Indonesia: Yogyakarta & Mount Bromo

Straight from Singapore we stationed in Yogyakarta, a city known for its variety of scenery from mountains to sand dunes to dense jungles. Unfortunately the weather wasn't too kind to us during our stay so we really had to narrow down our scheduled activities.

Our first stop was Indonesia's most visited tourist destination, Borobudur Temple. I'm not the biggest fan of temples, so I made sure to only visit one on this journey and this was it. 

We took the bus there which was an experience in itself. I mean, I say that as a tourist I suppose it wasn't as fun for the locals who were hauling huge sacks of vegetables bought from the market on and off the bus every other stop. I could have helped, but I didn't want to break the fourth wall.

Upon entry they explained that as this is a respected holy place that the outfits Eunju and I were sporting were too provocative showing too much leg. I say if you've got it flaunt it. Alas, I caved to their demands and donned a sarong type garment.

I must say that I really warmed to it. It was so liberating to be in something that I felt comfortable wearing. The slit enabled me to reveal a bit of upper thigh which really enticed the lads. After a few minutes I was sold, just call me Brendie Izzard.

The rain held off just long enough to explore the temple and enjoy the view of the thick vegetation surround this sightseeing hot spot.

We stayed at a hostel called Hati Hati, which was themed on the mantra "don't worry, be happy". It was hard to adopt this belief as there was an Islamic Mosque directly across the street, not that uncommon in Indonesia. The location is perfect for someone who wants to attend the mosque, but a little inconvenient for someone who wants to sleep in. The formal prayers started around 6am at sunrise and were repeated 5 times a day. Just after the Maghrib prayer at sundown we headed for the bar street. 

The next morning we checked the forecast and had a sunshine window of opportunity. We hopped on a scooter and made way for Curug Pulosari. It's off the beaten track and because of the recent downpours we had this secluded waterfall all to ourselves. It was peaceful and beautiful.

Yogyakarta is unique within Indonesia in that is has been given the status of "Special Administrative Region" meaning that it is the only region in Indonesia to be ruled by a monarchy. It was awarded this due to their contribution in aiding the survival of the Indonesian Republic. So, in our remaining time in the city we meandered around the palaces, where the Sultan of Yogyakarta still resides. It was pretty underwhelming. It seemed less of a palace and more of a bus station. It was so underwhelming in fact that I didn't even take a single picture of it. 

We made our way over to the Water Palace, a place where the sultan would relax, taking in a puppet show along the way. I'm not sure what I was expecting with the puppet show, but it was far from interesting. There's a reason why it's traditional entertainment because if it was any good it'd be on Netflix.

Eunju is the one on the left

And that drew to a close our time in Yogyakarta. We just had a short flight over to Surabaya where we were scheduled to take a sunrise tour of Mount Bromo, one of Indonesia's largest active volcanoes. 

We were picked up at midnight and travelled to the mountain. Arriving at around 4am we had an hour and a half to kill until sunrise. Previous to our tour we had been enjoying temperatures of 30°C+, but at the top of the volcano it was down to 11°C. Sure, it was chilly, but some people had dressed as it they were heading for the arctic. Hats, scarves, gloves, and jackets were all on sale, but I wasn't prepared to buy a scarf on holiday in Indonesia. And anyway, I'd just been tolerating Siberian winds in Beijing, light drizzle and a minor chill were nothing to us.

The time passed slowly. Minutes felt like hours. The drizzled worsened and there was a thick mist that was impossible to see through. If someone had said to me, 'would you like to watch the sunrise from the comfort of your warm bedroom?' I probably wouldn't bother waking up for it. 'Would you travel 3-4 hours, climb a mountain in the rain to see bugger all?' Yes, mate. Well up for that. 'And would you like to share that experience with 2,000 other people?' Even better. 

Officially at 5:33am, according to my phone the sunrise had happened and I saw none of it. It was that moment I realised I had wasted my time and money. 

Just as we were heading down the treacherous mountain roads, the clouds parted and we got to see our post sunrise. The sun shone through the clouds over the mist covering the mountains. It was spectacular. 

Further down the mountain we stopped on the Sea of Sand to take some more pictures. We drove over the volcanic sands with a feeling of astonishment. 

We climbed to the peak of the volcano to get a glance of the smoke emitting from it and drew in a big lungful of smelly sulphur dioxide. Either that or the previous nights Indonesian food was making a second occurrence. You could feel the warmth from it too which was welcomed. 

Back to Surabaya we had some time to kill before our early evening flight. We relaxed for a few hours while it rained outside. Our hostel was only 30 minutes from the airport, so we were packed and were left waiting for a taxi, the trouble was that we couldn't get one. After a long painstaking wait, we were on our way when we immediately hit traffic. The rain was coming down harder and flooded the roads 30cm high. I'd never seen rain quite like it. This intensified the traffic. There is nothing more stressful than being in traffic on the way to the airport (well, there are, but for the sake of this story there aren't). The minutes passed like seconds as we sat hopelessly. It eventually took us almost 3 hours to reach the airport and therefore we missed our flight to Bali.

