Another Friday of peaceful tidings for you all. After a lapse of one week let's continue the storytelling last left at From Malioboro to the Keraton - The ever festive Jogja....
Saturday 27th September 2014. From our lodging place we joined a group cutting the city of Jogjakarta westward before going up a rural highland. Then we stopped at this house where refreshment awaits...
The group is headed by an Indonesian write KH Fahmis Basya (left). In 2012 he has wrote a book claiming Candi (temple of Borobudur) near Jogja was built by Prophet Soloman. Since 2009 he has been taking groups up the temple to show sections to support his claim. Here he wants to show us a rock formation he believed has something to do with the legendary Gog and Magog.
I won't explain what Gog and Magog is. Please Google it yourself as it is actually a popular term referring to a fierce breed of people (some say creatures) mentioned in the Bible. In the Quran, the holy book of the Muslims it is known as Yakjuj and Makjuj. It is often said to have terrorised the Middle East or somewhere around it but this writer claimed the creatures brought terror in the Indonesian island of Java, originating somewhere around Jogja.
In fact he claimed the name Jogjakarta refers to Yakjuj and Makjuj. Yakjujkarta he said (Karta means city in old Javanese or so) becomes Jogjakarta. In the Quran it is said that a just and strong king known as Zulkarnain subdued the creatures by building an insurmountable barrier.
He claimed this happened at a stone formation called Batu (rock of) Blencong. The signboard mentions Batu as Watu.. I won't explain in detail the story anymore here as in general this blogspot is meant for articles supporting the main storytelling in CATATAN SI MERAH SILU, my main blogspot written in Malay.
And so there we were climbing ever higher from a starting point which is already quite high up the hills.
Batu Blencong in view...
I just can't resist climbing up to pose at the opening...
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