Banda Aceh
The City Closest To The Epicentre Of The 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami, Which Killed Around 170,000 People In This Province; A Generator Ship Carried Five Kilometres Inland Still Sits Where The Water Left It · Banda Aceh, Aceh
ON 26 DECEMBER 2004 THE WAVE REACHED BANDA ACEH WITHIN ABOUT TWENTY MINUTES and around a HUNDRED AND SEVENTY THOUSAND PEOPLE DIED IN THIS PROVINCE - the worst-hit place on earth. The city rebuilt, and what it chose to keep is the reason to come. THE PLTD APUNG, a floating power generator weighing some two and a half thousand tonnes, WAS CARRIED ABOUT FIVE KILOMETRES INLAND AND LEFT SITTING AMONG HOUSES; it is still there, a memorial you walk up onto, in the middle of a residential street. A FISHING BOAT REMAINS ON A ROOF AT LAMPULO, where it saved the people who climbed into it. AND THE BAITURRAHMAN GRAND MOSQUE STOOD while everything around it was flattened, and sheltered the living - a mosque the Dutch themselves built in 1881, as a conciliatory gesture after burning the original during the Aceh War. Most of the city you walk through is younger than 2005, and noticing that is most of what a visit here is.
Banda Aceh, Aceh, Banda Aceh, Aceh, Indonesia
BANDA ACEH HAS FLIGHTS from Medan, Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur, and is the gateway to PULAU WEH by ferry from Ulee Lheue. THE TSUNAMI MUSEUM and the ACEH STATE MUSEUM keep daytime hours and CLOSE ON MONDAYS as most Indonesian museums do. THE PLTD APUNG and the LAMPULO BOAT ARE OPEN SITES with small local charges or a donation; both sit in ordinary residential streets and people live around them. THE BAITURRAHMAN GRAND MOSQUE IS ACTIVE and welcomes visitors outside prayer times - modest dress is required, robes are lent, and FRIDAY MIDDAY IS PRAYERS. ACEH OPERATES UNDER SHARIA LAW: dress conservatively, alcohol is not available, and RAMADAN CHANGES OPENING HOURS AND PUBLIC BEHAVIOUR considerably - it moves each year, so check.