rantlust

Posted by papi on June 09th 2008 in Architecture, Art, Far East, Raves, Religion, Travel
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“You know it might be just this one anonymous glory of all things, this rich stone forest, this epic chant, this gaiety, this grand choiring shout of affirmation, which we choose when all our cities are dust; to stand intact, to mark where we have been, to testify to what we had it in us to accomplish.”

The quote is Orson Welles talking about the cathedral at Chartres, and it’s from the movie “F for Fake” but it could just as easily have been about the topic of this post. Borobudur - a tapestry of stone, a rich stone forest, an epic chant. I’d read about Borobudur in history textbooks, as the lesser known sibling of Angkor Wat, and I’d long had a desire to visit the temple and see for myself if it matched up to its formidable reputation. Earlier this year, an anthropologist friend researching urban planning in the nearby Javan city of Jogjakarta urged me to visit, and I did not need to be asked twice.

Borobudur is located about an hour away from the city of Jogjakarta in East Java, brooding over the surrounding paddy fields. It is rather too close for comfort to the active volcano Gunung Merapi, and the latter has over the years been a constant concern for the safety of the temple. However, Borobudur has survived not only the vagaries of Merapi’s explosions and numerous earthquakes, but even human attempts to destroy it. It still stands largely intact, a testament to the endurance of faith.
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Posted by papi on May 24th 2008 in Farmers Market, Travel
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On my first day in the Indonesian city of Jogjakarta, my friend, anthropologist and all round Matahari, Sheri, handed me a map of the city with illustrations showing the various points of interest. My eye was immediately drawn to a little picture of a birdcage in the bottom left corner, right next to the famous Kraton - the palace of the Javanese sultan. It said Pasar Burung which means ‘bird market’. “It’s a market”, Sheri deadpanned, “for birds.”

I’m a sucker for markets. Some of my best times have been spent in the teeming bowels of some native marketplace. Long ago, when I used to work in Delhi, I would scarcely glance at the ramparts of the Red Fort on my way to the old city bazaar, where I spent many a happy hour gorging on kebabs, lingering in motorcycle repair shops and browsing used bookstores. Bazaar over cathedral any day; twice on market day. More recently, a meal of roast pig and boiled corn from the marketplace at Otavalo will linger long in my memory. Small wonder then, that as soon as I’d dumped my bags at the Lilik, I hotfooted it across town to the Pasar Burung.
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