During Chinese New Year weekend, since we had a long break, that is 3.5 days, I went off to Indonesia. One must appreciate rarity.

I headed off to Central Java, Indonesia for what is going to be my last journey this period. I thought that I had booked a trip with a friend but soon found out that 15 other INSEADers were going to the same place. We ended up in the same hotel and on the same volcano.

Actually, I found it difficult to be with so many different people so loosely organized. Inevitably we had to wait, not everyone’s interest was identical and I quite welcome the opportunity to actually get to know more a few of them, which is impossible in the midst of a whole troop. Some members of the group displayed evident signs of selfishness and what I call bluntly disrespect. Call it a cultural thing if you will, but I was brought up with the idea that when one travels in a group, the needs of the group and its other members influenced your behavior. Not the other way around.
I have found some of the group member also plain arrogant. Asking a bus driver to turn on the radio would be ok. Then realizing that it is a local song, which hurt the delicate senses of the listening party and quite forcefully request that the music be turned off might appear too colonial. Even staying in a nice hotel, with an extremely pleasant and professional staff does not warrant inconsiderate behavior. It is good to remember how fortunate one is, how much of it is one’s doing, how much of it was external factors. It is humbling to realize how inter-dependent we all are, and how much everyone else can teach us, before deciding about the tone of voice which with we address a third party.

Fortunately, not everyone displayed such an attitude and overall the trip was very enjoyable.

The volcano climbing trip was much better – from my personal point of view – since we all had a clear bus schedule and we could climb in smaller group, thus really get to know the people we walked with. For the rest, we went away from the rest of the group and met up for a dinner, as we were staying at the same hotel.

Yogyakarta (pronounce Jogjakarta) is a buzzling intellectual city close to the Southern Coast of Indonesia’s most populated island. It is noisy, disorganized, polluted and cheap.

The hotel was a magnificent three star hotel, with a pool and outrageously expensive food. I must say that I was not in the mood for such luxury. I came to Indonesia with the desire to see Indonesia and not end up in a Western cocoon. My friend and I escaped to local food courts for a 3000 rupiah meal, took public buses, bike taxis, walked around in dusty streets. I wanted to get a feel for the environment most Indonesians find themselves in, day after day. Indonesia is one of these countries where the large majority of the wealth generated within the country is held by a very small number of people. Indonesian millionaires buy real estate in Singapore and Hong Kong. Most of them have Chinese origin and intend to be ready to quickly flee the country, should the situation turn sour.

We could not wear long pants, nor tank tops, despite the heat. Even men have to be fairly decent, although pants reaching down to knee level was accepted for a man, not for a woman. Indonesia is the second most populated muslim community, and the first one outside of the Arab world.

The city and its surroundings offer three main attraction points, which we could all visit:
An old Buddhist temple, Borobudur, an old Hindu temple: Prambanan and the Sultan palace, with a lively city protected by its walls, quite different from the rest of Yogyakarta.

I visited the Buddhist temple with the rest of the group, which meant that we left with a 45 minute-delay, rushed to find a guide, ran through the visit. I was always standing too far away from the guide to hear anything about what he had to say. I noticed that nearly all of Buddha’s statues had their heads cut off and I felt the appeasing power of the edifice on my senses. The surrounding landscape resembled Vietnam, or Cambodia and the elephant screams in the distance certainly contributed to this impression of being in a remote sacred place, protected by the jungle. The mountains were half covered in mist, refuge of spirits and other mystical forces. The whole place felt very surreal.

