Borobudur and Batik

Yesterday was our second of two AUA planned excursions. This time it ended up being an all girls trip because our Indonesian guy friends had other plans or slept through their alarms. Our single-sex group leant itself well to karaoke in the car. We belted out the words to tons of American songs and laughed at our collective horrible voices on the one-hour ride to Borobudur temple. 

Borobudur is the largest Buddhist temple in the world. Like the Hindu temple, Prambanan, it is also a UNESCO world heritage site. Dating from the 8th and 9th centuries, it is a truly impressive structure with three tiers. The name comes from two Sanskrit words and literally means "monastery on a hill". 

With a guide to lead us, we worked our way through the temple, climbing steep stairs and stopping to look at intricate carvings. All the way up, the views were absolutely breathtaking. The temple is set in a valley with mountains on all sides. These are called "Buddha mountains" and are also considered to be sacred. While there were a ton of tourists that definitely detracted from the view, it was still such an amazing place. Once we reached the top tier we caught sight of the iconic stupas that Borobudur is known for. They are bell-shaped because of the leaf of a particular tree brought over from India (unfortunately I don't remember the name of the tree). As you can see in the photo below, if you fold the bottom of the leaf up, you are left with the shape of the stupas.  

Inside each of these stupas is a Buddha statue. In total, Borobudur has 505 statues of Buddha, according to our guide. Once we had reached the top, it began to rain and so we headed back down the steep steps. On our way out we were harassed by vendors waiving their merchandise in our faces and yelling expressions in English. Luckily we've mastered how to say no thank you (Tidak, terima kasih). 

Next we hopped back in the van to head to lunch and batik-making. Lunch was at a restaurant that almost exclusively served mushrooms. They even had a wall where they grew mushrooms inside! Everyone really enjoyed it and it was a cool restaurant concept. 

The batik-making was definitely not my forte. I'm not very artistic and it can be a very frustrating process in general. The way it's made is you use a wooden tool with a small metal cup on the top of it. This metal cup empties into a thin opening that releases the liquid wax. It is very hot, so you have to hold newspaper underneath the cloth in order to not burn yourself. The most difficult part is getting an even flow of wax and not dripping all over the place. It is also hard because you have to have steady hands. 

Once you have made your pattern in wax on the cloth, they will dye it for you. I picked red, but it will take a few days to get back to us. Once going through this whole process, the batik is extremely durable. You can even wash it and the pattern and colors will stay in tact. I definitely have a new appreciation for batik. It's a very interesting and beautiful art form, but I will not be mastering it anytime soon. 

The view from the second tier of Borobudor. So many tourists! 

A stupah without a top on it. This is what the buddhas look like inside. Notice the beautiful Buddha mountains in the background! 

The iconic stupahs at Borobudur. 

A look at the inside of one of the stupahs. 

I stuck my entire camera inside the stupah to get this shot. 

A beautiful tree on the grounds of the temple

The whole group in front of the temple. As we did at Prambanan, we are wearing sarongs to show respect. 

About to start making my batik! Don't be fooled by this photo, I was actually quite frustrated. 

A closer look at the wax and tools used to make batik. We used electricity, however, the traditional method of heating the wax uses coal. First you dip the tool into the hot wax, but only fill it halfway. Then you wait and let the excess wax drip off and then begin tracing your pattern. 

No this wasn't done by a ten-year-old, it's my batik. You can see I'm not exactly an artist, but we'll see how it turns out.  It will be red cloth and all the designs in wax will be white.