February 26, 2016 Lembar, Lombok, Indonesia

Lumbar Wood Furniture

Lumbar Wood Furniture

Lembar Rice Fields

Lembar Rice Fields

Lumbar Puppet Show

Lumbar Puppet Show

Lumbar - Furniture Finished

Lumbar – Furniture Finished

Lembar is located on the island of Lombok in Indonesia east of Bali. They say that Lombok is what Bali was like before the tourist arrived and hotels were built on all of the beaches. Lombok has a population of about 3.5 million inhabitants and is home to the second tallest volcano (Mt. Rinjani) in Indonesia at 3,726 meters. 90% of the islanders are Muslim as was evident by the huge number of mosques that we saw around the island.

Our tour was titled “Mataram Highlights” but it was more of a shopping tour than anything else. Mataram is a larger city near the port where we tendered ashore. We drove about 45 minutes to the town of Lingsar where we visited the Lingsar Temple Complex built in 1714. This temple is the most important temple on the island for the Balinese people and for the local Sasak people who adhere to Wetu Telu Islam. This temple has a special area set aside for both the Muslims and the Buddhists but also has a central area where people of all faiths can come together. Its fountain contains fish that are believed to appear only when a persons wish is going to be granted. Many visitors throw coins into the fountain in hopes of seeing the fish and their wish coming true. The temple in general was very plain and not much to look at.

Our next stop was in the town of Sesera where we visited the Sayang Art Market. The market is a handicraft type market where people were demonstrating the making of baskets, carving wooden doors, inlaying wood furniture with some white material in elaborate patterns. The furniture would then be stained dark brown and the contrast with the white inlay was very beautiful. Here there were maybe twenty shops selling all types of local crafts, woodcarvings, batik clothing, pearl jewelry, masks baskets and more. Then we visited a pearl shop that had all kinds of pearls made into all types of jewelry. These are salt-water pearls that are harvested here on the island.

Finally we visited the Nusa Tenggara Barat Museum where we saw displays of cloth, Kris Knives, shadow puppets, drums, “mystic” paraphernalia-amulets used to acquire supernatural force, immunity from weapons or to foretell the future. The collection was quite extensive and beautifully displayed although they have no air conditioning so it was a bit uncomfortable.

The countryside is lush and green with many rice fields, fruit trees like bananas. The roads are well paved and many of the homes are much more substantial than some that we have seen in other ports. Most of the locals wear western style clothing although you do see some batik shirts and skirts. The mosques were a highlight as they dotted the landscape everywhere we visited. Many of them were still under construction but the domes and minarets soared above the landscape in vivid colors of all shades. The pony carts are very popular here.   We saw many of those transporting people and goods all around town.

The entertainment was a show by the Rotterdam singers and dancers titled Iris. We had seen the show once before but still enjoyed it this time.

February 25, 2016 Benoa (Denpasar), Bali, Indonesia

After a long hot day yesterday, we decided that we would stay onboard the ship rather than venture out into town on this day. There was nothing of particular interest that we wanted to do and the heat and humidity are overwhelming.

Mark had his hair cut, worked on a community puzzle onboard, a Sudoku puzzle of the day and just relaxed a bit. In the afternoon we ventured off the ship to see what was being offered in the market set up in the port, but there was nothing unique or of interest to us.

February 24, 2016 Benoa (Denpasar), Bali, Indonesia

Bali - Klungkung Kertagosa

Bali – Klungkung Kertagosa

Bali - Pura Kehan Temple

Bali – Pura Kehan Temple

Bali - Pura Khan Temple

Bali – Pura Khan Temple

Bali - Tengana Village

Bali – Tengana Village

Denpasar is the capital of Bali on the island of Bali. The island of Bali has about 4.25 million people while Denpasar has about 850,000 inhabitants with more than 2 million in the metropolitan area. 95% of the population is Hindu. Bali is known the world over for its beautiful white sand beaches, surfing and diving. The Balinese people are extremely devout and life on the island revolves around prayers and ceremonies. Many of the crewmembers are from Bali and they will have the opportunity to visit with their families both on and off of the ship today.

