Jakarta
Hello dear followers,
This
week we made our first stop in Jakarta. The capital city of Indonesia.
What would a trip be without visiting any buildings and criticizing the
architecture of the town. We are very lucky that the city council and
UNESCO restored different colonial buildings over the years. It turned
out really beautiful.
Our first visit was to Medan Merdeka a
big square in the centre of Jakarta. In the middle of Medan Merdeka are
beautiful building in colonial style, such as the presidential palace
and the city town.
It’s also nice to see that several museums
are located in old buildings. We visited the city town where
now a historical museum and the Gedung Gajah (the national museum of
Indonesia) can be founded. There are archaeological exhibits, including
the famous skull of Java man. In front
of the building there’s a bronze elephant, a gift from the Thai King
Chulalongkorn. That’s why this museum is better known as the Elephant
Building.
On the east side of Medan Merdaka is the largest
mosque from Southeast Asia. This is also where our next stop was. It was
one of the prestige objects of Soekarno. The Istiqlal mosque has a
huge dome that can be seen from far away. The Arabian name “Istiqlal”
means independency. It took seventeen years to build this enormous
gathering place and was finished in 1978. Over 120.000 people can gather
in this home of Allah. You can’t imagine how big this is unless you’ve
been there yourself.
To give you a better idea to know how it looks inside this mosque you can watch this short clip on youtube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wFKg9GksJ1k
The port of Jakarta is the largest Indonesian seaport and one of the
largest seaports in the Java Sea basin, with an annual traffic capacity
of around 45 million tons of cargo and 4 000 000 TEU's. The port is also
an important employer in the area, with more than 18,000 employees who
provide services to more than 18 000 ships every year. (1)
In
sharp contrast to the old port and colonial buildings are skyscrapers.
Especially after the fall of president Suharto in 1998 the number of new
sleek office buildings increased enormously. Today you can call Jakarta
quite a modern city. The current skyline that changed the face of
determined Jakarta can be described as modern.
We’re also
planning on visiting the highest skyscraper in Jakarta named Wisma 46.
With its 261.9m high it’s also the tallest building in Indonesia. I hope
none of us has fear of heights…
Shari
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