Live free or die hard (part 2 - Bromo)

Ohhkayyy...im home, and here comes the long overdue blog about the amazing Bromo.

hmm...where do i left u all at Borobudur?? so, after watching hopelessly at the top of Borobudur from afar through the heavy rain and being mugged into buying all kind of souvenirs we head back on the road, supposedly trying to make it to Bromo. It was almost 7 and judging from the time we took to reach Borobudur I have my doubt about our chance of reaching Bromo in time for first light. Borobudur is in central Java, and Bromo is in East Java, and even further east from susahbayar. But the whole trip had been a mission impossible all the way, so what the heck. ever since we reach Jogya i've been the driver, and its still me behind the wheel this time around. We were suppose to pick a 2more passenger at sby, jack's cousin and jack so called "lil sister", yeah...you know how one of those work *wink*

good news came from the new member as we don't have to pick them up at sby but some small city outside sby that i cant recall, so that cut our road time for like......errrr....an hour?? jack??

A few thing i hate about indonesia's highway are that they are extremely dark, at one point we even playing "pitch black", turn off our head light when we were the only car on the street, its pretty daunting to say the least. and then they are bumpy, those idiots cant even make a flat concrete, its wavy and when you went 100km/hr its not a very decent feeling.

once we reach the location of jack's company factory to pick up our new members i literally couldn't stand straight, gravity failed me, i feel like im on a cruise ship in the middle of a storm. stuff our stomach on Kwetiau akang en back on the road again. This time jack's cousin drive.....joy to the heaven!!!

after figure out that the amazing Bromo photo from my photography magazine was indeed taken from Puncak Pananjakan site we decide thats our destination. When we stop at the control post we were told that we might give renting a hardtop (4WD) a thought or two. Jack was doubting his panther, but his cousin (being the only one that been to Bromo before) keep convincing him that the good old panther will get the job done. And being in indonesia, we know we stand a chance of being ripped off if we rent the hardtop. So the gung-ho spirit fights on. Up we go the narrow en twisted road.

We have no idea whats the exact temparature up at the peak of puncak pananjakan was, but it sure was bone chilling. alot of people already gather there waiting for the almighty sun to reveal the beauty of Bromo. Its still pretty much all darkness, but if we stare hard enough we can make out the sillhoutte of the trio of amazing mountains below us. The excitement creeps in again, at least to me. with all gear set up i try to snap a few long exposure, trying to get the stars when its still there

Stars studded sky above Bromo

While i was busy with my camera, the cold jack was getting restless, so i guess a few foto centil need to be done to neutralise him. so i set him up againts the camp fire and the amazing first light along the horizon.

Jack trying to be cool

Some of the bule trying to get warm with a backdrop of an amazing skyline

And now some of the picture of the amazing Bromo....


Ain't nature a beauty.....people, if you never been to Bromo...i urge you....please, do yourself a favour....go and see it.....I promise you you will forget to breath even just for a few second, no matter how good my photograph are (they ARE good....aren't they??) it just cant beat the experience of seeing it with your own wicked eyes

Sun light broke through the valley

Notice the ground where that small village reside is much higher than the ground to the right (of us)...it was formed by the volcanic blast of the Bromo, look at how the blast push all those ground away and then it stop right there like a sea wave

Bromo I'm in love

And of course...more pics at my personal photography site (craxguy.multiply.com) but i havent got the time to sort it all out and post yet. just keep checking back...untill you are bored and mad

Group shot.

the other two people are Awie (jack's cousin) Irene (jack's mei mei")

Hows Irene doing anyhow jack?? you two still playing "cliffhanger"?? still fun?? Mwahahaha...i don't think you gonna ask her to read this after this huh.....c'mon i dare you, i wanna see her commenting this blog. Special message to Irene: i still owe you cebantun for the "moni" i pay that old bag at the foot of bromo...remember to ask from me when we meet again

After happy the view from above (actually not yet happy, i still feel like shooting a few more, but my good people cant stand the cold and eager to run to the nearest hot drinks liau) we stop by at a waroeng and filled up with hot indomie and hot tea. those who try to sneak a peek of the bapak who cook our indomie said that he cook it together with the plastic packaging!!! me, i stay away from trouble, insult the bapak more and prob he will spit in your tea while ur not looking. well...plastic or not, it was probably the worst indomie i ever eaten, all this time i never thought its possible to cook a not yummy indomie.

then we decide to go down the kawah and then climb up Bromo to take a peek into its sulfur smoke blazing mouth. Another episode of bargaining with the locals took place. they again of course trying to convinced or rather scared us into renting their jeep, saying that it was sand all the way down there and we might get trap inside and it will cost a fortune to tow us up. and again jack's cousin feel there were absolutely no need for it. so the good old panther was called into action again. this time the road was extreme to the max. Its extremely steep en extremenly narrow, one car and one car only can go through. No safety fences or anything, a few inches off and off you go.

