Jakarta Jakarta, capital of Indonesia in the western tip of the Island of Java, would be the first place on the South Hemisphere I'd visit in my life. Yup, I had never crossed the equator, so this was sort of special to me. Plus the Island of Java sort of carries a mysterious aura to it, doesn't it? you know, one of those places you've heard about but never really had a clue where it was, let alone going there yourself.
On August the 28th I landed late at night at Jakarta's International Airport. As it was close to midnight and the airport is 35km from downtown, all buses had ceased giving service, so I had to bargain hard with the taxi drivers hawking at the airport for a ride. It was an amusing situation, the both parts being desperate to close the deal: me because I needed to find a hotel, and them because they knew I was probably the last customer they were going to get for the day. The price settled from US$16 down to US$7, I finally arrived at the Jalan Jaksa area, where the Lonely Planet guide located most of the budget guesthouses in town. I did fetch a cheap, spartan, bugs infested room. Not too bad for my first day in Indonesia. Indonesia is a muslim country, so I got to see some familiar sights I had witnessed during my two months in the Middle East: mosques, women wearing black scarves covering their head, speaker-boosted calls to pray, etc. However, it didn't feel to me that religion plays such important role in every day life like it does in the Arab countries. At the end of the day Indonesia is a South East Asian country thus relax and laid back atmosphere is the name of the game here. However, there's a heavy Dutch architectural influence in Jakarta and Indonesia as a whole, having been a Dutch colony till the WWII. What is even more surprising is the shitloads of Dutch and German travelers here in Indonesia. I swear on God 80% of the backpackers I have met in this country come from central Europe. In the same way that Thailand is English territory when it comes to independent travelers, Indonesia is definitely tinted by German colors. At every guesthouse, at every backpacker hangout you can here a conversation going on in German. Well, German, Dutch, Austrian or whatever, they all sound the same to me. I would also like to point out that Indonesian people are very good looking, both males and females. Featuring a very dark skin, Indonesians appeal to me like a cross-breed between Asian and Caribbean gens. I only spent one full day in Jakarta really. It is a 9 million people city and not particularly beautiful or interesting but rather just another major Asian hub that's forgotten its charm in the chase for economical development, like Bangkok or Saigon. Besides, it felt dodgy and un-secure. So I just explored the very centered key-spots and promptly booked a bus ticket to Bandung, few hundreds km eastwards.	A monument downtown Jakarta. You can climb atop for some panoramic views over the city
Bandung Another charmless town, the reason as of why I came here is because there are some volcanoes in the whereabouts. Funnily enough, I got a cold on the bus ride. Oh, the irony: I am right in the tropic at summer time and I catch a cold. But the truth is that tropical temperatures stand no chance against over-A/C'ed buses hehe. Anyway, in Bandung I ended up staying at what I suspect to be a brothel disguised under a hotel badge. There were loads of middle aged women wearing bright mini-skirts and flaming red lipstick make-up hanging out at the hotel corridors, smoking cigarettes and stuff. They were really polite and no one ever offered me any service, but the whole thing smelled fishy. Bah, what do I care, the room was cheap and acceptably clean, so I couldn't give two shits if there was a pre-paid XXI century version of Sodoma and Gomorra going on in the room next by. The volcanoes just nearby Bandung were certainly an interesting tour. There's about a handful of them, some of them extinguished and some others still active. The main one, called the Queen, is an enormous hole covered with ashes and dark gray stones. One hour trek through the very thick rain forest takes you to a second volcano of smaller dimensions but still presenting seismic activity, with boiling pools, sulphur steaming vents and the whole enchilada. No lava showers though, thanks God hehe.
The Queen crater	The Queen crater from another angle
It was hard to breath due to the sulphur emanations steaming from underneath	That water pool is at 100 celsius!
