Majalengka: “My Indonesia” Photo Series (4)

Kampung Curug Baligo. Majalengka, 10 January 2011

Majalengka was one of the cities I visited when I first arrived in Indonesia in early 2011. This city also falls within the Sundanese area, like Karawang, and its name in this language means “Maja-e” – the Maja fruit and “Langka” - disappeared, the disappeared Maja fruit, bizarre name.

At the time, I only visited a friend's kampung in Curug Baligo. I remember a truly relaxing atmosphere with breathtaking landscapes.

Kampung Curug Baligo. 10 January 2011 

It is now a town under work because in 2018 the second major international airport will open there, so many tourists are expected, the streets are widening, new luxurious hotels open. In kampung, social campaigns are promoted to teach women new business, such as opening restaurants or catering. I have been to Desa Sidamukti, who became Desa Wisata, a tourist place, with the great NGO PKPU, for one of these social campaigns: in this area, almost everyone works on rice or mango plantations.

I spent a whole day with the mango growers, following them from the harvest, tasting the superb Red Mango – the King of mangoes, as they call it here for its flavor and high price – until the sale of mangoes at the end of the work for the salary.

The women returned home tired and the men indulged in a little relaxation with cockfights.

The deserted streets were crossed only by women of all ages with their baskets laden with fruit or wood.

Desa Sidamukti, 22 November 2017

 

I also visited the famous vertical terraces of onion cultivation in Argapura: vertical walls that challenge the law of gravity in walking on it. Their uniqueness should be appreciated in the two seasons in which their color changes, before and after the harvest, green in cultivation or red of earth. I have been there during the barren period of brown ground, but equally a spectacular glance, and walking there really makes your heart beat, because slipping would mean falling down for kilometers.

 

Desa Sidamukti, 22 November 2017

Moment of rest. Desa Sidamukti

Desa Sidamukti

  

Argapura, 23 November 2017

Desa Sidamukti, 22 November 2017

About the city (from Wikipedia):

Majalengka Regency is one of the 18 regencies (kabupaten) in West Java, Indonesia. It covers an area of 1,204.24 sq. km, and had a population of 1,166,473 at the 2010 Census; the latest estimate (as at 2014) was 1,254,440. The capital is the town of Majalengka.
As at the 2010 Census, this regency consists of twenty-six districts (kecamatan), subdivided into 13 urban villages (kelurahan) and 318 rural villages (desa).
The new airport Kertajati to serve the Jakarta megacity was begun in 2015 with a 3,000 metre runway for phase-1. It was opened on May of 2018, which is 70 km east of Jakarta, has an area of 1,800 hectares; it can accommodate a double runway of up to 4,000 meters.

 

Italian version