Semarang and the Gedong Songo

The attractions of North Central Java

Originally published in Bali and Beyond Magazine, January 2009

http://www.baliandbeyond.co.id/bnb_jan_09/beyond.html

As the orange glow of the sunrise gradually spreads to the east and the wisps of mist clear from the steep pine forest-covered slopes, a spectacular view opens. Below the red rooftops of the hamlet of Duran the mountainside falls away through terraces of cabbages and onions – exotic vegetables here in Indonesia which only grow in the high altitude cool. Through the pale haze that cloaks the valley below, palm-lined ridges and amphitheatres of green rice can be made out, and further to the south the Rawa Pening Lake catches a dulled reflection of the morning sky. Beyond that, rising stark above the streaks of cloud that blur the landscape of Central Java, is the great purple cone of Gunung Merbabu, a 3000-metre high mountain. Loitering behind it, it is just possible to pick out the smoking summit of Gunung Merapi, the most active volcano in the area, while to the right another pair of huge conical mountains, Gunung Sumbing and Gunung Sundoro, seem to float on a sea of white haze. Closer at hand the sunlight begins to streak through the pine trees, lighting the intricately carved stonework of the ancient Hindu temples, known as the Gedong Songo, that lie scattered across this high hillside.

While the World Heritage Site temples of Prambanan and Borobudur in the southern part of Central Java attract hundreds of visitors every day, fifty kilometres to the north the older temples of Gedong Songo rarely make it onto visitors’ itineraries. They might be small in stature compared to the splendours to the south, but those who make the effort to follow the steep road through the cabbage fields will be amply rewarded. The Gedong Songo occupy one of the finest positions anywhere in Java, high on the rugged slopes of Mount Ungaran looking out over that mighty vista of volcanoes. And while Borobudur and Prambanan swarm with sightseers from first light every day, if you visit during the week, chances are you’ll have the Gedong Songo to yourself.

Gedong Songo means “Nine Buildings” in Javanese. The name might cause modern visitors to scratch their heads – there are only six temple groups spread over the slopes above Duran village, and though some of the groups contain several individual structures, no count will reach a tally of nine. It seems that the early Dutch surveyors who first mapped the site in the 19th Century made a mistake and the name that they gave the “nine” buildings was later translated into Javanese for local maps. But the locals around Gunung Ungaran had another more evocative, and more accurate, name for the place: Candi Banyukuning, the Temples of the Yellow Water.
The Gedong Songo temples were built in the 8th Century and are some of the finest of the early Hindu temples in Java. Their design – rising tiers, an inner chamber, and decorated facades – was a prototype for the classic Javanese architectural style that reached its greatest heights at Prambanan, two centuries later. And in their remote location, up in the cool pine forests, the Gedong Songo temples have survived remarkably well for more than 1200 years.

The temples lie at the end of a narrow lane some seven kilometres from the pleasant hill resort of Bandungan. A path leads from the entranceway with its cluster of simple cafes serving tasty sate kelinci (skewered rabbit kebabs with peanut sauce) and hot coffee sweetened with condensed milk, up through the narrow terraces where hill folk work tending plots of vegetables. The first of the temples is a bulky building with a yoni – cosmic symbol of femininity – in the gloomy inner chamber (its male counterpart, the lingam, is missing). But the best carvings are further up the hillside at the second and third temple groups. Here there are carvings of the elephant-headed god Ganesh and the goddess Durga looking out from niches in the walls, the craftsmanship still obvious after more than a millennium. The backdrop of pine-clad slopes makes an atmospheric setting, and the faint scent of sulphur in the air adds to the otherworldly atmosphere.
The source of the smell is in a nearby ravine where geothermal energy from the active volcano behind the temples sends acrid smoke hissing from cracks in the rocks and brings yellow-tinted water bubbling to the surface in shallow, steaming pools. The colour of this naturally heated water is the source of the old local name for the temples. A small swimming pool has been built at these hot springs. The waters are said to have healing properties and on weekends locals from the coastal city of Semarang and beyond make the journey up into the pine trees to bathe here. On a weekday afternoon though, you can enjoy this natural spa treatment alone for the princely sum of 5000 rupiah.

The other temples stand beyond the hot springs, on a steep ridge surrounded by trees. This is where the early morning sunlight first falls after dawn, and it is from here that the bird’s-eye view across the valley is at its best. There are more fine carvings, and inside some of the buildings you’ll find offerings of leaves and petals and a little pile of incense ash, a sign that long after the great Hindu kingdoms of Java faded from the scene, someone still venerates these sacred places. With their stunning, atmospheric location it’s easy to see why.