Trekking through the rain forest. The buzz from an ungodly number of insects all around you is deafening	Another picture of the rain forest
Pangandaran Another 6 hours worth of A/C-delivered freeze and I arrived to the resorty coastal town of Pangandaran, Java's budget alternative to Bali and target for locals seeking a sun'n'beach holidays. Here I befriended two friendly guys, Lowell from USA and Shawn (hope I got the spelling right) from Indonesia. Lowell is a psychologist involved in humanitarian activities who travels all around giving speeches and working with those who most need help, family crisis, convicts, etc. Shawn is an art student from Bandung. The three of us had some nice suppers at the fish market: crab, fish, shrimps and squid cooked with a local sauce made from garlic, chili and soy. I might meet Lowell again in few months time at the end of my trip if I finally pass nearby Washington DC. He says he will show me the real black-American experience haha. Scary uh? Pangandaran looks exactly like what it is: a touristic destination with plenty of bungalow resorts and beach stalls selling beverages, flowery T-shirts, postcards and stuff. It's a very peaceful and laid back town, or at least it was at this time of the year. In fact, it was rock-bottom season and there were very few tourists to be seen anywhere. The locals though are most friendly, and they go out of themselves to help you out. I really love Indonesian people: there's always a "Hello Mister, welcome" around every corner as you walk down the street. Indeed, along with the Thai, Indonesian people are the friendliest bunch I've met during my trip. Thumbs up to you all! One of the days there in Pangandaran we rented two motorbikes and rode to the very mesmerizing Green Canyon, a narrow gorge cut through by a river. The Green in Green Canyon stands for the color the water gets tinted on as the sun beams filter through the exuberant foliage atop the gorge, making of it an idyllic hideout for a swim.
The sun beams filtering down into the narrow gorge	See the color of the water? no wonder they call it Green Canyon
Let me show you now some other random bites of Pangandaran and its surroundings.
This is the Green Canyon river, few miles upstream	And the very unstable bamboo bridge linking both sides over
Just another tropical beach	fishing boats anchored by the beach
I spent three very relaxing days here in Pangandaran. Shame it was so quite at this time of the year. Apparently, Bali is the only hotspot in the country that receives visitors all year round, more so after the 2002 terrorist bombings that so bloodily dented on Indonesia's tourism industry income. One dreadful event like that and your national budget balance goes down the loo. Fucking terrorists could blast their own collective asses off the planet and leave us all in peace for a change. Only one complain from my days in Pangandaran: the mother fucking call to pray at 4:30 am thundering across the entire town with the speakers cracked up to max volume, waking up everyone and their mother, myself included. What the hell is up with praying at 4:30 am man?
Yogyakarta Nick-named Yogya, Yogyakarta lies more less in the center of the island of Java and it is visited by tourists and backpackers all year round. This is an interesting city for it is the epicenter of all artistic and cultural movement in Indonesia, and ancient traditions are still kept here. For instance, Yogya hosts the Sultan of Java as its most representative resident, despite the fact that the Sultan no longer holds power upon governmental matters. Unfortunately, the Sultanate palace is dull and far from splendid so I walked within its walls for less than an hour and moved onto merrier businesses. In Yogya I came to know of the painting technique called Batik which is very characteristic from Java. Originally used to decorate clothes and dresses and later on evolved as an artistic activity, the Batik paintings are re-known for the use of wax instead of a brush. Basically, the artist covers different portions of the canvas with wax shaping it up as intended. Then, the whole piece is dipped in a bucket of colored ink and later they let the paint dry. Afterwards, the cloth is washed with hot water and thus the wax melts away, leaving a colorless shape. Following, the artist will cover new sections with wax and will dip it all into consecutive differently-colored buckets of ink, letting it dry and washing it up in hot water in between each step. Eventually, the painting will be finished after a whole week of work. I bought a handful of extraordinarily beautiful paintings for a very reasonable price as presents for my beloved ones back at home. By the way, once the painting is completed and dried out, the piece of cloth can be washed and ironed without risk of damage. Apparently, tourists do get ripped off by scrupleless art dealers who buy paintings off art students and re-sell them to tourists, boosting up the price tag five fold in the process. I was lucky because a friendly local working for the tourist information department explained me how to avoid such scams and told me where should I go to buy the paintings from the students themselves (much cheaper than if you buy teachers's paintings). Anyway, the two main sights in the Yogya whereabouts are the temples at Borobudur and Prambanan. Borobudur is the quintessence of Java's Buddhist expression. Listed along with Angkor Wat (Cambodya) and Bagan (Burma) as one of the architectural jewels of South East Asia and erected during the IX century, Borobudur is a single square-based ziggurat with consecutive storeys dwelling hundreds of meditating buddha sculptures, and crowned at the top floor by over fifty inverted bells (they ain't bells, but look alike) disposed in a circular lay-out. And, in the center of them all, yet another enormous inverted bell, towering over the whole structure. The complex was made of volcanic rock so no wonder it features such a dark gray, ashenly color. The walls are carved with buddhism motives and figures. Borobudur is a very very pretty sight, but no where near the splendorous Angkor Wat.
