ADHVAGATI

One of the benefits of living in an industrial suburb of a small town in Indonesia was the opportunity we got to visit some very exotic sites , scattered around Central Java. One of them was BOROBUDUR. The data about Borobudur : A World Heritage Site . The Largest Buddhist Stupa in the world. " The Temple With No Inside" . Built between 740 and 852 AD ( the precise years  as given by Britannica)    during the reign of King Samaratungga of  Shailendra Dynasty. Seismic activity ( or a war or cultural shift) caused  total  abandonment in around 950 AD ; swallowed by jungle and forgotten till 1814 when Stanford Raffles rediscovered the humongous rubble. Painstaking, continuous restoration by various nationalities .... Opened for pilgrimage and tourism in 1973. The monument is built like a stone ( lava-rock) cladding over a natural hill ( hence, "no Inside") in Central Java, not very far from the holy volcano Merapi. It is 9 tiered,(six of th...

Life inside a mill+residences campus isn't exactly similar to gracious living within a posh Gated Community. Especially in an Indonesian countryside compound thats 40 kms. from anywhere. More like "incarceration" in a 4 star facility bearing as its postal address just a series of pointers : " Km.44 on Highway to xxx xxxx, Behind Village xxxxx , North End of Province xxxx." I guess our letters were delivered not by mailmen but by cartographers. No wonder the milkman chose to appear only twice a week. But life went on ; we lived an indian life less ordinary and even worked up nostalgia for it later!  The campus, which was home to me for a decade, nestled in a sylvan setting , amidst verdant lush paddy fields, in the shadow of a respectably tall hill . The climate,over all, was "hill-station"ish. The gardens in front of the 20 houses, tended by the company gardeners, were in perpetual bloom. The Housekeeper, a pleasant faced, industriou...

Its ancient name means The Abode Of Gods. Verily, it must have been the chosen resort of the gods.. For though the divine dwellings are now vacant, the place still retains a surreal redolence of deep peace and beatitude, which can only be associated with a place called Paradise .  A long drive from Yogyakarta in Central Java( Indonesia ) through a hilly road winding up through green vistas, past the town of Wonosobo,  has brought us to one of the summits called Dieng. Dieng Plateau is the caldera of two or more old volcanoes , situated 2500 meters above sea level. The annual average temperature being 15 degrees, ghostly veils of mist and shrouds of frost seem to have taken permanent residence here. The mineral rich soil of the plateau supports profitable cultivation of potato, tobacco , cabbage and asparagus. All the small towns sprinkled around the plateau engage in activities like curing, canning etc. There is also a ...

Mt. Merapi in central Indonesia is making news - news of the ghastly kind. Recurrent outbursts in the past two weeks have wreaked much havoc. It is reported to be the worst episode in 100 years for the Holy Volacano. Reading reports of this disaster is distressing , all the more because one has seen that mountain in happier times. Though it is the most active volacano in the region, on both the occassions that I saw Gunung Merapi, it was beautiful, benign, bathed in picture-postcard loveliness. This was years ago. Merapi is the most sacred site for Buddhists who consider the "self-ignited" fire from it the holiest , to be used in rituals in the viharas spread around Central Java. The name Merapi is a combo of two Javanese words : Meru ( holy mountain)+ Api ( Fire). The first time I saw it, was during my visit to Yogyakarta , an elegant Sultanate that lies some 30 kms. from the mountain . The Yogyakarta Sultanate , considered one part of the holy trio that protec...

Small communities of expatriate Indians , living in far flung small towns in alien land, are always thrilled to seize upon any excuse to have a jingoistic bash where they can wallow in nostalgia and longing for "home", with over- the- top exhibitions of Desi-ness. Hyper-Desi sentiments, Uber-Desi attire, Ultra-Desi feasts . Diwali is one such excuse and a grand one at that. In the ghetto of the factory -campus in a smaller- than -small town of Indonesia, where we once lived, Diwali was always a Big Fat Desi Affaire par Excellence - yeah, Bollywood dances religiously included ! The Party was usually held not on actual Diwali day, but on the Saturday night nearest to it. Since Fireworks were prohibited, a few anaemic chinese flare sticks were burnt for "tradition's" sake. But the rest of the party was great fun. Women turned out in bridal finery, men togged up like residual royalty, children stumbled around in cumbersome "ethnic" wear. Dark ...

Bali revisited. After a l-o-n-g interval. But surprisingly, i found little change of any note. Bali now felt and looked the same as the Bali of my memory - a well hawked , well packaged, well presented " Last Paradise on Earth ". Tourism, the major industry of the little island, has recouped , even increased, after that momentary lull following the ghastly bombing incident. A monument in the busy Jalan Legian called The Ground Zero Monument, in memory of the bomb victims, is now a "place of interest" too ! This time around, we did not touch any tour brochures, but decided to make our own plans. And move at our own pace. It was much more relaxing, especially since the heat and humidity of peak summer was merciless and life sapping. Even the beach proved to be stifling and still. ( The typical Balinese split-meru gateway. Besakih. ) The only "must see" on list was Pura Besakih in Karangasem Regency, the holiest...

Not in my looniest dreams had i imagined that i would some day walk into a live volcano. But i did........I know that sounds like a stretched fantasy yarn. But if revise our perceptions about volcanoes and re-educate ourselves in descriptions, such a claim will not sound so daft after all. In our country volcanoes never figure in normal, perceived geography. They are in text books, fairy tales, sometimes in newspapers, and always evoke the mental association with the image of a perfectly conical mountain,furiously blowing its top in a blaze of red, orange and yellow illumination. Thats the standard "live" volcano ; and it was just such an image that popped in mind's eye when we heard that there was a friendly, neighbourhood "live volcano" about two hours away from where we lived in Sumedang-Bandung, Indonesia. And it being the biggest tourist attraction of the region, we just couldn't give it a miss. It last erupted in 1983 and exhibited some half-he...