Loving Orangutans = No Palm Oil

October 10, 2013

Our crew of 3 left Borobudur Temple for a 3 day sail to the islands of Karimun Jawa, a National Marine Park of 27 islands of which only 5 are populated.  There we enjoyed a day on a beach and met two Americans who decided to join us as crew as we set sail for Borneo - one of the only two islands in the world where orangutans live!!!

Not only did I have an amazing three day trek in the jungles of Borneo seeing orangutans  - I had an eye opening experience of what is really happening with the palm oil industry and why they are the number one reason orangutans are endangered!  In a few short words - clearing jungle for palm plantations. 

Please visit the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo's website which is full of information and has an incredible app you can download that will help you avoid products with non sustainable palm oil!  It might not mean a lot to you, but it means life or death to my furry new friends.

http://www.cmzoo.org/conservation/palmOilCrisis/

 Here's Omar, me, Caitlyn, and Rhiannon lounging on a private beach in Karimun Jawa. The girls decided to join us as crew and sail to Borneo!

 We sailed Tropicbird up the Kumai River to the town of Kalimantan - avoiding giant logging ships the whole way.  Boo.

 Nothing like squishing into a boat taxi to get to shore!

 Who knew they had the Disney Jungle Cruise all the way in Borneo?

 

Rhiannon standing next to our new home - ours is the one parked on the right!

 

Rhiannon, Omar, me, Matt, and Sophie lounging in our new home. We met Sophie wandering the streets, so she joined us for our jungle cruise.  

 

You don't want to stand beneath this guy!

 

 

Omar and I walking through the jungle - it's a surprise we could remember how to use our legs!

 A proboscis monkey - he does not need to drive a lifted truck!

 

Just when we thought we were safe from the crocs . . .

 The hunchback of Borneo...

 They say everything is bigger in the jungle - roots are no exception!

 Ahhh . . .

 This gibbon kept stealing bananas when the gorillas weren't looking - he moves just like a ninja!

 Me and my new boyfriend...

 Omar, Sophie, me, Rhiannon and Matt just hanging around!

 If you look closely this guy's got a milk mustache! How embarrassing!

 We payed $5 to plant trees to help reforest a part of the jungle that had burned down due to an illegal hunter.

 Fear not - I talked to my tree before I left the little guy.

Borobudur and then some . . .

October 5th, 2013

Visiting the Borobudor Temple might have been my favorite stop so far!  We snuck off the Sail Indonesia path so we could anchor in the 5th largest town of Indonesia, Semerang, which happened to be only a few hours away from the temple.  We anchored in a giant shipping port - something that would never happen in the States before we jumped on local buses and headed to the Borobudor Town for the night.  

We anchored the boat on a jetty in a busy shipping port - giant fishing vessels behind us!

And the navy to our side!  (They kindly let us in to their head quarters to do laundry!)

First glance at the temple . . . we woke up at 5:30 am to be there right when it opened at 6am.

This is the largest Buddhasist Temple in the world - 7 stories high.

The Buddhists Monks who visit the temple walk circles around each level - on the first level they walk 3 steps then bend down to kiss the floor.  It's like a new Crossfit WOD.

Here's a tour guy, Hatah, explaining one of the 1,200 reliefs that is in found on the floors around the temple.

UNESCO restored this whole temple over 10 years back in the 70's - they took it all apart and put it back together again. 

The top of the temple is full of tupahs - a Buddhist sign.

Inside the tupahs are perfect Buddha statues, except the main tupah which is empty inside.  The final state of enlightenment.

Here's the view from the top.

UNESCO won't put stones back into place in the temple unless they are certain where they go.

After the temple I took off a tofu making tour.  Just outside the town there is village where over 50 houses make tofu for the local markets.

Each giant square of tofu costs about US $2 - yum!!!

The only bummer is they use mostly USA grown soy beans!  Boo GMO's!!!  It costs them US 80 cents per kilo, thanks to our government subsidized soy beans.

The fresh soy milk I drank with my guide, Erik, made me forget about GMO's for a moment.  Mmmm….

Next on my tour - batik making!!!!  Here's where they measure the cloth.

Once the cloth has been cut, the women use hot, melted wax to draw patterns on the fabric.

I got to make my own batik, but as you can see I used the stamp to apply hot wax instead of free handing it.

I did free hand my name though when I was all done with the waxing!  (Think Ukrainian eggs mom!!!)

That's my finished wrap covered in now dry wax.

Next I went to a local dye shop, where some women dyed my fabric a darker blue than I wanted it. :(

After the dye set in my fabric, about half an hour, the ladies boiled my wrap until the beeswax melted off, leaving my white designs underneath.

Tada!!!!  My finished hand made batik!

Borobudur or Bust

We made our way to Borobudur by sailing to Semarang and taking land transportation to Borobudur. As always this turned out to be an adventure.

 

We arrived at the busy port of Semarang. All the sudden we were looking for a parking spot in between the big guys. It was like parking a smart car at the truck stop.  From there we took the shuttle to Borobudur.

 

 Welcome to Borobudur, a Unesco World Heritage Site. We made our way to the temple right at sunrise.

 

Borobudur is the biggest Buddhist temple in Indonesia as well as the busiest tourist attraction in the country. 

 

The temple is the illustrated classroom of Buddhist teachings. Carved in stone are multiple stories about Buddha. Here we see Buddha in a previous reincarnation as a monkey. The story involves greedy humans trying to kill the monkeys in order to keep the fruit and Buddha saving his fellow monkey friends by letting him escape on his tail. 

 

As we ascend the top of the temple we find stuppas.

 

 Having reached the higher levels of enlightenment in the upper level stuppas you find and enlightened human Buddha.

 

However the very top stuppa has nothing inside of it. In true Buddhist form the ultimate enlightenment has no desire. 

 

 I found it striking that while this is a religious temple it is not a temple to a God. The Buddha is anyone who has found enlightenment, however they are not expecting another one for about another 4000 years. Hope you enjoyed the tour of Borobudur with me.

 

 

From Borobudour we headed to Karimun Jawa and we meet two new crew mates. Now we have enough crew to make things on the boat fun and night watches easy.

 

Now we head to Kumai, a town that has promises of Orangutans and quaint villages. For now I leave you with another Indonesian sunset.

 

 

Kumai update

Hello folks, 

We are in Kumai, in South Borneo. We have some nice pictures from Borobudur to put up but we are in a town that does not have a single wifi hotspot. 

We are off to see orangutans and take tons of pictures. We will post more as soon as we can.