Our excursion on this day was called Historic and Scenic Bali. Due to the change in tides the ship was unable to dock at the port when we arrived, so guest needed to tender to shore until late morning when the tide had risen enough for the ship to dock in port. This slows down the time that it takes to get ashore significantly and many of the guests get angry having to wait for a tender.

Our first stop was at a small village called Tenganan about a 90-minute drive from the port. The distance is not that far but there are no freeways and traffic is busy on the narrow and winding streets. About 100 families live in the village that are called Bali Aga and are descendants of the original island people who maintain their pre-Hindu culture. The village is arranged like a city street with homes on each side of two stone paved lanes. Between the two lanes is a common area with public buildings used for festivals and special events. Most of the families invite you into their homes where they sell merchandise of one type or another. A few of the residents were weaving a unique Kamben Grinsing (flaming cloth) believed to protect its weavers from evil. Many were selling calendars, batik fabrics and clothing, woodcarvings, hand-painted eggs, and more. There were also many wicker baskets with brightly colored (red, yellow, green and purple) roosters in them used for cockfights. In the street we found water buffalo, chickens with many baby chicks, cats and dogs.

Our next stop was at the Klungkung Kertagosa, which was built in 1710 by some of the best artists in the country. This compound contains the Bale Kambang floating pavilion and the Kertagosa Royal Court of Justice. Each of these structures is a raised open-air pavilion with richly painted murals on the interior peaked ceilings. The originals are now housed in a museum but have been replaced with replicas. The Court of Justice contains a large table and chairs where criminals would be seated across from a judge to plead their case before being punished for whatever crime they were charged with. The murals above are explicit, colored murals depicting several rows of acts for which you would be punished and suffer the fate of hell while the upper tiers of the mural reflect good behaviors for which you would be rewarded with eternal life in paradise. The site is very well preserved and contains beautifully landscaped gardens.

A buffet lunch was enjoyed at a local restaurant located in the foothills overlooking the terraced rice fields. The food included rice, fried chicken, pepper steak, chicken and fish satay, fried noodles and more. The dessert included fried bananas, fresh fruit and a local dish that had a coconut mixture wrapped like a mini burrito in a light green colored pastry. While at lunch the skies opened up once again and the rain came pouring down. This is typical weather for this time of year.

Our final stop was at the Pura Kehan Hindu temple complex built on a hillside in the 11th century. A staircase leads you to the main entrance where the demonic face of Kala Makarta stands guard over the temple grounds. Every temple has a temple tree and this was no exception. The Banyan tree in this temple was enormous and must have been many years old. The temple itself consisted of one main temple building plus twenty or more smaller temple structures, each dedicated to a different entity like elephants, people, the sun, etc.

The drive back to the ship took us another 90 minutes or more in traffic. In total our tour lasted about ten hours including the time it took us to get ashore on the tender.

For entertainment they had arranged a local dance and music troop to come onboard to entertain us. They had a band of ten members who played a variety of drums, cymbals, xylophone-like instruments and gongs. Several men and women dressed as women in beautiful costumes presented a variety of dances using both their hands movements and eye movements to entertain.

February 23, 2016 Probolinggo, Java, Indonesia

Probolinggo Chinese Temple

Probolinggo Chinese Temple

Probolinggo Pedicab

Probolinggo Pedicab

Probolinggo Red Church

Probolinggo Red Church

This is a smaller port located on the island of Java and known for its fishing industry. Tourists usually only stop here on their way to visit the nearby Bromo-Tengger-Semeru National Park. The Mount Bromo national park is a volcanic complex of five volcanoes including a new caldera forming within an ancient old caldera nearly six miles in diameter. Mount Bromo stands some 7,850 feet and is Indonesia’s highest mountain and best-known volcano in the Tengger chain.

