February 17

February 17

This is the morning of departure for Yogya, the area where my mother and father met.

Menno said that it is a wonderful city, and it surely was....

  We are in the train to Yogya, aka Jogja  or Jogya….etc..... 

granddad in Yogya

  What an interesting day this turned out to be so far... As agreed we were fetched by a friend of Hariman in a van to drive us to the train station, 2 hours away....
The ride there was definitely the worse ride we have ever experienced, the roadway was full of pot holes and no realistic speed could be achieved.
For some reason, yet to be explained, we were unable to get to the station that we agreed to go to, something was mumbled about a bridge being washed away, but we were secured that if we would not reach the station on time, the driver would block the tracks with his van, so as to stop the train and let us on.....BIG relieve  !!!!

Anyway, we made it to the station in plenty of time, as the train was very much delayed by + 1 hour. And because it was so delayed, it would only stop for 30 seconds to let us on. Thankfully several attendants helped us climb on the train and into the cabin, thankfully again, we had reserved Eksekutif class tickets, which gave us reserved seating in a nice airco coach, 2 coaches away from the goats, chickens, vendors and beggars that invest the other class cabins….

chinese new year in Yogyakarta

Traveling by train coach is a lovely way to travel and sitting by the window gives me a great view of the country side as we speed by.
Unfortunately, the windows have a bit of faded tinting on them, which makes it impossible ,for me to take reasonable pictures  to share with y'all.
By the way, the Eksekutif class is only  3 or 4 bucks more than traveling business class and business class is  about 2 bucks more than economy (that's the one with the critters...and droppings)
The trip from the station, where we left to Yogyakarta (Yogya) should take about 2.15 hours. So far we run about 45 minutes behind time, but that could be because of that flat tire on the locomotive, they were talking about.

Mom and dad, wedding in Salatiga

Well we arrived in Yogya and is a lovely town....to think that our mom and dad would have walked and shopped here, when daddy would take his Willey's Jeep and take our very young mother for a ride to get out of Salatiga to the bigger town of Yogya.....

Mom and dad in the Willey's jeep

The feel of this city is quite different from that of Bandung and certainly Bogor. We arrived at our lovely "guest house" called Duta Guesthouse. We had a garden view room and it is basic but very nice and clean, lovely people tending to our needs, almost seemed  that they were trained to perform American style service.

Duta guesthouse

We mandied and got ready for our first excursion. We were very excited to know that this little place has WiFi and a computer station as well.... So I can catch up on some of my blogs and send them on.
We started the evening off with a drink of cold Bintang beer at a local land mark....Tante Lies, a warung that was owned by an Indo campur woman, of Dutch and Indonesian descent. She had died a year ago and her kids are running the toko into the ground, I think...
Anyway, the beer was cold and wet, so we were ready for our next stroll down Jalan Malioboro, the main street of Yogya, filled with eating warungs and stores that sell Batiks...
We took a becak (actually 2, because we felt sorry for the driver) the rickshaw took us for a ½  hour ride for 10.000 rupia, which equates to about 90 dollar cents.

Menno is having way too much fun

 
Once at Jalan Malioboro, we strolled passed several sate vendors, before we finally decided to try some.....it was delicious, great snack food. We bought 10 sticks for 5000 R which is about 50 cents Canadian....gosh, I should be ashamed of myself.....

Even back then....he was having fun....

It was so good, in fact, that we walked down a few vendors, and bought another snack, sate again....
 


It so happened that we landed in the middle of Chinese New Year celebrations, which kept us so occupied, that when we decided to have our next snack, it was too late and most of the stalls had closed.
So....back with the same becaks to the hotel, where we stopped off at Tante Lies, where we had a nice Soto ajam, for less than a buck....do the math !!!!
We had an early night and turned in, because the next day would be a busy one!

breafast buffet at the Duta....best of the trip.