Day 72: Semarang, Java … Indonesia

Sunday, 19 March 2017
At Sea — Celebes Sea

Stats @ Ship’s Time 5:40a (WIST — 20 March) … UTC 10:40p (19 March)
Temp: 83.7F (28.7C)
Position: 4.40.53S / 109.43.40E

Travel is the frivolous part of serious lives, and the serious part of frivolous ones.
~ Anne Sophie Switching ~

I’m going to start this blog entry with two photos — the only ones I am including in this post.  I processed and uploaded a bunch from today’s excursion to my online gallery, but getting individual photo links to insert them here was like having teeth pulled … with a pair of rusty pliers … very painful.

Why did I choose these two photos?  Because they are representative of the people who approached us with glee almost everywhere we went today, asking us to pose with them.  I’ll explain later why this is a common practice here.  Ultimately, though the reason I chose these photos is that I really loved the people of Indonesia and it seemed appropriate to include them in this last post about the country.

Our last port of call in Indonesia brought us to the island of Java — one of the most populated places in all of Asia.  Specifically, we called on Semarang on the north shore of the central part of the island.  I’ll just say that it was yet another very hot and humid day and leave my weather commentary at that.

Most of the ship’s passengers — five bus loads we later heard — went to the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Borobudur, a 9th century Buddhist temple.  I would love to have gone there, but neither Mui nor I were willing to spend 6 or more hours on a bus in return for about 2 hours at the site.  You’d think that with that kind of travel time, the temple would be far far away.  No.  It’s a little over 60 miles (about 102 km) from Semarang.  But the traffic in the area is horrendous, and even if one pays for a police escort, it’s slow going.

So, we settled for exploring the attractions in the city instead.  We were joined by Sonia and Boris for a private tour I booked with SpoorIndo, a local company recommended on CruiseCritic.  At USD $65/person it was considerably more than what we paid in Bali for our tour … but perhaps not so surprising considering we were in Indonesia’s 5th largest city.

Insignia docked at the cruise ship terminal at Tanjung Emas.  We were off the ship shortly after it was cleared at 8:15a.  That we were going to be a novelty to the people was apparent almost immediately when we noticed customs agents photographing us as we went through the security check-point … and it wasn’t for security reasons.  More on that later.  Outside the terminal, we met up with Shanty, with whom I had been communicating.  She introduced us to Uke, who was to be our guide and we were all set to get going.  Oooops … not quite so fast.

Turns out that the vehicle was going to be too tight of a fit for the four of us, plus the driver and the guide and Boris’s folding wheelchair.  I suppose we could have squished ourselves in there, but that wasn’t appealing on such a hot day … even with A/C.  Besides, Shanty had known about the wheelchair — and had, in fact, encouraged us to bring it — so it was up to her to figure out a more comfortable arrangement.  In the end, they negotiated with another driver and Shanty followed us in a second car … at no extra cost to us.  Not ideal, but it worked out OK.

Having heard so much about the dreadful traffic in Semarang, I was surprised at how “normal” it seemed to be when we set out.  As a matter of fact, except for one or two instances, I would characterize it as better than DC rush hour, with traffic flowing and not at a standstill for any length of time.  That it was Sunday probably helped.  Uke told us at one point that the city’s population of 2,000,000 swells considerably during the week, with people streaming in from neighboring towns to go to work.

Unlike Bali, where the majority of the population is Hindu, on Java Muslims outnumber the other religions (mostly Christian, Hindu, and Buddhist) by quite a bit —70%.  Nonetheless, the people of different faiths have learned to live in harmony — something the rest of the world could learn from.  Our day took in temples from all of these religions.

Our first stop was at Masjid Agung Jawa Tengah [Great Mosque of Central Java] — built in 2002.  The roof was unlike any mosque that I’ve seen before … styled like a “joglo”, a traditional Javanese house, it symbolizes the rising steps toward heaven.  The mosque, and two side buildings, overlooked a huge marble courtyard capable of accommodating 15,000 worshipers.  Pristine is the only way to describe it … helped by leaving one’s shoes at its edge instead of at the entrance of the mosque as is more common.  What looked like rockets turned out to be six hydraulically operated umbrellas — inspired by the ones in Medina.  Installed to protect worshipers from the elements, these umbrellas represent the six tenets of the faith.

At the opposite end of the courtyard from the mosque stood the 325-foot (99 m) tall Asmaul Husna Tower.  It’s said to be shaped like the minaret of a mosque in Jerusalem.  Like the calligraphies decorating the arches around the courtyard, the height of the tower represents the 99 attributes of Allah.  In addition to being used to call people to prayer the tower houses a radio station, a museum, a restaurant, and an observation deck.

In fact, it was to this tower that we went first, but the lift to the observation platform was out of order, so we didn’t get to go up.  It was as we were going there that we were instantly inundated by young students asking to pretty-please have their photographs taken with us.  This turned out to be the rule rather than the exception of the day no matter where we went, and included people of all ages.  Apparently fair-skinned people with light hair and colored eyes — not that mine are anything but brown — are a novelty here.  I later learned that these pictures are printed and hung in their homes and posted on their social media pages!  Go figure.  We graciously allowed all the photographs to be taken even though it was an intrusion at times.  But everyone was so charming and so thankful that we couldn’t not grant their requests.  I think we gained an understanding today of what it means to be a celebrity!  Later, we were also interviewed by students — for their English classes apparently.  They had a list of questions that they asked us and our responses were recorded with their smartphones.  Everyone here had a smart device of some sort!