Once we reach the foot hill of bromo, where all walking and climbing will took place there was a lot of locals trying to offer us their horses' back, in exchange of money of course. but we determined to walk up there with our own two feet. It was a hard climb, never do it with empty stomach, you'll need all the energy you can get, and it was scorching hot. Yeah it was spine chilling cold up there and hell blazing hot down.

Bromo most eligible bachelor 2007
Also known as "the sejati shot" (kau yg sejati...berjuang dengan hatiiii.....)

A journey of a thousand steps begin with a single photo shot

Just so you know how far we climb
Kawah Bromo

The sulfur smell is pretty daunting up there, it took a while to get use to. There were some fences right after those long stairs we took but none to be seen a few meters from there. You can walk around the lips of the kawah but make sure you see where you put your feet at, no more fences to catch you fall. I walk around trying to find the best angle but didn't dare stray too far away since the heat and the smell is starting to get to me. once you fall theres no hope of survival anymore, im not even sure if they can retract your body.

On the way down Awie give up and decide to hop up to one of the horses, they all waiting down the stairs for a tiring tourist leg. and our only girl, Irene still refuses to ride the horse, If im not mistaken i over heard she ask jack whether or not he wanted to ride too, and after gave her a no she said "if you're not riding then im not riding too" awwww....sweetness befall Bromo...jack, she read this yet???

Then i run behind those horses and try to keep up with them trying to recapture a very famous shot done by a very respectable photographer at this spot. but of course mine is far fetch from the master's (but the elements were not all there for mine though)

Trying to recapture the famous "the wild of east jawa" by Kenvin Pinardy

failed miserably trying to copycat the master i ended up eating a lot of sand instead. Then i see an old flower seller lady sitting there offering me the edelweiss she were selling, instead i feel like photographing her, all the wrinkle that fill up her face really make an interesting portrait. so i approached her and she say yes, when i just about to press on the shutter she keep saying "moni" to me. At first i don't really understand and don't really care, i just went 'iya iya" but few second later i realised she means money!! and i went "ohhhh...iya bu...nanti dibayar" and she start to stare into my lense, and i start to suspect that this grandma was a super model once in her younger life. i try to posed her and she was very proffesional, even better than those young models we use at our photographer community.

Supermodel......

Nenek moni will close this episode of my Java trip, after all this suicidal episodes we were not yet done, its only fair that we close it with a bang...so from Bromo we go Wild water rafting!!!!

if you wondering why me and jack still alive, well....we were wondering too

untill next blog....

Live free or die hard (part 1 - Borobudur)

yeah baby....since im still alive and typing its clear that im living free instead of dying hard

so, after taking care of bitsness (the killing lil miss piggy thingy) im all set for an escapism from my little shit hole life. having my original 6.50am flight to soerabaya being postpone to 11.50am is a blessing in disguise indeed (air ASSia call me at 1am to tell me bout the delay!) as jack can shoot straight out from office and ready to roll, but he was 1.5hr late. Reaching the very neat and impressive Surabaya's Juanda airport at 2.30pm and after a pit stop for lunch we were on the road right away.

Jack was under the (false) impression that it will only take us 4hr to reach Jogya from sby with 4 wheels. So as the result we reach Jogya 4times!!! at around 8pm when we hit some city jack went "here is Jogya buddy...up front will be the famous Malioboro St" of course there wasnt any Malioboro to be found in that city since its not Jogya!!

we keep going under false hope that Jogya will be around the corner

Later on we found out that we were still more than an hour away from Jogya! and since we'd been saving our empty stomach for Malioboro's food for like a year now we decide to stop at a random waroeng at a random city with a random food. Jack ordered the "nasi mawut" and i opted for the much more usual "nasi goreng" but once the food were ready...we cant make out the differences between the two, can you??
Which is which?? the eternal mystery of the difference of nasi mawut and nasi goreng in central Jawa


with a barely full stomach we continue our journey and at almost midnite we finally reach the city of Jogyakarta/Yogyakarta/Djogyakarte, choose whatever that work best for u since the gov themself don't seem to know much bout the official spelling, it was different spelling on different street signs we saw.

