Indonesia – Mount Merapi
We went to the Ketep pass for a view of Mount Merapi. The Merapi is still active today and we were advised not to climb it. The last eruption took place two years ago. The driver took us to see the face of the volcano at vista points. There was heavy rain, however, and we did not manage to see much of the view.
We then went to the awesome Moro Lejar (freshwater fish) restaurant for a grilled fish lunch. It was very nice watching the rain pouring down like drawn curtains around us whilst we ate. The bamboo-stilted quarters were set above water. At the ponds we saw the largest and fattest carps that I have ever seen in my life, so big they looked almost like mini-sharks. I wondered if the Indonesians eat them. The Chinese people certainly do not, since they are symbols of wealth and prosperity.
The sun was soon to set so we rushed to the village of Bebung to see the ruinous rubbles caused by the Merapi eruption two years ago. The village has been evacuated now, and it is fair to say that it was haunted. There were two volunteers who were buried in the bunker by the debris from the eruption. We walked around the barren landscape of a once populated village. Legend has it that the village heads of these villages relied on their visions to tell if eruptions would threaten the lives of the villagers. There was one miraculous time when the village head was right in predicting that the eruption would not touch the village and refused to evacuate. Yet the second time around, he was wrong and the village was completely destroyed.
Illan said that in the last eruption none of the villagers died, as they all evacuated on time, but the two volunteers did not survive. He also told us about the “hot clouds,” where clouds of hot dusts would move and devour everything along its path with heat. The Lonely Planet said that at time of the eruption, the lava could gush down at 300 km per hour. The place was haunting, not in the sense of the dead, but rather how ominous the mountain was, having the enormous power of destruction in its path throughout this area.
We left with an utmost feeling of eeriness and returned home.