The next morning, we visited the Sultan palace and witnessed a puppet theater, Chinese style (using rear light and shadows). The instruments were gongs, percussions and some sort of iron and steel pants. There was no visible conductor and the perfect coordination between the numerous musicians still puzzle me. There were male and female singers to tell the story. The guards were wandering about with large knives on their back, a la Touareg. The palace displayed a lot of pictures and presents from all over the world received by the Sultan. Most of the official rooms of the palace had a ceiling supported by four columns, representing the four elements – of the four cardinal points…

Around the palace is a small city, with narrow streets and low white houses, inter-connected by pedestrian passages and small squares. On one of them you can see the Sultan’s elephants. The mother had just died and Father and Baby were the only one left. I heard that the Sultan was rather unhappy with the vet. Streets were full of merchant life: all sorts of crafts were being sold, colorful and flamboyant fruits, screaming monkeys and flashy tropical birds. If you find yourself walking in the street of Kraton (the Sultan palace city) and wish to ask for direction (every street looks the same), do not ask merely for the palace. We ended up several times to the Water Palace, which is another interesting monument to visit, but which is not included on the entrance ticket to the Sultan palace…

The Sultan is acting as a governor and plays an important counseling role. He is also a revered figure and his opinion weighs a lot in the local community. The new government in Indonesia was elected, even though it created a lot of discontent.

In the afternoon, we headed to the Hindu temple. Instead of paying a lot of money for an organized tour, with everyone else and a car for the day, a small portion of the group opted for the public bus approach. We took a taxi-bike, sort of Indonesian-Chinese push bike, to the public bus terminal, giggled our way to the Prambanan yellow public bus and round ourselves en route to the glorious 9th century temple.
If anyone finds Borobudur humbling, you will be absolutely stunned by Prambanan. The palace is truly beautiful. One is quickly reminded of the fact that the Indians have built the Taj Mahal. I hope that the Prambanan architect did not get his hands cut off after his feat. The palace hosts several temples, each of them dedicated to a Hindu God or Goddess: Shiva, Vichnu, etc…I am unfortunately not versed in Hindu mythology and I cannot share with you any insight with respect to the temple, its history, its meaning, etc…The place was packed with local tourists. We seemed to be the only one from abroad. It was noted as we became the center of attention of the palace. Everyone wanted to take a picture with us. My short-lived stardom...

On the way back, we took another public bus and ended up at a different terminal. We then tried a city bus to get back to our starting point. It took us well over an hour as we basically went around the whole city…Beware, when buses tell you they go somewhere, it might not be the most direct way to get there…

At 10pm, we were leaving for a night climb of the most dangerous active volcano on the island of Java: Marapi. Close to 3000m high. The climb was difficult because the terrain was very slippery, or made of unstable volcanic rocks and most of our flash lights died within 20 minutes. This is where you realize that your balance is largely visually based. I was walking as fast as a snail on a complicated puzzle. The heat and humidity was lessened at such altitude which was quite a relief. In fact, we reached the top about 1 hour before the sunrise and it was truly freezing cold. I had lent my Goretex jacket to my friend, and survived with a fleece. Fortunately, we remembered that we were climbing on an ACTIVE volcano. In many places, the rock was boiling hot, with light sulfurous vapors or just plain steam. Some sort of free sauna. Little islands soon formed around these pockets of heat and everyone became happier. We could see the crater from the top and from time to time, lava. We also walked past rock in fusion on several occasion, outside of the crater. This is quite scary. Yet I felt no fear, nor imminent danger.
The sunrise on the volcano, the neighboring inactive volcano, covered by green patches and reminding me of the French Massif Central and the tropical plain unveiling its secrets in front of our eyes was truly magical. What a change from the city. What a change from the MBA programme. It was well worth the climb.

The way down was much more painful. I waited for a friend who had hurt her knee and walked very slowly which was hard on my own knees. As we reached the village, I turned down the offer to finish off the last kilometer with a car. I walked down the street, greeting everyone in Indonesian. And everyone came to the gate with an amicable greeting, everyone offered me some water, a hand wave and a smile. Even the poultry was energetically greeting me. This experience was worth to me much much more than a night in a five star hotel.

The rest of the trip was fairly uneventful. We went back, slept for the rest of the afternoon, which was quite necessary after 10 hours of walking and spent the evening in Djarkarta – which struck me as a very clean and modern city.