Borobudur is sort of a ziggurat with five or six consecutive terraces one upon each other	Buddha statue meditating over the fields
The top floor with its inverted bells	The top floor with its inverted bells
Lotus position meditating buddhas all around!	Walls are flourishly carved with buddhism motives
Also dated from the IX century, and apparently the grandest of the Hindu temples in Java, Prambanan itself is a cluster of small pyramidal and pointy temples rather than a single massive structure like Borobudur. The biggest of all is the Shiva temple with its 47 meters of height, and a human-sized statue of Shiva can be found inside. Flanking this main building there are the Vishnu and the Brahma temples (one is Shiva's wife and the other one is his son, can't remember which one is which). Also, statues of Vishnu and Brahma were erected inside their respective temples. Shiva's son is the God of Intelligence and he is portrayed by a human body with an elephant head. According to the Hindu mythology, Shiva's wife was pissed off at the national team getting disqualified for the world cup, and preceded to offset her anger on her poor passing by son, chopping his head off. Shiva came along and was like "what the fuck?". The wife, very sorry of what she'd done, decided to cut yet another head, this time a nearby elephant's and glued it onto her son's body, thus his current form. Without a doubt, Shiva's wife was not to be messed around with! Anyway, all these mythological epic poems come from the Ramayana, an Hindu holy book narrating incredible tales reminiscent of Homer's.
Prambanan's main courtyard is populated by 16 of these pointy temples	Staircase entering one of the temples
Meet the family: Shiva's son	Meet the family: the multi-armed Shiva himself
Beautiful wall close up	General overview of the courtyard
Here in Prambanan I met an interesting fellow called Rogerio, from Brazil. A 38 years old jazz musician, Rogerio travels often abroad to promote his music, appearing in sporadic concerts here and there with different bands and at the moment he's recording his third CD. If I remember correctly, he is a bass player specialized in Brazilian jazz. You can read further about his work at his web site www.bottermaio.com. He had been sort of a worldly globetrotter himself in his youth having lived in a number of countries such as USA, Italy, Germany or France, and he spoke fluently 6 languages, spanish (my first language) included. We went out for a supper and talked about a number of subjects. Yeah, definitely an interesting guy.
Mount Bromo The mount Bromo is a volcano situated in the eastern end of the island of Java. Actually, Bromo is just one of a handful of them packted together in the same area, but Bromo is the only one that remains active. There are three volcanoes that have emerged within the massive crater of an ancient volcano called Tengger, so it's like an active volcano within an extinguished one. The whole national park has a supernatural moonscape feeling to it, and the entire valley (the Tengger crater actually) is swimming in ashes and volcanic rock. We woke up at 3:30 am to reach the summit by dawn, and despite the biting chill it was well worthy. The view from up there as the sun's tinting the skies in purple, blue and orange is simply anotherworldly, specially when the tallest volcano in the area (3600m) erupts every now and then, steaming out huge columns of cloudy gas. Very very impressive sight. If you ever visit Indonesia, don't miss out the Mt. Bromo panoramic view at dawn. It's easily one of the most spectacular sights you'll see in your life.
Sun rising over the cloud line at 5 am	Panoramic view of the three craters up front (Bromo is the steaming one of the left) with the tallest of the group erupting in the background. Those first three craters emerge from yet another crater greater than the picture outbounds
Close up	This is what you see if you peek over the crater ring: emanations venting out the rock cracks
The two cheery couples I visited Mt. Bromo with: Elles and Hans (Holland) on the left and Anna and Hans (Germany) on the right.   I only stayed one day here because other than the amazing volcanic views, there's little else to see or do. And, on top of that, I was craving to hit the world-reknown island of Bali, just east off Java. I'm not sure why, but I can't help getting magneted in to tropical beaches in far'n'away islands with their hypnotizing charm like a kid to a chocolate cake.
Bali (Kuta beach) Hans, Elles and myself arrived early in the morning to Denpasar, capital of the Island of Bali. We took a cab to the close by Kuta Beach, the touristic epicenter of Bali. Here is where the bomb exploded in a disco club a dreadful summer night in 2002 killing over 200 people, most of them locals and young australian tourists. Ever since, Bali and the rest of the eastern islands have been struggling to recover the tourists's confidence to have them back, which is happening little by little. In Legian street here in Kuta, there's a heart-touching "memorial" fence where the blown-up disco club used to be: dozens of poems and farewell messages written by the victims's relatives and friends are glued there, some of them unleashing utter pain and anger, some of them begging for peace. Very sorrowful sight indeed...