During the 19th century, under the Dutch East Indies colonial administration Probolinggo, was a lucrative regional center for refining and exporting sugar, and remains an important product today. Today it is also famous for Mangoes, rice and grapes.

The weather was extremely hot and humid and our tour this morning was called Probolinggo Highlights. This is a tender port, meaning that we were required to anchor offshore and take a small tender boat to shore. Our first stop was at the City Square that is more like a central park with a large lawn area for sports or civic activities. Next to the lawn area is a large park area with many trees and birdhouses for the pigeons. This area also has many food stands where people can enjoy some local cuisine.

We then took Pedi cabs to the Red Church, built in 1862 by the Dutch, with a bible inside that dates back to the 16th century. This Catholic Church is constructed of bright red corrugated steel and is very minimally decorated inside. The Pedi-cabs then took us to the Probolinggo Museum to watch a traditional dance demonstration and enjoy some of the local sweets. The dances were quite simple in steps but some of the participants wore elaborate headdresses with peacock feathers. The museum is fairly small but had some displays of local dress, modes of transportation, bicycles, an airplane, some agricultural equipment, weapons, houses and some information on the area.

Next the Pedi-cabs took us to the local market called Pasar Baru, which is very dark under a roof of corrugated steel. The tiny winding walk ways through the market lead you to small stands of fresh fruits, fish, chicken, baskets, flowers, vegetables and many other items. There was no refrigeration and things looked very primitive.

We then went to a local batik workshop, known for creating designs incorporating the local mangoes and grapes for which Probolinggo is famous. Mark was able to create his own small batik print in the short thirty minutes or so that we were there. They showed us how they apply the wax to the muslin fabric, dye the cloth and then remove the wax. They also had a small shop where you could purchase their batik fabrics.

Our last stop was at the Tri Dharma Sumbernaga Chinese Temple built over 145 years ago. The temple is built in a very ornate Chinese building style. This is the center of activity during the Chinese New Year celebrations and the Chinese Cultural Parade. This temple is still used today for religious ceremonies.

Since this is not much of a tourist town, the locals are not used to seeing foreigners. Many people wanted to take pictures of us or to have a photo taken with them. In the local market, our guide commented that many of the ladies were talking about how long our noses were compared to theirs. They have very flat noses so all of these Europeans and Americans had very large prominent noses to them. The people were extremely friendly, smiling and waving as we transited the city from place to place. It is a very simple town with mostly modest housing, but is was fairly clean and well maintained. On the way back to the ship, Mark noticed his room key was missing and made a stop to get it replaced at the Front Desk. All is well.

The evening’s entertainment was a variety show featuring the comedian Tom Sutton and the Japanese violinists called String Idols.

February 22, 2016 Sea Day

This morning David, our location guide, discussed several upcoming ports before we had a lecture on the spice trade by Barry Dryer. Barry discussed how valuable spices were in this region and how the Dutch, English and Portuguese competed for the spice trade over two centuries before the Dutch conquered the trade.

The afternoon brought a lecture by Dr. Valerie Mock on rubber and rice, two Indonesian commodities. She discussed how important rice is to the Indonesian people who eat rice for three meals a day. Rubber plants were brought to Indonesia from Brazil and helped make them the largest economy in Southeast Asia.

We met Charlie, one of the singers from the Rotterdam cast, for drinks along with some of our other friends onboard. Charlie is from London but has dreams of performing at the Hollywood Bowl one day. Kent enjoyed asking Charlie and the others in the drink group his “25 Questions” to facilitate “getting to know you better.” Dinner was shared with our Dutch and German friends, Martin and Thomas, as well as some others from our “group.” The nightly show was a new show by Master Magician Peter Mehtab who had performed for us a few nights ago.

