Madura. The word evokes an image of men in red-and-white striped shirts, probably screaming at their beloved honey-rubbed racing cattle. They are a famously rough people, even rougher than Surabayans (shockingly enough). But, I say rough in an affectionate way. The Maduranese the type to grab your arm in their utter excitement to ask you where you want to go and forcibly get you there, while only ripping you off a little bit.
To those who don't know the difference between Madura and madu*, Madura is a teeny tiny little island that's about 15 minutes by ferry away from Surabaya. They're famous for karapan sapi, an epic bull race held every October where prized bulls are rubbed down with honey, beer, and flowers for good luck before they run. It's a huge deal there.
Madura is connected to Java by Suramadu, the longest bridge in Indonesia, which is much beloved. The name, a combination of Surabaya and Madura, is the product of Indonesia's fascination with abbreviations. Avery and I were asked multiple times during our year if we had been to Suramadu yet. You can find Suramadu adorning t-shirts, expensive batik, and all manner of other things; people will stop there for pictures as if it's actually a point of great interest.
It is not. It is a bridge. From what I hear, it takes less than five minutes and a toll of $3 to drive across. Not that Indonesia shouldn't be proud or excited about it, it's just... a bridge.
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| Or, uh, you be the judge of Suramadu's worth! |
Cynicism aside, the week when David came, we all decided that a trip to Madura was essential. For the most part we all had never really had a chance to get off of Java, and even though Madura wasn't very far, it was still something. So we scoured the tiny section in David's guidebook for something to do once we landed, and set off.
I was really grumpy that day - but I was wearing my favorite shirt, so there's that! The ferry from Surabaya to Madura costs RP 4.000 or about 40 cents, but making up for the price over driving, there's an unending stream of people trying to sell you quail eggs and instant coffee while en route.
The harbour is gorgeous if you ignore the floating trash and the questionable toothpaste color of the water. At one point you can see where the harbor water collides with sea water. Surabaya is a naval base, and you can see clusters of old ships everywhere along with the hubbub of shipping vessels marooned closer to each other and the land.
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Our port of arrival in Madura was Kamal, a dusty port city which features a bemo station, a few dilapidated tent restaurants, and goats. Lots of goats. The three bule were accosted immediately, and there was a lot of confusion involving Maduranese men shouting to each other and making sure we were taken care of. Having chartered a bemo, we were off to Sambilangan, a tiny town home to an old Dutch lighthouse and the only place we could reasonably reach and return from before nightfall at 5 PM.
The Madura countryside is gorgeous - lush, green, and glistening with the watery faces of rice paddies. It was the idyllic jungle paradise I had always dreamt of. On the way, we listened to the driver and two young women fondly bickering, intermittently answering their timid questions about us and America.
Sambilangan was indeed tiny - a couple warung, and what would turn out to be a handful of farming families living nearby. The lighthouse was gorgeously jutting out of the landscape, unmistakably Dutch in all its white and metal glory. It was around 100 years old, with all the original metalwork and signs still in relatively good condition. We paid to enter and rushed inside, to be greeted by a dingy interior, and a stomach-clenching empty elevator shaft shooting up from the ground to the top, 200 feet above.
The climb was long - 200 feet worth of staircases and stopping at every opportunity to look out the windows at the scenery, and the cows below. Graffiti was everywhere, mostly fairly recent scribbles, declarations of love and names paired up with hearts. The only other people there were a quiet Indonesian family on their way down. They offered us tired smiles as we continued up, probably glad they didn't have to make that trip again.
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| "Look! It's suckling!!" - David |
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| The man, the myth, the legend |
The climb, of course, was so worth it. We poked around the lantern room for a while, finding out that the lighthouse was decommissioned and the light would never guide men home again, before the fumes of motor oil drove us out to fresh air. Even out on the deck, everything was cramped and precariously close to the only thing protecting us from falling to the ground below - a little cast-iron fence.
We ended up happening across some friends who had much less than that keeping them from disaster. A few guys, probably about our age, were hooked up to harnesses on the top of the lighthouse, messing around with metal and doing repairs on the roof. We could hear banging and drilling the entire time we were up there. I shouted up to them:
"Mas! Takut ga?" ("Bro! Aren't you scared?")
"Tidak! Ada tali." ("Nope. We have ropes.")
The worker looked a little shocked that someone was talking to him, and in turn I was shocked that most of the structure keeping them aloft was made of bamboo. Their faith in it was incredible as they must have been at least 230 feet above the ground.
We turned to see that another young guy had either climbed down or was helping the others from the same place where we were standing. Though he was very shy and hesitant to talk to us, we coerced him into getting a picture with us.
The singular thought I had while wandering another direction on the deck and staring out at the landscape was this is it. This is the rainforest. I'm here. It was so shocking that something which was so foreign and unimaginable when I had only lived in a scrub desert my whole life, was spread out before me. The rainforest. I was an exchange student, living in the freakin' rainforest. I had dreamed of the moment when I could see it in real life ever since I learned of the rainforests' existence, and its plight, and had done multiple school projects on the subject.
Despite everything that was weighing me down then, I felt free, and so proud of myself to have gotten so far. I was seeing the world, in a way I couldn't have even dreamt of when I was younger.
But sadly, a fact stands out that kind of diminishes the inspirational power of that story: I don't think that Madura even has any real rainforest. I'm told it was temperate or something like that. Doesn't make it any less pretty though.
Before it was time to board our bemo and get back to Surabaya, we decided to explore the haphazard veins of the rice paddies/mangrove forest. It turned out to be just as fascinating as our trip up the lighthouse. It was untouched, wholly original, and enough for an entire day's worth of slow strolling. Shacks were set up here and there, as were little fish traps on the muddy shores. Snails crawled in the muck; we tripped over home-made wooden bridges fit snugly from one edge of the earth to another.
My camera was dying at that point though, so I got just a few pictures, but as it began to sprinkle and I covered my head with the sarong I had hastily packed that morning, the feeling of 'oh my God this is happening' came back. I was squishing through a mangrove forest with three of my best friends, doing 'what backpackers do', as David had put it. Not even the irritated driver or my hurting wallet could diminish the high that suddenly overtook my previously sullen mood.
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Ty-pi-cal is all I have to say about that, and this picture, and everything else about that day.
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*Madura is an island and madu is honey
Also, as for the title of this post, I still don't know. You tell me!
One of the best trips ever. You know dem cows was cutiess
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