When we finally made our way across the courtyard to the mosque, the marble was cool to the touch, and it served beautifully to reflect the architecture and the people for some double-the-pleasure moments.  Inside, the mosque was quite simple.  No rugs covered the floor … marble still the material of choice here.  Scaffolding kept us back from the central area of the mosque where the faithful pray, and I got the sense that construction was ongoing.

From the mosque we left to go into Kota Lama [Old Town], which is on the UNESCO WHS tentative list.  Here we were supposed to switch religions and visit Gereja Blenduk, a church built in 1753 by the Dutch.  If I understood Uke correctly, the name translates as “Church of the Dome.”  Unfortunately, our arrival coincided with Mass so we were not able to go inside.  Instead, after taking some photos outside, we walked around the Sunday market — more of a flea market really.  Then it was time to head to another building constructed by the Dutch.

Lawang Sewu [Thousand Doors] is a colonial era building built between 1904-1907 as the headquarters of the Dutch East Indies Railway Company.  It doesn’t have quite 1,000 doors — or openings, to include windows.  There are more like 600 to 700 of them, but the Javanese people use the word sewu [thousand] when they want to indicate that there are many many of something.  The building has a basement that was kept flooded back in the day to keep the whole place cool … there was very little water when we peeked in today.  After they invaded Indonesia in 1942, the Japanese took over the building and used it as a prison.  The executions that took place during that time have led to the building having a reputation for being haunted.  We saw no ghosts, but did wander through the various rooms where there were displays of historic artifacts and photographs, and went up to the gallery surrounding the top floor to see the beautiful stained glass windows.

The place was crawling with visitors.  If there were any other fair-skinned people there, we did not encounter them.  Once again we were a popular photographic subject … especially where we stood at the exit gate waiting for our car to arrive.  This was the only time we had a major problem with traffic.  Turns out there was an accident on a side street and our transport took about 30 minutes to negotiate its way to pick us up.

Next up was Sam Poo Kong, the oldest Chinese temple in Semarang, now shared by multiple religions and ethnicities as a place of pilgrimage.  The original temple, which was destroyed in a landslide in the early 1700s, was established in the 15th century by Admiral Zheng He, a Chinese Muslim explorer.  The cave where he prayed is inside one of the temple buildings, but we were so hot and so drained by this time that we opted not to pay the extra admission to go inside.  Instead, we paid IDR 15,000/person (~ USD $1.15) and just wandered around the courtyard.  Too bad that the light in the direction of the actual temple was bad, but I clicked the shutter and did my best to get a few decent photos.

From Sam Poo Kong we drove to the area Uke called Semarang’s upper town for lunch.  From the houses we saw, I’d say this was the neighborhood of the rich.  Because of the traffic delay at Lawang Sewu, we arrived later than planned.  Thus, the food at the buffet — which featured Indonesian specialties — was only lukewarm … tasty, though.

When we left the restaurant we headed to the final temple of the day — Vihara Buddhagaya Watugong, a Buddhist temple/monastery.  Our driver had just parked the car when it started sprinkling lightly.  Undeterred, we walked up the steps and went up to the pagoda-style temple.  Surrounded by a terrace decorated with statues and red lanterns on all sides, the pagoda consists of a single room dominated by a big shiny gold Buddha.  On the altars in front of it were offerings — everything from cups of water, to bags of chips, to bottles of cooking oil.  After wandering around the terrace, I went to the nearby garden where I had glimpsed a reclining Buddha … which I had read is a major icon of Buddhism.  Such statues are said to “represent Buddha during his last illness, about to enter parinirvana.”

I was clicking the shutter for one last shot — trying to frame the reclining Buddha with the pagoda behind — when the heavens opened up in a downpour.  We hurried across the wet pavement and sought refuge under a big tree where there were two more statues of Buddha.  Red ribbons were tied to the tree branches.  As we jumped into the car, Uke explained that these were wishes that people had written to Buddha, asking for help to make them a reality.

From this temple it was about 30 minutes back to the ship.  With little traffic en route, we were back at the port by 3:30p.  I sat in the terminal lobby where there was free and fast wi-fi to share photos with family and friends via What’sApp and Facebook.  While I did so, I was entertained by a Javanese band playing a variety of American songs … everything from “Take Me Home Country Roads” to “Moon River” … odd but charming at the same time.

We are getting closer and closer to the northern hemisphere and the day’s are growing short.  So it was dark by the time the ship set sail at 6:00p.  I stayed out to watch the shore recede before going up to the Terrace Café to join Mui and a few friends for dinner.  Four of the fellow passengers who joined us had gone to Borobudur with the ship’s tour … said it was very well done, and despite the long drive, they felt it was worth the effort to see it.  Perhaps another time.

Now for two days at sea … hallelujah!

For more photos from today, click this link.

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