Dear Jen,

You wanted Indonesia...you got it!

(see people...there are rewards for being an avid reader and commenter!)

After a rocky plane ride over the equator, we landed in Yogyakarta (pronounced Jogja) which is a really busy little town in Central Java.  Why so busy you ask?  Well, because the entire town is working extremely hard at selling me batik art.  And when I say the entire town...I literally mean every single person is involved in this highly elaborate scheme to convince tourists (of which there are about 20 total) that they have happened to arrive on the very last day of an art exhibition which closes at 2pm (4PM, 8PM, in 20 minutes...come now, I will show you).  But here is the thing...everyday is the last day of this "temporary" exhibit.

When you get past this little trick though, you realize this really is the Batik capitol of the world and the arts and cultural capitol of Java...and I am pretty sure I heard a local or two refer to it as "Janice Baker's Wonderland," but I'm not sure.

Aside from the hustle and bustle of the city, the main attraction in Cental Java is Borobudur, the largest stupa in the world.  Although, I still don't know what a stupa is.  But I do know Borobudur is the biggest (but not the tallest (I think)).  Clearly I did a good job of reading all the signs.  I'm more of an experiential learner anyway.

But here are some things I did learn:  you must circumambulate (I love that word) the stupa as you ascend.  This, however, isn't difficult because if you want to see the over 2500 reliefs and 400 statues of Buddah on the towering structure, then it only makes since to wind up each level until you hit the top. 

 

 

Of course, after all those circumambulations (try that one for scrabble, jen...) you can get pretty tired.

At the end of the day (11AM) I was exhausted and headed back down to Jogja where I could feast on fried fish with rice and a fresh guava juice with a chocolate and peanut butter pancake for dessert.  All for a little over a dollar.

I can't wait for the rest of this month in this country...which one sign described as:

DANGEROUSLY BEAUTIFUL