Yogyakarta, Indonesia

I've been telling you my trip to Jakarta didn't start very well, neither did my travel to Yogyakarta. I arrived to the little city in the middle of Java about 5am after a 8hours train ride in business class. I got 2 French girls I met in Jakarta as company, Sofia and Kathun. I used my last Rubiah to buy a bottle of water and went to the ATM to get some more. I tried every each of ATM's nearby but none of them seemed to be willing to give me any money. They french girls felt really sorry for me, probably more than I did, and tried to help in every possible way. We walked down town to try to find a hostel, which wasn't too easy at 5-6 in the morning. As soon as western union was open I went over there to ask for some help. They felt sorry for me too while they tried to explain that Indonesian bank don't accept visas. I could walk down to this one and only special bank office where it hopefully might work. It was quite a bit to walk, but after all, I was in a good mood and didn't mind a little walk around anyway. I walked in to several bank office's along the way before I finally find the right one who, luckily enough, gave me my money. I always knew I would work it out, some way or another. I was never that worried, really even if it was a quite interesting morning.

Sofia and Kathun was happy to share a room with me, to get the price down. After a shower we went to the art centre where we could see and be told how to produce this fantastic paintings made of wax and color. How to see the difference of handmade and fake ones. It was interesting and really good, hard work. I kind of regret not buying one but I just didn't want to carry it when I'll be gone for so long. And I'm on a budget as well. We took a walk down to Karton temple, where we met Italian/German Nicole who was happy to join us. The temple was not that special, really, so we moved on to the water palace which was more interesting. Even if it was more like a temple, with a pool in it. We tried to walk down to the bird market but ended up taking I pushpush (quite alike a tuk-tuk but smaller). We stayed at the market a few minutes before we left again. Nothing to do there but watching animals in cages. Just not my thing. Since we just had a few hours uncomfortable sleep on a uncomfortable train we had an early night and fell asleep like at 7pm. 

After a really good 13hours sleep, the four of us went to the temple of Borobudur. We rented a private car to take us there and back. The temple were actually really good. I'm trying to forget being on the temples of Angkor cause my expectations are really high since. But I wasn't disappointed this time, even if it was a little bit smaller than my imaginations. It was still beautiful with a great mountain view. 

That evening we all sat down for hours with our lonely planets, iPads, laptops and notebooks to really seriously sharing all of our travel experiences. As Nicole is heading to Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam I gave her all usable information I possibly could. And she shares her australian experiences with me since she just spent a year there and told us everything we need to know about Bali, Gilli and Lombok which is where we're heading next.