Yogyakarta: UNESCO site, ballet show and movie star sighting

After Cirebon, we rode the train again for four hours to Yogyakarta. The train took us southeast across Java (the island we are on), going thru a mountainous area where the rice fields were terraced.

It began raining while we were on the train, a daily occurrence in Yogyakarta.

The Y in Yogyakarta is pronounced like a J, and sometimes the city name is shortened to Jogja. Jogja proper has about 375,000 people, but the metro area has a population of 4 million, still well below the crowds of Jakarta. We took a Grab from the train station to our hotel. The Grab app is not as easy to use as Uber, but I am getting used to requesting rides on it. During our first evening here, we just enjoyed the air conditioning of our hotel room.

On Thursday, we toured the Prambanan temple complex, a UNESCO World Heritage site. It is the second largest Hindu shrine in the world, eclipsed only by Cambodia’s Angor Wat. 

This shrine was built in the 8th century AD, 200 years before Angor Wat. Also, the stone used here is harder than that of Ango Wat, so the details of the carvings are more visible. 

We walked around the main temples and went inside one to see the chambers and their statues. Around the temple, carvings told the epic story that would be presented through the Ramayana Ballet. 

Prambanan is not fully intact. Earthquakes have turned many of the shrines into rubble. Archeologists had separated stones into piles of ruins for the shrines that had fallen over the years.  In the entire complex, 508 shrines have been identified. 

Our tour guide took us to the other side of this main area for another view of the main Shiva temple and the other intact temples next to it.

Our tour included dinner before the ballet, a buffet of Indonesian food. From our outside dining area, under a pavilion, we had a great view of the temple complex when it was lit after dark.

At 7:30 pm, the Ramayana Ballet performance began, lasting until 9:15 with an intermission. Musicians played, five singers sang, and dancers danced. Two screens showed brief plot descriptions occasionally in Indonesian and in English. The story, an epic love story with heroes, villains, and misunderstandings, was secondary to the costumed dancers. My favorite character was the Golden Deer.

Phillip liked watching the monkeys because a small boy, probably about 4 years old, was part of the dancing group. It was cute watching him keep up with the moves of the bigger dancers and avoid being stepped on.

Yesterday, we took a Grab to the Taman Sari, which translates to the Sultan's Playground. Near the palace, this was a collection of bathing pools, ancient walls and even an underground tunnel with a mosque that was used centuries ago by the Sultan and his family. 

The site had three pools. The two above were for his 12 wives and his 24 children and the one below was the sultan's private pool. 

All entrances had low clearance so that anyone entering had to bow. "Watch your head" was the most frequent saying from our guide!

entrance to the tunnel that led to the palace

As a side venture while near the Taman Sari, our guide took us to a coffee house that served civet coffee. I tried it in Vietnam, where it is called weasel coffee. The civets (look like cats with a ferret head but are not in the feline family) eat the ripe coffee beans. They poop the coffee beans out after their stomach enzymes have affected the flavor of the beans. 

civet coffee bean poop (dried)

And the beans are cleaned and roasted to make civet coffee!

It was in this coffee shop that we saw South Korean movie star Ma Dong-seok. The coffee shop owner had customers write in his book, which I did (closing with "live long and prosper"). He approached a man at another table who was initially hesitant. Then thru questioning by the owner, the man explained who he was. I looked him up later and yep, the man was indeed a Korean action movie star, known for his tough guy roles! South Korea's version of Jason Stratham. I did not get a picture because the Mr. Dong-seok was trying to be low-key about his identity. 

We planned to walk to the palace from the Taman Sari, but there was no sidewalk and the motorcycle taxis and tourist vans filled the street from side to side, so for 20,000 IDR (about $1.15 US), we hired one of the motorcycle taxis ourselves for the trip. Unfortunately, long pants were required to enter the Kraton (palace). I, wearing a long skirt, could go in but Phillip declined to rent long pants to enter. So, he sat in the shade and drank a bottle of water while I went in without him. I didn't tour it extensively but did find pavilions full of traditional musical instruments used for a traditional music performance called a gamelan. 

bonangs (pot-looking instruments on left), huge gongs,
drums, and metallophones

After the palace, we walked back to the hotel, traversing the entire JL Malioboro (a famous tourist walk with many, many shops). As it was May 1, May Day, we came across (and avoided) two political gatherings. May Day is workers' day, like our Labor Day, but more political as workers use the day to demand more rights and better working conditions. 

Police, wearing lime green vests, monitored traffic
amid the small crowd at this May Day rally.

This afternoon, we have our first cooking class, which includes visiting a market and preparing an Indonesian meal.