778 AD.
In the afternoon I adventured by bike to reach the Mendut buddhist temple. Funny story, I stopped by the market to buy some bracelets, and I started bargaining with the ladies of the market. I bought 3 bracelets for 100K rupias (5 euros) instead of 70K rupias each. I think they ripped me off anyway, I would have gone lower but I didn’t have the change, so I gave them 100K rupias. Ok just for comparison a Nasi Goreng (typical dish) in a restaurant costs around 30K and in a street vendor 15K. So you can see that 3 normal bracelets for 100K is waaay to much, with this money I could have bought 3 Nasi Goreng in a restaurant. But anyway it’s ok you learn with experience, next time I bargain more haha Anyway at the end I didn’t have enough money to pay the entry ticket for the temple haha so I just took a photo from outside and I left. By bike it was a bit shitty, because the pollution of the traffic is way too much from what we are used to, plus it’s a bit dangerous since people drive totally random. Tomorrow I’ll leave to Jogja where I’m meeting with the german group of Bukit Lawang again :)Read more