February 21, 2016 Semarang, Java, Indonesia

Borobudur with Robert and Dennis

Borobudur with Robert and Dennis

Borobudur

Borobudur

Borobudur

Borobudur

Semarang is located on the north shore of the island of Java and home to 2 million residents while another 4 million reside in the region. First inhabited by the Chinese in the 15th century, Java has played host to many occupants due to its strategic position along major trade routes. In the 18th century Semarang became a part of the Dutch East India Company.

Our tour took us to the Borobudur Temple located 56 miles south from Semarang. Even with the help of a police escort the travel time is about two-hours each way. We stopped in route at the Eva Café House for coffee and a snack of cashews, a sweet and a mini banana about four-inches in length. When we arrived at the temple we enjoyed a beautiful Javanese buffet lunch in the garden under a canopy. During lunch the skies opened up and it poured rain for an hour or so. Luckily it had mostly stopped by the time we began our walk up to the temple.

The Buddhist Kings of the Sailenra Dynasty, around the year 800, built the Borobudur Temple, possibly to enhance the image of Buddhism when Hinduism was growing in strength across the Indonesian archipelago. It is believed that it took more than 100 years to build the temple. It is the largest Buddhist Temple in the world, built with over two million stones. Shortly after its completion, the temple may have been abandoned when the Hindu Majapahit Empire overthrew the Sailenra Dynasty in 850. It lay buried in volcanic ash and vegetation for more than 1,000 years until Sir Stamford Raffles discovered it in 1814. Over the next century the temple was cleared and the process of restoring it began. Additional restorations were done between 1907 and 1911 and again from 1975 to 1982.

The temple is built on ten terraces, each level symbolizing a different stage of enlightenment or Nirvana and is covered in some of the finest examples of Buddhist reliefs in the world. At the top is the great stupa, surrounded by 72 smaller stupas and statues. From the top platform you are able to see the lush green landscape around. Our guide took us around the temple to explain some of the reliefs, carved into the stone, reflecting the teachings of Buddha. There were many school children at the temple who wanted to have their photo taken with us. I guess that it is unusual for them to see tourists—like us.

After exploring the temple, we were taken a short drive to see a demonstration of a Wayang shadow puppet show. The puppets were stick puppets traditionally made from the leather of a water buffalo. These traditional puppet shows may include hundreds of puppet characters and the performance may last for eight hours or more. A man telling an old epic story from India manipulated the puppets. As he tells the story he is accompanied by live music and a female singer who sings songs related to the female characters in the story. At this same stop they have a very large gift shop filled with traditional Javanese handicrafts. The crafts included many types of silver jewelry, silver figurines, woodcarving and some puppets.

The countryside is extremely lush, green and beautiful with rolling hills, rice paddies and terraces. The main roads are filled with many homes and shops selling everything from bananas and jackfruit to auto parts and gasoline. Most of these properties face directly on the street with little or no sidewalks and the streets are filled with motorcycles, cars, trucks and busses.

It rained on our return to the ship and there was much lightening in the dark skies. The streets in the port area were flooded from the heavy rains but we arrived back safely to the ship after a nine hour excursion.

The evening entertainment was a couple of young Japanese women who had graduated from the London academy of music. They played the violin and called themselves the String Idols. They were excellent musicians, however one of them had such a heavy accent you could hardly understand her English.

February 20, 2016 Tanjung Priok, Jakarta, Indonesia

Jakarta

Jakarta

Jakarta National History Museum

Jakarta National History Museum

Jakarta Puppet Museum

Jakarta Puppet Museum

Indonesia is an archipelago with some 17,508 islands located northwest of Australia, south of the Philippines and Malaysia. The archipelago is between the Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean. They have 256 million people (87% who are Muslim), who speak 700 different languages and inhabit 6,000 of the islands. They have over 50,000 miles of coastline. Indonesia is the 4th most populous country in the world and is the 3rd most populous democracy in the world. The country has only had its independence since 1949.