We needed to book another flight, but the airport staff were far from helpful. We got online and our options were limited. We had to settle for one of the morning 2 days later. When I attempted to book these flights my credit card wouldn't work, so I had the joy of talking to their customer service department. By the time we had our flights booked all the restaurants had closed. I was truly pissed off. Over some dry KFC Eunju looked at me and said "smile". You'd have to be a mentalist or a Mormon to smile in that situation. I calmly replied "tomorrow".

This meant we had a day and a bit in Surabaya. Let me tell you, there isn't much to do there. The options were to take a tour of a cigarette factory or look around the zoo, which is most famous for their terrible treatment and conditions for the animals. You know you're in for a long wait if the city you're in is mostly known for cancer sticks and animal cruelty.

We made our morning flight to Bali and I smiled at Eunju.

A shout-out goes to Eunju as she had to tolerate a significant period with a miserable bastard. 

Homosexuality Isn’t a Choice. Discrimination Is.

We just had a bank holiday weekend and it was action packed. Coming to Asia on of the things I  wanted to see was some form of martial art display so on Friday Karl and I went to Namsangol Hanok Village to watch a taekwondo performance. The show merges dance and martial arts to create great entertainment. I’m not really into dance performances, neither am I overwhelmed by martial arts as I always considered the people that did them after school geeks (geeks that could kick my arse) but put them together and I thoroughly enjoyed the performance.

Martial arts are a bit weird really. If Karl had called me that morning and said 'Do you want to come round mine and watch me break some wooden planks?' I'd have said no thank you. But because these people are professional Asian wood-kickers I was well up for it.

Saturday came around and there was the much anticipated Korea Queer Festival to be enjoyed. I have never been to a gay pride festival before so I wasn’t too sure of what to expect. I asked a gay friend of mine and he told me to expect the unexpected.

"They have parades. There're no parades for how I get laid. They have parades... marching down the street to celebrate that they blow each other, fuck each other in the ass, and smush their vaginas together or whatever that one is. Whatever wonderful thing those folks are doing, it's none of my business." (Louis C.K.)

Karl and I arrived in Sinchon, the first person who welcomed me outside the station was someone who was working for the local clinic. “Free STI checks for everyone!” They really know their target market.

We had only been there a matter of minutes before we saw our first confrontation. Homosexuality is still taboo here in Korea, gay movements only started fighting discrimination laws in the 1990s (according to Wikipedia). The confrontation was between the thousands of representatives from the gay community and about 4 Christian nut-jobs. It started getting heated and had the police not intervened it probably would have resulted in violence.

In that situation who are the crazy people? The people who are attracted to the same gender or the guy dressed in his pyjamas telling everyone that they’re committing an “abomination” (Leviticus 18:22) and that they all “deserve to die” (Romans 1:32) because it was written in a book over 1,800 years ago. People used to believe that well preserved Beanie Babies would be worth a fortune one day, and that only happened in the 90s. Sometimes people are wrong. (Although, give it 1,800 years and my Beanie Baby collection could be worth £40).

We met up with a gay friend who came to shed light on the whole festival. Apparently, protesters are very common and they should be ignored (something I couldn't bring myself to do in this blog). Anyway, we continued through the crowds, we saw a lot of stands, a lot of love, and a lot of skin (from both genders, don’t worry). We enjoyed the stage performances too, many gay people, drag queens, and the like who were on stage showcasing their dancing and singing abilities. The highlight of the show was when a transgender (I think he/she was anyway) tried to sing Beyonce’s Crazy In Love but unfortunately he/she didn’t know the words… and was out of time… and was out of tune. To the crowds delight he/she still gave it a go and filled in the unknown words with “blah, blah, blah”. Very funny.

At the end of the show the parade started. This was certainly a first for me, not only was this my first time in attendance at a gay pride parade, it was also my first time partaking in the march. With a cocktail in hand, and wearing the gay pride flag as a cape I was fully immersed in the day, I was ready to throw on a pair of leather hot pants with the arsecheeks cut out.

The parade came to a halt only half-a-mile in. The Christian nuts had taken it upon themselves to stop everyone’s fun. They were sat in the middle of the road bringing an end to the festivities. The police were drafted in again, this time to protect the selfish, insane, prejudice, close-minded, homophobes. The thousands of parade marchers were growing restless, they were ready to throw buckets of cum and glitter on the Christians for ruining their fun. It’s a shame that a mere 20 or so Christians can ruin the fun of thousands on a day which is to be celebrated not targeted.

This is the kind of Christian I can get on board with.

The interruption was a perfect opportunity for a toilet break. I nipped into the nearest Tom N Toms only to find that there was only a single cubicle. I waited patiently, and as the guy in the cubicle left he was followed by another gentleman. I guess it was the day to be proud.

