Jogja on my mind: relishing the street art, street food, and street music of Yogyakarta

Andy Hill

What was to be a weekend turned into two months of exploring every side street and coffee stand of the artistically vibrant and historically fascinating cultural capital of Java.

After having soaked up the highly refined and ritualized culture of central Bali for nearly six months, my girlfriend and I made a spontaneous decision to pack a bag and take a weekend trip to Yogyakarta, central Java. Also spelled Jogjakarta and fondly called ‘Jogja’ by residents, this relatively small city is known as the cultural capital of Java, similar to Kyoto in Japan. I knew next to nothing about it besides that there were some ancient temples, Dutch colonial buildings, and interesting local delicacies.

We arrived in the morning at the bus station and got a ride to the area with cheap guesthouses and bars, Sosrowijaya. We wandered into a small network of tiny alleyways and just kept turning corners until we were completely lost amongst the crammed-together book shops, cafes, convenience shops and guesthouses, where children were playing and women seemed to be perpetually sweeping every set of front steps. We turned to each other somewhat aghast, completely unprepared for how charming and pleasant it was.

One of the first things you notice in Jogja is the street art. It seems that every possible square foot of wall in the city is covered with some bright, bizarre, cartoonish, playful piece of technically impressive art. I would never call it ‘graffiti’ or vandalism; those have nothing to do with the resplendent display of artisanship ubiquitous in this capital of creative endeavors. The pieces are never covered over or damaged; residents of Jogja seem to take much pride in the fact that their city is so vibrantly adorned.

 We strolled through and admired the alleys, found a guesthouse for the equivalent of $10, had some lunch, and decided to go out at explore.

I could tell you about the Sultan’s Palace, or the Water Castle, or the ancient temples on the outskirts of Jogja like Borobudur (the biggest Buddhist temple in the world), but you will read about those in every other piece about the place.

What to me crystallizes being in Jogja is spending the day walking through the various neighborhoods of the city, getting countless cups of coffee, sitting at tiny  bakso and soto ayam stands, and chatting with the perennially friendly people there. At night, my favorite thing to do was to stroll along Malioboro, the main shopping street, which comes alive with food stalls selling local dishes such as fried duck and chicken with noodles after the sun goes down.

There are roving bands of young people with guitars, fiddles, and banjoes, and the occasional transvestite with microphone and speaker, serenading the throngs of people walking with friends, family and lovers through the balmy night.

Eventually we got on a train and rumbled across Java for twelve hours, to hop on a ferry back over to Bali. But when I close my eyes, I can still see the motion-picture of otherworldly creatures painted in murals on every surface, as I remember them rushing past from the back of a motorbike through the streets of Jogja.