Tanjung Priok is a very busy port near the town of Jakarta, handling more than 50% of Indonesia’s shipping traffic. Jakarta has a population of over 11,000,000 people. The minimum wage is only about $280 per month; they pay $2 to $5 per month for healthcare and most practice the Islam religion.

Many of the ship’s crew members are from the island of Java, so about 1,000 family guests were onboard the ship today to visit for a short time with their loved ones. A band, dancing girls and two large puppets greeted us as we disembarked the ship today.

Our tour took us from the port to the center of Jakarta where we visited the Taman Fatahillah Square and the Museum Wayang or puppet museum. The square was the heart of the colonial administration in the 18th century and underwent a restoration in the 1970’s. A fountain in the middle of the square once served as the main water supply for colonial capital of Jakarta. The puppet museum is located in an old church building dating back to 1640 and now houses thousands of puppets from all over Indonesia. The puppets range from very small and simple stick puppets to extremely large three-dimensional puppets made of paper Mache and fabric. Many of the puppets were used to tell stories in puppet shows and depict a wide range of puppets from the exotic to the down-right ugly faced puppet.

Our next stop was the National Monument Monas representing the Indonesian people’s determination to find freedom. This 450 foot tall marble obelisk is topped with a flame coated in 77 pounds of gold. Surrounding the obelisk is a large public park where people often come to protest things they think are unfair or in need of attention. Across the street is the beautifully landscaped home of the president of Indonesia.

We then visited the National History Museum where we saw exhibits in the life and times of Indonesia over the millennia. They have human skulls on display from the Java man, pottery, bronzes, stone statuary, housing models, textiles, furnishings, jewelry and so much more. We did not have time to visit the entire museum but what we did visit was very well presented. The museum has a collection of more than 140,000 objects in their collection so it is someplace to spend more time on any future visits.

We then visited a very large government department store with a basement, ground floor plus five additional floors filled with merchandise. The fourth floor was all batik fabrics and clothing, while the fifth floor was filled with local handicrafts from all over the country.

The city of Jakarta appears to be very poor and mostly unpolished. We saw many slums around town, people urinating in the streets, dirty waterways, rundown buildings in need of repair and trash. On the other hand there was a lot of construction going on, so maybe things are improving.

It was a short day in port as the ship sailed at 4:00pm for Semarang, Indonesia. The night’s entertainment was a comedian by the name of Tom Sutton.

February 19, 2016 Sea Day

King Neptune Ceremony

King Neptune Ceremony

The ship is fully booked for this segment, and it is abundantly clear when you try to get something to eat or find a poolside chair. Every available space seems to be filled with people. Hopefully, in a few days when the new guests are more familiar with the ship and where to find things, it will settle down. At the same time, we are missing some of our traveling friends who disembarked the ship in Singapore.

We enjoyed a new guest speaker by the name of Barry Dryer who spoke on the Java man and the early settlers of Indonesia. They now believe there were more than one species of human-like people living on the planet at the same time. Homo Sapiens who were our ancestors may have shared the planet with people who were not much taller than three feet. Early man may have had facial features with a very extended jawbone and that over time these have changed due to our change in diet.

We crossed the Equator this afternoon and therefore we had to subject crewmembers to the judgment of the Sea King and Queen. Crewmembers who are new onboard the ship were led to the king by other crewmembers dressed as pirates. They had to kneel down to the King, kiss a large fish and then be covered in slimy goo by other crewmembers, all while the guests took pictures. Legend has it that this will provide us safe passage over the equator.

We also had another new lecturer by the name of Dr. Valerie Mock who spoke with us about Zheng He, Ibn Batutah, Tenjiku Tobubei and other early explorers in the Indonesian waters. Her expertise is in commodities and so she will be speaking about the spice trade, as well as other products, that shaped the world to what it is today.

The evening’s entertainment was the show called Variations by the Rotterdam singers and dancers. We had seen the show early in this voyage but enjoyed it again.