Malioboro here we comes!!!! alas the famous nite spot was not as happening as we hope for. After suffering from empty stomach for like 6hr and reach 3 different fake Jogya our Oasis in the middle of the Sahara is not there. It was friday nite, but Malioboro is almost empty, a few waroeng lesehan (a waroeng where u sit on the floor) is open but there were almost no body eating. We sat down and ordered a hot ginger milk!!! to take care of all the excess gas produce by our empty stomach vaganza
A nice cuppa of hot ginger milk

that took care of the 8hr of driving out of our system, although im not driving. its almost 1am and since we were on a cheapskate and kamikaze holiday it only make sense if we were not staying at a hotel. So to kill a few hour we got before we need to cruise up to Borobudur in search of that amazing sunrise we go clubbing instead! ari kink kink...ari kink kink kink!!! Sorry,what...?ohh that song was like so early 90's?? ohhkay then.....ajeb ajeb ajeb........

watching hot girls shaking their booty was certainly much better than sleeping. But all the while we didnt really know how to get our lousy ass to borobudur yet. So we interviewed the club's staff, of how long and what way should we take. And later on we hit a cyber cafe to browse for some map and info about borobudur, all the while trying to keep up with the sun. Being on a mission to take a sunrise pics of the great candi i must get the 1st light pic, without that it just wont work. thus we must be there and with all my gear set up when its still dark.

so, equipt with bits and pieces of info we (or rather jack) were convince he knows how to get there exactly. But of course just as the way he found "jogya", at no time we were lost again. Listening to jack say "turn right here..im dead sure this is it" is like listening to a tukang becak say "yeah pull that thing and im dead sure u'll get the plane on the air". So after a series of "im sure" we were trap deeper and deeper in the heart of Jogya. A frantic direction asking to strangers took place thick and fast (who said men dun ask direction?? dumb men dun that is. we smart men ask direction! well, not so smart as to not getting lost though)

After being told we were on the right way and need to keep going straight i step on the accelerator like my hairy ass depended on it. Its about 3.30am and we were not even sure what time mr.sun wakey wakey. Determined not to miss first light i made Jogya street into my own private formula one circuit.

Once we were on the gate to enter Borobudur our race is not even close to finish line as we are told by the bapak who seems to be the gate keeper that the gate will only be open for public at 6am!!! that wont do...at 6am the sun will be bright and shining, it will be well and trully morning. So we told him that we want to take picture of sunrise yada3 and he offer to take us to a hotel that he said arrange this kind of thing and cost around 200.000 sweet rupiah. Being a paranoid that he is jack was not sure at all. So we ditch the bapak and try to find out more info from some local. All this time i was acting like a kid on his birthday all hooked up on sugar and accidentally swallow his dad's ecstacy pills.im just so excited and just imagine the worst, the sun comes out while we are no where near a place to see borobudur!! Then this ibu convinced us to follow her, turn out she bring us to the same hotel the bapak was talking about. and turn out this hotel is the only one open 24hour and organize sunrise watching, unless of course if u can find your way around the kampoeng surrounding Borobudur and find a sweet spot which we of course didn't.

The hotel was part of the National Park where borobudur is situated. There were some foreign tourist going on this sunrise thingy too. later i found out that we were going to be taken to the top of Borobudur itself to watch sunrise, hell no, i want to take picture OF Borobudur on sunrise not sunrise FROM Borobudur! and thanks to Buddha they do have a place for that kind of thing.
They brought us to this small hill that we need to climb up ourself, all the while jack was breathing on his last breath, looking paler than a kuntilanak with a wrong face cream.

But once we were up there and before any light even shine on the great candi....wait....there are a few spotlight light there giving us a breathtaking sillhoutte of the candi. But ironically that view actually gave more breath to jack. He found a new meaning of his life, a sudden surge of energy. I think we both were pretty awe struck by what we saw.
My 1st sight of Borobudur...and it certainly is unforgettable

I saw alot of amazing pictures of Brbdr and this spot was not the best, but with our limited knowledge of the local places and our extremely limited time this is the best we can get. But all the while i wondered how amazing if we get to see it from the spots of those great photos from great photographers as what we saw here is pretty friggin amazing in itself already.

