Yogyakarta
The Only Part Of Indonesia Still Ruled By A Hereditary Monarch; The Sultan Of Yogyakarta Is Governor Of The Province By Law, A Standing Reward For Backing The Republic In 1945 · Yogyakarta, Special Region of Yogyakarta
Yogyakarta is the cultural capital of Java and THE ONLY PART OF INDONESIA STILL RULED BY A HEREDITARY MONARCH - the Sultan is governor of the province by law, a standing reward for declaring for the republic in 1945 when he could have sided with the Dutch. The city was briefly the capital of Indonesia during that war. THE KRATON, the sultan's walled palace, is still lived in and still staffed by courtiers in traditional dress, and gamelan and wayang are performed inside it on a weekly schedule. Around it sit the TAMAN SARI water castle, the batik workshops that earned Indonesian batik its UNESCO listing, the silver quarter at Kotagede and MALIOBORO, the long market street that is the city's spine. It is also the base for BOROBUDUR AND PRAMBANAN, which is how most visitors arrive - and the mistake is treating the city as a dormitory for them, giving it one night and a pre-dawn departure and seeing none of it.
Yogyakarta, Java, Yogyakarta, Special Region of Yogyakarta, Indonesia
THE CITY IS ALWAYS OPEN; the things inside it are not. THE KRATON opens mornings only, closing in the early afternoon, and CLOSES ENTIRELY FOR ROYAL CEREMONIES - it is a working palace, not a museum. Its gamelan, wayang and dance performances run to a WEEKLY SCHEDULE, a different art each morning, and are included with entry. TAMAN SARI keeps similar daytime hours. MALIOBORO runs from morning until late and its street food warungs come out in the evening. THERE IS A SEPARATE CAMERA FEE at the Kraton and Taman Sari, small but charged. Most sites close or shorten hours around Idul Fitri, when the city also fills with domestic travellers. Borobudur and Prambanan are forty minutes to an hour away by road.