I shamelessly declare that Kuta Beach is not a pretty sight. Mass, cheap tourism (like myself hehe) has had a nasty impact here: hundreds of losmen (low-standard accommodation buildings), restaurants, shops and bars have chaotically sprung everywhere. Traffic floods the saturated streets and McDonalds's "M" neon sign overlooms everything around. Hawking (locals harassing tourists offering from T-shirts to hash to prostitutes to fake Ray-Bans) is rampant, and generally any idea of a quite, relaxing and laid back tropical-beach holidays you might have had slips off your mind within the first 24 hours in Kuta. Basically, Kuta Beach is Indonesia's Kho Samui on steroids. That been said, it's also an alive place with pumping night life, surfing facilities and more sun than your doctor would recommend. I reckon Kuta is the perfect destination for high school graduation trips. Picture on the right: nop, it's not Baywatch, it's Kuta Beach!
I really didn't do much those four days I spent in here. Mostly, I hung out with Hans and Elles in the beach or going out for dinner. Those two turned out to be really cool and easy going, joking around all day long. Just the sort of people I like. One day we decided to blend in and rented two surf boards. None of us had ever surfed, so this was bound to be fun. Well, to put it mildly: we didn't have much of a success here. Surfing sure is way more difficult that it looks like. First of all, you gotta swim the board into the sea beyond the wave-braking line, which is exhausting as you get constantly pushed back by the crushing waves. Secondly, you patiently wait till a powerfully ascending wave pops up. And finally, you got to push yourself up on your feet with your arms, push-up style, on the board and ride the wave. I personally didn't even manage to get vertical on the board, for the wave would knock me down before I was set on my two feet. Moreover, the bloody board bumped me in the nuts really painfully on one occasion, triggering my calling-it-quits instantly. Surfing's gotta be a great fun once you've mastered it though. There were some guys Dare Devil-riding the board and it looks really cool.	Surfing in Bali (trying to, actually) - lovely Hans and Elles, fooling around just as usual
Another day, we rented a scooter and explored the southern end of the Island. Big surprise, I lost track of their scooter, got lost outta my mind and somehow ended up in a blissfully beautiful small beach called Dream Beach, where I spent my afternoon sipping coffees and watching the people surf till sunset. Pictures of this Dream Beach bellow.
By the way, two significant events occurred as I was in Bali. The first one was a bomb explosion in Jakarta, claimed by some extremist muslim terrorist gang. Just what the poor people of Indonesia needed... Well, believe it or not, the three of us noticed that Kuta Beach emptied out the very next morning, as undoubtedly australian tourists still remember and fear the 2002 havoc and consequently proceeded to book the first flight ticket outta there. Way to help your own people... The second event was, on the 12th of September, completing half-year of traveling. Man, already six months on the road... In a way, I think it's been enough: I've traveled, I've explored, I've learnt, I've found the answers I was seeking for, and now I am somewhat looking forward coming back home and resume my life where I had left it. Rest assure there's no way in hell I'm going to cancel my around-the-world trip now half way through, but I do feel like speeding up a bit the second half. Besides, I sort of have to, because I still got the South Pacific world region (Australia, New Zealand, etc) and the whole American continent to go. I can't believe I've been missing home, family and friends lately, but I have. Anyway, like I said before Bali as a whole, although beautiful, seemed over package-touristified for my taste, and since I had already spent half of my Indonesian visa permit through, I decided to skip the rest of Bali in benefit of the eastern islands of Indonesia: Lambok, Gili Islands, Komodo Island and Flores. I hear they're less commercialized than Bali, so let's check them out.
