Post #150 20 October 2017

Gentlefolk,

This post describes our visit to Surakarta  (better known by its traditional name Solo) and Salatiga.

We stayed in Salatiga for 2 nights, 17 & 18 August 2017.

We hired a car & driver and drove from Jogja to Surakarta (aka Solo), had several hours there, and then drove on to Salatiga.  Two nights in Salatiga, and then on to Semarang, on Java's north coast.  After looking around Semarang for a  couple of days, we drove to Jepara.

Some people contend that Solo is the "real" heart of Javanese culture.  It is certainly much less developed and more grass-roots than Jogja.  We only spent about 3 hours there, so couldn't judge.

One of the main streets in Solo - lined by huge trees.

We visited the Istana Mangkunegara which is reported to be in better condition than the Kraton Surakarta (dates from 1745, but badly damaged by fire in 1985).  The Istana was built in 1757 and is the home of Solo's second family. At the centre of the Istana is the Pendopo (Pavilion), and behind the Pendopo are the Royal Residences, part of which have been converted into a museum.

  We were fortunate to be at the Istana on a Wednesday morning when they have gamelan & dance practice.  Three men were practicing, very skilful (later joined by some women). It was all very casual, with about a dozen tourists sitting on the floor watching the practice.

The gamelan orchestra.

Later these women joined the three men to practice traditional Javanese dances; one of them brought her young daughter along.

Vera with our guide who showed us around the Istana.  She was a student at a Teacher's Training College, knowledgeable with good English.

Central Java is famous for its batik.  These days most batik is machine-made, but the highly-prized (and expensive) cloth is hand-painted. This rack containing different patterns of batik was in the museum of the Istana (all hand-painted of course).

We spent about 3 hours in Solo and then drove on to Salatiga, about 100km north-west of Solo.  We stayed at the nice Grand Wahid Hotel, which had great views of Mount Merbabu (see photo).  There is something very special - almost mystical - about volcanoes.  A string of volcanoes form the spine of Java, stunning.  Salatiga is about 1,000 metres above sea level, so has a very pleasant climate. The Australian Government used to send staff to Salatiga for language training at the Christian University, but in recent years they have gone to Jogja instead.

The Grand Wahid Hotel didn't have a 4th floor - it went straight from 3 to 5 as shown in this elevator.  We assume that the owner of this hotel is a Chinese-Indonesian, as "4" is a bad number in Chinese culture.  We saw this in some other hotels too. Another interesting thing about this hotel was that it only had one non-smoking floor (the vast majority of Indonesian men are heavy smokers).

The nice pool at the Grand Wahid Hotel.  The water was quite cool, as Salatiga has a high elevation.  On this trip we made a point of staying in hotels with pools, and tried to swim every day.  The Grand Wahid Hotel had a recreational club (pool, gym & sauna) which people living in Salatiga could join.

The extensive garden next to the swimming pool had many statues, as well as a large aviary with many birds.

We saw a couple of large (and old) turtles in the garden, which delighted kids.

Vera's friends in Jogja introduced us to a couple in Salatiga, Pak Eddie and his wife. who kindly showed us around. One night they took us to this local restaurant - simple but delicious food. European soccer is popular in Indonesia, and Pak Eddie was a keen supporter of AS Milan.  

Walking around Salatiga we came across a children's parade. 17 August is Indonesia's National Day, there were lots of posters and banners.  We thought there might be a big parade, but we didn't see anything.   At night we saw a gathering of public servants near a government building (speeches, followed by band/dancing) and this small kid's parade.

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Our next stop was Semarang, the capital of Central Java, about 100km due north of Salatiga.  I'll do a separate post on that visit.

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I'm slowly catching up my blog, but it's taking longer than I expected.  I'm trying to finalise our 2016-7 tax returns, which have taken priority this week.

Best wishes, stay healthy and keep smiling.

Alex & Vera Olah
Canberra, Australia
Friday, 20 October 2017