***

You can get to the Gedong Songo temples from the popular tourist town of Yogyakarta, less than three hours to the south. But the nearest city is Semarang on the north coast, just 45 minutes away. Semarang is often overlooked by guidebooks and tour routes. It is true that the city has none of the royal palaces and artistic highlights of Yogyakarta and Solo, but it is one of the oldest cities in Indonesia, and it is a good place to see traces of a different side of Java’s history.
Semarang was an important trading city in colonial days, and in the narrow streets around its winding river there are some of the finest examples of Dutch architecture anywhere in the country. Sprawling in either direction from the thoroughfare of Jalan Jendral Suprapto are alleys lined with old shops and warehouses with stocky columns and high shuttered windows. Red-tiled roofs and arched doorways still offer a faded echo of the older quarters of Amsterdam. The finest of all the old buildings is the 18th Century Immanuel church, better known as Gereja Blenduk, the Church of the Dome.

One of the most atmospheric of all Semarang’s colonial relics is the venerable Toko Oen restaurant. Inconspicuous on a busy street, once through the doors you are back in the 1930s – the decade when the place first opened. With old wooden furniture, slow-turning ceiling fans, top-notch ice cream, and tasty homemade cakes and biscuits from tall glass jars, it’s the perfect place for afternoon tea.

Elsewhere in the city there is a sprawling Chinatown, dotted with temples full of red and black tones, pungent incense smoke, and old women praying before gold statues of the Buddha – and needless to say there is some fine Chinese food.

Semarang might not offer the instant attractions of Yogyakarta, and the Gedong Songo might not rank among the wonders of the world, but this little-visited corner of Central Java is well worth a detour to escape the crowds – and to see some of the most beautiful landscapes in Java.

© Tim Hannigan 2008

The overlooked attractions of Central Java's north coast

Semarang and the Gedong Songo Temples

Originally published in The Jakarta Post, 5/10/08

http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2008/10/05/the-overlooked-attractions-central-java039s-north-coast.html


The gunpowder smell of fresh rain in the night air hit me as I climbed down from the train in Semarang. By the time I reached the station gates and had clambered into a waiting becak (pedicab), a thunderous - and highly unseasonable - downpour had begun.

I peered from beneath the becak's dripping hood as it rolled along the empty streets. This was an old city, and I caught glimpses of heavy Dutch rooflines, crumbling columns and arched windows. Shadowy figures sheltered beneath shuttered balconies, and other becaks rolled swiftly through the wet night, their drivers straining urgently at the peddles.

I stopped at the only place open on this dark street: a cafe in a high-ceilinged old building with slow-circling fans. The walls were decorated with photographs of Semarang in years past, and the cafe was known simply as "No. 29" (opposite Blenduk Church). I ordered a plate of juicy sate and a glass of iced tea, and sat peering out at the wet darkness. The rain continued to fall.

Semarang is not high on any must-see list for travelers. Overshadowed by its southern counterpart, the touristic behemoth of Yogyakarta, it's easy to forget that this coastal city of 1.5 million people is the capital of Central Java, and one of the oldest settlements in Indonesia.

With a couple of days to spare I had decided to eschew the more obvious attractions of Yogyakarta to see what this lesser-known place and its surrounds had to offer - if only it would stop raining!

Colonial history, Chinese culture

To my relief, the dry season returned the following morning. I picked my way over the puddles back into the old part of the city - still sometimes known by its Dutch name, the Outstadt.

While Yogyakarta is a truly Javanese city, Semarang is the archetypal port, built on colonialism and immigration.

Semarang's history can be traced back to the first millennium - ancient by Indonesian standards - but it was in the colonial era when trade networks spread from the harbors of Java that it came into its prime.

The ruler of the ailing Mataram kingdom, Amangkurat I, ceded Semarang to the Dutch in 1677 after they came to his aid against the Madurese renegade Trunajaya. Semarang soon developed into a seat of colonial government and commerce.

The loudest echoes from this era can be felt around Jl Jendral Suprapto, the street that my becak had rolled along through the rain the previous evening.

The atmospheric gloom had cleared with the dawn, but what had been ominous silhouettes in the wet darkness, now revealed themselves as fine 18th and 19th Century buildings.

This was an area of hipped roofs, stocky columns and some of the finest Dutch domestic architecture I had seen in Indonesia. Best of the colonial buildings was Gereja Blenduk, the domed Church of Immanuel opposite the cafe where I had eaten the night before. Built in 1753, it is still one of the most important Protestant churches in Semarang.

Its heavyset white clock towers and red brick dome were bright against a clear blue sky.

Wandering along narrower alleyways south of the church, I found my way to the edge of the river that once carried trading ships into the very heart of the city. This was an area of tiny doorways and outdoor kitchens. Fighting cocks preened themselves haughtily under wicker baskets and finches twittered in bamboo cages hanging from trees.