Gili Islands Aahhh the Gili Islands, three tiny pearls in the Java Sea. Think of Robinson Crusoe's island and you'll get a mental picture of the Gili: white sand, turquoise waters, palm trees and coral reef. Of course, good ole Robinson couldn't enjoy the pancake stalls or the beer-serving bars you can find here, but that's another story, isn't it? Meno, Air and the busier Trawangan are the three islands of this archipelago. They're seriously small, around 2 km wide each, and you can walk your way all around by the beach line in two hours. Also, they are less than a kilometer away from each other, so as you can imagine we are talking of a very insignificant distance frame in any map. Trawangan, the liveliest of the three, reminded me of an under-developed tropical version of Red Sea's Dahab as soon as I set foot on it. There are the cushion-stuffed restaurant-tents by the waterfront. There are the cheap and kinky bungalows too. There's the diving and snorkeling as well. And, of course, there's the bunch of young people baking up on the sun in the daytime, enjoying the booze in the nighttime. Like I said, not nearly as large as Dahab, but probably getting there within the decade. The set, for one, is unbeatable. I spent five relaxing days in the Gilis. There's not much to do here to be honest due to their micro-size, but if belly-scratching about in a tropical heaven is what you're after, this is the one place to be. One day I went snorkeling and diving among giant turtles (stretching up to a full meter long from nose to tail). Another night I drank few beers at a party organized by one of the scuba-diving clubs in the island. I also hung out a couple of days with Hans and Elles, and that's about it really. Gili must have meant chill out in some extinct ancient language or something, 'cause that's the name of the game here.
White sand, turquoise water and flaming sun. Welcome to paradise, welcome to the Gili Islands!	Couldn't this picture perfectly be a postcard?
So like I said, after a handful of blissfully stress-free days, I joined a small cruise that would sail the Java Sea eastwards to the far-away islands of Komodo and Flores.
The cruise I'll be blunt here: the four-day cruise ended up being a pain in the ass. The problem is that they stuffed a small, inadequate warmed up fishing boat with almost 20 people, so we consequently had to sleep on the crowed deck without cabins or showers. The food was quite basic indeed too (rice, rice, some noodles, a bit more of rice, and a bit more after that). On top of that, the boat would rock menacingly during the nights haunting our sleeping hours. I have a tough stomach so I don't get to puke or anything of the sort, but you can't help the constant dizziness 24/7. Hell, we even had to drop two of the guys behind because they got mighty sea-sick at the second day. I myself stoically stood on my grounds for the four days till the end, but I couldn't wait to get off the blasted boat already and kiss welcome the firm earth. At least we got to witness in awe the full-blown beauty of sunsets in the equator line. Picture on the right. The best of the those four days on the cruise was to meet up with some friendly fellows like Ricky (Canadian but with Hindu roots), Eric (Swiss), Julian (from Germany) and Abi and Troy (from England).
Posterior note: I would meet Eric again two years later, exploring together Portugal and southern Spain in August 2006!     The Komodo Island The third day aboard we stopped for few hours in the Komodo Island, world famous for its most charismatic inhabitants, the Komodo dragons. These 3 meters long and 100 kg weighting lizards can only be found in two islands across the entire planet, one being of course the Komodo Island and the other one being the island next by, Rinca. This strikes me as surprising, for the Komodo dragons are skillful swimmers (thus they could expand their territory boundaries) and also deadly predators. And here is where the most interesting characteristic of these animals lie: their killing procedure. They don't jaw-clap your throat to death like lions, nor snap you in pieces like crocodiles, nor slice you up with razor-edged teeth like sharks, nor needle a poisonous venom like snakes. Hear this out guys: the Komodo dragons carry a deadly bacteria in their mouth, mixed up in their saliva or something. It's not something they produce, but rather an external agent. Well, they simply bite you once and lie the bacteria in your bloodstream which rots you away from within at every step you take. So, upon biting you that one time, they let you go and patiently follow you in the distance till you drop down flat on the ground, flagging their lunch time up. A german journalist was killed and eaten few months ago while shooting some pictures here in the Komodo. They only found his camera. Spooky, ain't it?
A 3 meter long monster sticking its tongue out. They seem to walk slowly, but they can launch themselves to 40 km/h within a snap.	We found a komodo dragon who had just killed a deer. As you can see, he had already eaten the back end up. Gross uh?