February 18, 2016 Singapore

Singapore Skyline

Singapore Skyline

Marina Sands Hotel

Marina Sands Hotel

Singapore Skyline from Flyer

Singapore Skyline from Flyer

Another day riding the Hop-On, Hop-Off bus took us to the Singapore Flyer Ferris Wheel. The ride takes you on a thirty-minute ride rotating just once around the wheel. From the glass enclosed, air-conditioned capsule that we shared with just five other guests; we saw the panoramic sights of the city. The city is extremely modern, very clean and includes some beautiful architecture. They have maintained many of the small historic buildings around town but continue to reclaim land along the shore, increasing the land mass significantly. Construction sites are seen all over the city where they are improving public transportation and building new housing and office towers. The prices are incredibly high as well. They say that a lovely new two-bedroom condominium, in a nice neighborhood, may set you about $6,000,000. Many of the locals live in older apartment buildings, built by the government and are allowed to buy the apartments with a 99-year lease for about $250,000.

The afternoon brought us rain shortly after we returned to the ship for a late lunch. We attended the required lifeboat safety drill at 4:15pm before we sailed at 5:00pm.

The evening’s entertainment was a magician by the name of Peter Mehtab. He was very entertaining and his magic was good as well.

February 17, 2016 Singapore

About 530 guests disembarked the ship today and about 600 new passengers embarked the ship for the next segment through the islands of Indonesia. This segment will be a round trip journey from Singapore and they say that there will be a fair amount of Australian’s onboard.

Singapore, with 5.7 million inhabitants, is an island country and the smallest country in Southeast Asia (approximately 3.5 times the size of Washington DC). It is located on the southern tip of the Malaysian Peninsula. Singapore was the site of several ancient port cities and a possession of several empires in its history before the United Kingdom colonized it in 1819. In 1867 Singapore was put under the direct control of the British crown and consolidated into one administrative unit. The Japanese occupied it during World War II before a merger established it as part of the Malaysian Federation in 1963. By 1965 Singapore was ousted from the federation and Singapore acquired its independence. Having few natural resources, it was socio-politically volatile and economically undeveloped. Foreign investment and rapid government-led industrialization grew an economy that relies on exports of electronics and manufacturing, primarily crude oil refining. Singapore has the second busiest port in the world… second only to Shanghai. They load and unload 90,000 containers of cargo daily from ships in the port. It has the highest standard of living in Asia and 83% of the population lives in housing built by the government. More than half use the efficient public transportation system daily maintaining low pollution levels. Those who chose to own their own vehicles pay a sales tax of more than 100%. In addition to that they are required to have a vehicle license that is only available by auction and may set you back some $40,000. The license is only good for ten years at which time you will need to purchase a new license if you intend to drive your own vehicle. Driving on streets downtown may require multiple tolls, which are automatically charged to your account and vary in price by the time of day and the volume of cars on the road.

We have been to Singapore in the past so we decided to purchase a two-day pass on the local Hop On – Hop Off bus. In Singapore the busses run on four main routes around town, each taking about one-hour to make a loop. The closest stop for us was in China Town so we took the underground metro two-stops to reach China Town. The subway fare was approximately $1.80 (Singapore dollars) each way.

Once on the open-air double-decker bus, we were able to transit the city to see the waterfront, including: the Singapore Flyer (Ferris wheel), Little India neighborhood, Arab quarter neighborhood, Orchard Street—where all of the high end shopping is located–and more. We stopped for a delicious lunch of Singapore noodles at the Suntec Shopping Center before continuing our journey. By late afternoon we had melted in the hot and humid weather and returned to the air-conditioned ship for dinner.

Singapore Architecture

Singapore Architecture

At dinner we sat with two new couples who had just boarded the ship–one from Australia and the other from the Seattle area. The entertainment for the evening was a movie in the main showroom title Rogue Trader with Ewan McGregor. Having had a long day we passed on the movie.