During the wait a friend of mine checked his Grinder app on his phone and it was crazy! An app which is designed to find the nearest gay person to you so you can meet and ‘hook up’. It’s slightly different than straight apps such as Tinder, which measure available singles in miles, Grinder measures available singles in feet. Lo and behold there was a gay man only 6 feet away, I could see him! He was ready to fuck!

Those kinds of Christians really bother me. What do they really expect when protesting at those events? All the gay people to say “I’ve seen the light, I’m now straight and a devout Christian!” No, of course that’s an unrealistic thing to expect. They’re gay, they cannot change who they are. All the Christians are doing is making gay people, and others hate their religion. People were at the festival to celebrate being gay, drink, party, and have a good time not to convert. We stayed a little longer before we got bored and found a nearby pub.

Sunday was soon upon us and we decided to do some sightseeing, we went to Changdeokgung Palace and the palace's Secret Gardens, as I write it on here it becomes far less secret. A less dramatic day than before but beautiful all the same.

A great weekend from start to finish. 

Losing Feels Worse than Winning Feels Good

Anyone that’s in the know has found out that Josh has gone home. For his own personal reasons he has decided to bring his Korean adventure to an end and head home back to Bedford. This was strange for me, since arriving in Korea I was welcomed by Josh, James, and Susie and settled into life very quickly. A little over 3 months later and James and Josh have both departed, as it happened Susie was busy this weekend so I had my first weekend without any of them. I felt like Heather Mills, something was missing.

In all honesty I didn’t think Josh would go although maybe it’s a good thing that he’s gone. In the absence of James and Josh I might learn some more Korean and it’s likely I’ll meet some new (hopefully more interesting) friends. C’est la vie. “I hope you ready for the next episode. Heyyeyyeyay!...”

Anyway, I went to watch White Lies with Angie during the week. They’re an English rock band but I’d never heard of them. We arrived at the venue and they didn’t serve beer. Yeah that’s right, they didn’t have beer at a music gig, mental. Standing in the crowd I felt very old. I’m only 24 but felt 44. I had come straight from work so I was dressed in work attire. I looked at the young people around me and they were wearing vests and baseball caps backwards and I was dressed like a teacher, jumper over the shirt look. I didn’t know any of the songs. I was holding both of our coats, and as my sober mind wandered I started to look around at the venue and I had the most boring thought ever known to man; “isn’t the brickwork lovely?” I mean the brickwork was delightful, but Christ! Could I get any more boring?

Watching a gig in Korea was different to any that I have been to back in the UK. No beer, no moshing, no cups of piss being thrown. If there was a suggestions box at the venue I’d have suggested “more piss, please.” One other thing that annoyed me about the gig was the bassist. He was sweating throughout the gig but he never removed his beanie hat, I needed to have a word with him. Having said all of that, the band weren’t bad and I had a good time.

We took a trip to Gyeongbokgung Palace on Saturday and it was very interesting. I went with Karl and managed to time it well enough to get to the palace for the English guided tour, we had 20 minutes to kill but our boredom took over. We went off exploring around the palace grounds on our own. I managed to piece it all together anyway, that building was the king’s throne room, that one was his bedroom with en suite, that was his walk-in wardrobe, that one was his games room, and that one was his kitchen with adjacent conservatory. A nice place, I wouldn’t buy it though, too many tourists and with a place that big people would be expecting to stay over all the time.

We saw the changing of the guards, a bit of a drawn out occasion.

The guard were dressed in traditional apparel, they went a little far with the dodgy stick on beards though.

After we went to Itaewon to a sports bar, a big weekend of football for both Karl and I. Chelsea vs. Arsenal and Derby vs. Nottingham Forest. Unsurprisingly the bar opted for the Chelsea vs. Arsenal game. To be honest, it didn’t really matter which game they put on, both teams got hammered. This was another game that I’ve watched Arsenal lose since leaving the UK. I noticed this pattern a few weeks back, I haven’t seen Arsenal win a game live on TV since leaving the UK back in November.

This is a list of Arsenal games I’ve watched live since leaving the UK:

11^th December, 2013 – Napoli 2-0 Arsenal

14^th December, 2013 – Man City 6-3 Arsenal

23^rd December, 2013 – Arsenal 0-0 Chelsea

8^th February, 2014 – Liverpool 5-1 Arsenal

12^th February, 2014 – Arsenal 0-0 Man Utd

19^th February, 2014 – Arsenal 0-2 Bayern Munich

8^th March, 2014 – Arsenal 4-1 Everton*

22^nd March, 2014 – Chelsea 6-0 Arsenal

* I watched the first 60 minutes of the game before leaving the pub while the score was 1-1.

The best 2 results I’ve seen have been two 0-0 draws. A depressing 4 months, I can tell you! I even went to “support” Seoul FC in their opening game of the new season and guess what? They lost as well!

8^th March, 2014 – Seoul FC 0-1 Jeonnam Dragons

I’m hoping that the next few Arsenal games are an improvement; we’ve got an important cup game coming up soon. Maybe I shouldn’t watch it? Probably for the best.