Touring Yogya with Ingrid...

So yesterday Ingrid came to pick me up on her scooter and we spent hours touring Yogya. The scooter ride alone deserves comment--we wove in and out and between buses, cars, bicycles, rickshaws and pedestrians; we dove across three lane roads in matter of seconds; we drove on the wrong side of the road if expediency demanded it. When I said "wow" after an especially daring maneuver, Ingrid explained "We are like a fly." It did feel like that. When we arrived at the sultan's palace, Ingrid explained that "Driving in Yogya is like dancing; we sense each other's movements and go from there." It does seem to work, but I'm not sure I'll ever learn those moves.

We survived to see the sultan's palace (where he evidently still lives); it's beautifully ornate, a hybrid area where colonial Dutch and Javanese traditions mix. People here love their sultan, unlike most people under rule--in fact, guards volunteer for 24 hour shifts, for free! As for the historical aspect, Ingrid made an apt point: most of the displays are the sultan's souvenirs--plates from China, Japan, Europe, teapots from the Dutch and the Germans--you name it and they have it for cutlery and dishes. I suppose much of the other historical items were ruined in the earthquake three years ago. There were also these grotesque (in the Freudian sense) life- sized statues of people doing everyday palace things--like praying and cooking--that look like real people when photographed. Eery. I'll post pictures.

After a three hour tour of the palace grounds and museum, (during which we had an English- speaking guide, though once the guide found out that Ingrid spoke such good English, Ingrid ended up doing most of the talking), we hopped back on the scooter and set out in the blazing sun to see the sultan's water palace. Evidently the earthquake did a bunch of damage, but the area is still quite beautiful. Essentially, the water palace is a series of ornate swimming pools where the sultan's 71 wives were ordered to swim. He sat above them in a tower and chose which bathing beauty he wanted to spend "special time with." In Ingrid's words: "That's not fair! What if you were an old wife? In a swimsuit?" Indeed.

Underneath the pools is a huge underground circular mosque--its arches and the juxtaposition of dark prayer rooms and an inner, sunlit courtyard area with multiple staircases ascending upwards is quite beautiful.

Surrounding the palace and water palace there is the royal kampung--a rather depressed looking area, with tiny little alleys, roosters on the loose and falling-down houses that we explored a bit. Evidently only descendents of the sultan can live there--and evidently they're not living the royal lifestyle!

After jalan-jalan (wandering) around in the sun for hours, we were hungry, so Ingrid took me to Milas, her favorite place to eat: as she explained "This place is so Ingrid." It's in this gorgeous, flower and pond-filled outdoor courtyard. Customers sit cross legged on sugarcane floors in traditional Indonesian pagodas with covered grass roofs, and they bring you delicious vegetarian and organic fare that they grow in their own garden. I had this Indian rice dish and a yogurt/vanilla ice cream milkshake. For dessert we shared some apple pie--a delicious rarity in Indonesia. They also have an English language library on the premises, and support their local street children by displaying and selling their lovely artwork. I'll definitely be back there!

I have to teach tomorrow, so I have the jitters. I wonder if I'll ever get over them...If I was back in the U.S. I would have a couple of IPAs to calm my nerves, but here it looks like I'll have to settle for a book and listening to the man bellow from the mosque across the street...