I followed the river south to the 18th Century Tay Kak Sie Chinese temple. It is an impressive building with dragons writhing along its bowed roofline. Inside, old ladies raised bunches of smoking joss sticks before the altars while old men with bony knees sprawled on benches outside. The air was thick with the heavy scent of incense.

Semarang has a large ethnic Chinese population. There is a suggestion that the name of the place may be a corruption of that of the famous Chinese Admiral Zheng He, who came here in the 15th Century and to whom another temple on the outskirts of the city is dedicated.

Across the river I wandered into Chinatown. Here there were old shop-houses and more temples at unexpected street corners. Flashes of red and gold showed above the counters of pharmacies and hardware stores.

Semarang's modern center lies to the south of all this history, focused on the broad expanse at the heart of Simpang Lima, a five-road intersection lined with hotels and malls.

Shopping is not my scene, so after tracking down an edible souvenir, the local speciality known as wingko babad - small, sticky coconut-flavored cakes - I retreated north and took refuge in another relic of the colonial age.

Toko Oen is a venerable institution, a restaurant that has hardly changed since it opened its doors in 1936. The heat and traffic noise seemed to stay respectfully outside and four superannuated Chinese women sat dabbing at homemade ice cream at a table near the door. I slipped into a creaking wooden chair and settled down to read the newspaper over coffee and cakes.

Hindu temples at high altitude

The next morning I headed for the hills. Yogyakarta may have Borobudur, but Semarang has its own classical temples within easy reach of the city.

A battered local bus carried me south. Ahead, the ghostly outline of Gunung Ungaran formed like a photograph from the haze, and soon we were rattling along a rising road through green forests. Just beyond the little hill resort of Bandungan, 45 minutes from Semarang, I left the bus and took a motorbike taxi up a narrow lane through fields of cabbage and potatoes, into the clouds.

It was a weekday afternoon and the cool hamlet of Duran, 1200 meters above the sizzling coastal plain, was deserted. I left my bag in a little caf* on the edge of an empty car park at the end of the road, and made my way uphill to the temples of Gedong Songo.

Strung out among the pine trees and terraces above Duran, these 8th Century Hindu temples have a truly stunning location. And as the light faded and skeins of damp mist crept down the high slopes, I was the only person there to enjoy it.

Gedong Songo means "nine buildings" in Javanese, something that may puzzle modern visitors: There are only six distinct temple groups. It is said that the name has its origins in the dubious counting skills of early Dutch surveyors who ignored the more evocative local name: Candi Banyukuning, Temples of the Yellow Water.

These finely decorated temples were dedicated to the worship of Shiva. Bug-eyed demons grimaced above entranceways and naga or dragons flanked the steps. In the wall, niches carvings of Ganesh (Shiva's elephant-headed son) and the goddess Durga had survived, all with swollen bellies and tilted hips.

Inside the empty inner chamber of one the buildings, a small pile of petals and a curl of incense ash showed that someone was still venerating these places.

I picked my way along the white stripe of the footpath, zigzagging through the forest. The valley below had disappeared under smears of bruised cloud and the pine trees hung limp in the damp air. There was a faint odor of sulfur. I found its source - and that of the temples' old name - at the bottom of a narrow ravine where smoke was issuing from the cracked rocks, and steaming water was bubbling in shallow, yellowish pools.

There was a small bathing pool here where the geothermally heated water was at perfect bath temperature for this cool climate. After a relaxing dip I hurried downhill and found a clean, quiet guesthouse in the village.

Mountain vistas at dawn

A crimson stain was seeping along the eastern edge of the morning as I hurried uphill at first light. The blue mist of the evening had gone and the only mark on the slopes was the sulphury smoke from the hot springs.

It was cold and I kept moving swiftly until I reached the temple on the highest ridge. Shards of sunlight were spilling across the mountainside now and a warming breeze was lifting from the valley.

A sea of pale cloud all but covered the landscape of fields and forests below, but I could just pick out the faded mirror of Rawa Pening Lake away to the south. Beyond it, rising in a smooth purple cone was the high summit of Gunung Merbabu, and peering over its western shoulder, trailing a smudge of pale smoke, was the belligerent peak of Merapi. To the west another pair of high volcanoes - Sumbing and Sundoro near Wonosobo - were slipping away into the rising morning.

Semarang might not have a kraton (palace) or endless reams of batik, but it has palpable relics of another side of Javanese history. And if the dignified remains of the Gedong Songo don't match the giddying splendor of Borobudur, they do occupy one of the most stunning locations in Java.

As I sat there, alone and untroubled, the warmth of the new sun on my face, the sound of insects creaking in the forest, I thought of the hordes of sweating sightseers that would already be swarming up the steps
of Borobudur, just 50 kilometers to the south. I was glad that I had come here - and it had stopped raining!

© Tim Hannigan 2008