Flores Island One of the most oriental islands in the Indonesian archipelago., Flores is a feast of lush vegetation and volcanic sites. As our one-month tourist visa was dangerously approaching its deadline, Ricky and I had to skip most of the island and, accompanied by Troy and Abi, rented a van for an exhausting 15 hours ride -Indonesian roads are a joke, twisting and crawling like a drunken cobra- to Kelimutu, the number-one site in the island. A sacred location among locals, Kelimutu features three seismic-generated lakes within a major crater. The reason as of why this place is so special is because each of the three lakes, which are next to each other, are dyed in three different colors: one blue, one brown and one black. No one has been able to outcast a reliable, scientific explanation to this phenomenon, but it is rumored that each lake has a different combination of minerals in the soil. However, the funniest shit is that the colors change depending on the season and the weather. Ha! beat that, David Copperfield! Anyway, the local lore has it that upon death, people's souls arrive to Kelimutu for the Judgment Day. If you'd been a good fellow, your soul goes to the blue lake. If you were the sort of peep skipping classes and lifting the chicks' skirts at primary school, your soul'd go to the brown lake. The black lake embodied the purgatory if I recall correctly. Alright, myths aside, the Kelimutu volcanic view is quite nice, spiritual (you can hear the eagles' cry soaring over the surrounding forest) and the rest of it, but it's no match to Mount Bromo and in a way not really worth the 4 days nightmare aboard, the 15 hours bus ride and the flight back. Please don't misunderstand me, it really is an impressive panoramic vista, specially at dawn when we arrived, but it's so fucking far away from everything and transportation-commuting there is so ackwards that I sure as hell wouldn't repeat it ever again!
The blue lake with the brown one right behind. Please note the crater'ish shape	The black lake. This one was wrapped up in 30 meter tall, square-angled walls.
After visiting the three color lakes, we took a local bus (one of those with people pouring upon each other and chickens flying loose about) to Maumere, capital of Flores, which has nothing worth writing home about. We booked a domestic flight back to Bali, back to civilization after a whole week roughing it backpacker style, babe!
Back to Bali (Ubud), and out Since I had already been -and disliked- Kuta beach, I decided to follow the english couple Troy and Abi to Ubud, in the geographical center of the island of Bali, for my last two days in Indonesia. Ubud, and central Bali as a whole, was a pleasant surprise compared to the bustling and tasteless tourism's Frankenstein-experiment called Kuta. Cool, cozy, graceful and pretty, Ubud is a lovely town to enjoy and indulge in the numerous art galleries or cafe terraces. I remember Rogerio, the brazilian jazz musician I had met couple of weeks back in Yogyakarta, heartily recommending me to visit this town and its top-class dinning restaurants. I wish I had spent more time here in central Bali instead of bogging five entire days away in Kuta. Oh well, too bad... Shame I didn't have time to rent a scooter and explore my way around the rain forests. The flew glances I peeked through the taxi window had been very promising. Indeed, like I just said I didn't have much time to explore the area, as I spent my two days here shopping around for a flight ticket to my next destination, Australia, which proved to be quite a painful hassle due to some last-minute issues involving the strict Australian immigration code lines, flight ticket schedules, visas and whatnot. I am looking forward Australia in a way. Every other traveler who's been there spits on and on amazing things about that country: friendly, beautiful, endless fun, etc. My only concern is that I will only spend one month there and considering that its sheer size, larger than the whole European Community land size, I will have to be very selective as far as my destination-list goes. I guess I will stick to the beaten backpacker trail along the east coast. We'll see when we get there. I really don't know anything about Australia, I haven't even bought a Lonely Planet guide yet... And so concludes the second stage (Asia) of my journey around the world, having just crossed the 6 months equator line ever since I left Spain in March'04. Other than China, which I disliked for the reasons explained in its section, the rest of the Southeast Asian countries have been an absolute delight to travel in. So far, my favorite travel destination. Now I enter into the third stage: the South Pacific - Australia, New Zealand and some yet undecided island like Cook Islands, Samoa or Fiji. I think it's going to be fun... but let's do find out, shan't we?
Indonesians themselves. Along with the Thai, the friendliest people I have met in my travels. Such a wonderful feeling to be again among welcoming people after the rather rude and un-friendly Chinese
Value. Truly a Southeast Asian country: little money takes you far! Mouth Bromo at sunrise is seriously a breath taking view Gili Islands are stunningly pretty and the idyllic place to ponder about nothing but what to have for lunch Batik-painting shopping in Yogyakarta! Central Bali, away from the sun-baked tourists, is very nice in a lush, exuberant way. Green Canyon in Pangandaran. Voted best picnic spot 2004
Jakarta: dodgy, ugly, busy and all around uninteresting. There goes my mighty middle finger The four days cruise. Mum, I don't want to be a sailor anymore when I grow up! Nah seriously, what the fuck is up with charging big money for plastering 20 people in a 15 square meters deck? Bandung. Not much to see here, don't cry if you give it a miss The infamous Kuta Beach is the breathing example of what happens if mass tourism is not regulated nor pre-planned Indonesian roads, an endless sequence of left and right turns. Even a mere 300 km bus ride seems to last forever