In Reply to: jarva and temple posted by suzie on Friday, 10. June 2005 at 08:53 Bali Time:
Been to Borobudur and I can assure you that it is well worth it IMHO! Yogakarta is also a fascinating place even tho' the smell of sooooo many kerosine stoves and motorbikes made me feel a bit off at time. (That didn't bother my husband) It is well worth seeing. The Sultans Palace and the Water Palace are also not to be missed. We ran out of time to see Prambanan but would loved to have seen that too.
You will find that you will have 'celebrity' status at Borobudur whatever your travel status. You will be asked to pose with locals for photos. We'd never had this happen to us before and our guide explained to us that these photos would have pride of place in homes and that the locals would "show off" their caucasian "friends" - apparantly this wins a lot of brownie / status points with their Indonesian friends. We found a lot of school children and locals pointing at us giggling ... we are both fair, I'm blonde and my husband is a Kenny Rogers look alike so we did rather stand out like sore thumbs. There weren't a lot of tourists there at the time but the same thing was happening to others be they alone or a couple. The history of Borobudur is fascinating .......go and when you are there remember to climb it in a clockwise direction to reach Nivarna ... and to reach in to the stupas for good luck! It's one of the lost wonders of the world - why miss out. We did a day flight from Denpasar and the flight into Yogakarta where you fly through a corridor of volcanoes alone is a memorable experience. Just go - as a lone traveller, take the usual precautions that you would anywhere else.