Wasting no time i get out all my arsenal and start snapping. so pls check to my photos site for a complete range of great photos later on craxguy.multiply.com (prob have to wait untill im back in mdn before i can post it all tho)

But certainly it wont be a road trip/photo trip without a few foto centil of ourself...prepare your eyes..............
two wise men in search of enlightenment
one not so wise man in search of a slap in the face by the Buddha Himself


the ministers of tourism of central Jawa welcome you to Borobudur


When morning broke and it was less amazing to see it from far away we walk down and go to the candi, ready to greet the Buddha himself, u know how the myth says that only those with pure heart can touch the Buddha's statue inside the stupa. But we stop by the hotel's cafe to recharge with a hot tea and a nice pisang goreng complimentary of the 130.000/person we paid to get in the "sunrise tour" first

Borobudur is just hidden behind those tall tress behind us


And here we are...seeing and touching the legendary Borobudur, u heard story bout how it was build without cement or any other form of building adhesive, its just stone on top of stone, but somehow it survive all kind of nature test for all this long and amazing time. so seeing it and touching it was somekind of surrealism

Jack was too beat to continue climbing up and exploring the candi, and since we were planning to come back late in the afternoon to take some twilight picture he gave up on the 1st step of the candi. So i went up by myself. take some quick snap with the morning light. and climb down in no time so not to make jack die at borobudur, though it wont be a bad idea to die here, there are certainly plenty of other places that u wouldn't want urself to die in.

ohhh i did touched the statue of Buddha Inside the stupa....yeaaaa i got pure heart......

Long story short later that day the rain pour down like mad.....no more chance to take picture. so there are no foto centil of us with the candi. its like we never visited the place!!! there are no proof!!! and jack never go in!!!! but hell.....at least he has this one shot....
The only proof that we (or he) visited borobudur

Im so gonna photoshoped myself into this pic later mwahahahaha. Our morning affair with the candi end at aorund 8.30am. but before we can find a place to park our tired legs we were "harashed" by a bunch of souvenir sellers. I am a sucker for a traditional handy craft and when i saw those beautiful stone sculpture i know i must have it. Having been warned to bargain the hell out of the opening price I told them 80.000 for 4 pieces while they open with 90.000 for 1 piece. I know i could get it for the price i wanted if i just make one last push to the seller who keep saying that with 80.000 for 4 he wont make any profit at all. And although i know he will earn something with my price i refused to be a total arse and offer him 100.000 for 4 instead. He promptly agree
"supposed to be" made from the volcanic stones of Merapi

From here we found a 60.000 a room guest house to crash, i couldn't sleep and opted to walk around and having a chat with the locals instead, but jack was gone.........
Jack was out cold

Outside of our lakbantun room

Later the day when we went back and stare hopelessly from afar through all the heavy rain we were once again mugged and harashed by souvenir sellers, though they were very polite and keep repeating saying sorry but damn i admire their determination, its like they wont quite until u buy. If only the indo's soccer team have this kind of determination...the world cup is ours.
buy or die u rich chinese bastards

We end up buying some cloth with the image of borobudur printed on it, would make a nice souvenir for family back home and some wooden pen with image of borobudur being draw on it too. People who treat me nicely back home are gonna get some of those, if u didnt get any...u know u are not on my "nice kids list"

Borobudur is amazing.....but there is still BROMO......

untill next blog..........keep an eye out for "live free or die hard II"

Lil miss piggy is dead

no animal and certainly no pork were produced from the making of this blog. its just that im blowing my piggy bank wide open to upgrade my photography gears. out in the big Jakarta ready to acquarie the best gear there is, actually no..cant afford the best yet.

and to set the record once and for all to my followers who stay true to asking "when's the studio open?" on every given chance....the studio is NO go, i repeat its a NO go. abort mission...abort....
why, u ask? its partly because im poor. cant reveal much more to you.

so, as from now on i'l go all out as a photographer, determined to make it as a freelancer. otherwise piggy gonna die in vain. No job, no eat. Snap or die. Shot or shoot myself

and since i've been in a depressed state for sometime now i take the opportunity of a road trip since im already out here in jawa. always been a great admirer of the great Borobudur, so Borobudur here i comes! as Indonesian its only fair that u at least once visit the wonder of the world. and prob make the effort to reach Bromo too, another great location for stunning picture.

so, should be lots of interesting story to tell...and maybe some great pics too. but im too damn lazy to explore this site to find out how to post a damn picture

and spidey 3 premier today...prob should try to watch it while im out here. much better than spending time inside medan's movie theater....aihhh better dun start, or else im gonna fail my anger management test miserably.

and oh....GLORY GLORY MANUTD