Source: facebook note of my friend, Arlene A. Gonzales.
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When my friend earlier mentioned that she was willing for me to tag along on her trip to Madura, I was excited but a bit shy and unwilling to impose. To add to that some of my other friends were discouraging me or asking “why go to Madura?”. Finally, one day before the Suramadu bridge (from Surabaya to Madura) was to be inaugurated by the president, my friend fetched me early at the hotel. Her other colleague was meeting us at the hotel too. The day before, I bought a coolpak, bottled water, juices, biscuits and apples, plus some roti ayam (buns filled with chicken)from Holland Bakery as “baon” for the four of us (including the driver).As they were in a hurry to make it to a meeting, we didn’t have time to stop for breakfast. The air was still cool as we made it to the pier via the toll road, then onto the ferry or RORO for us. We got off the car to go up to the higher levels, while the driver “parked” the car at the lowest level.
There were a lot of interesting sights and sounds on the ferry, with motorcycle riders keeping watch on their bikes and their loads, sellers shouting “Kopi!Kopi!” with different brands of 3-in-1 coffee slung on their baskets together with thin disposable plastic cups. An array of snacks were being peddled, “lontong”, rectangular pieces of sticky rice with a chicken filling sandwiched in between and the whole thing wrapped in banana leaf and steamed, also a conical shaped rice cake akin to our “suman” whose name I forgot. We took a few pictures and enjoyed the view of the sea while watching the different kinds of people on board. Barely 30 minutes after we were already in Madura. We hurried down to the lowest floor where the car was parked and cruised on.
After finishing some business, we continued to go around the island primarily in Bangkalan, its capital. It was like going around the Philippine countryside with the ricefields, cornfields, fishponds. There were a lot of tamarind trees too. The only difference was that instead of thatched roofs or tin roofs the houses, no matter how small, had clay roof tiles on them. I was told that was because galvanized roofing was hard to come by while the clay roof tiles were a cottage industry. My friends took pictures along the way, as much as they possibly could, because it started to rain very hard. Interestingly, rain is “hujan”(with a silent “h”), which sounds like our own “ulan”.
I also noticed that there was a lot of construction of new houses going on. I was curious how come there were a lot of houses clustered together which had a courtyard in the middle. And there were a lot of mosques, big and smaller ones. I was told that parents have usually build a main house and when the children marry, they build more houses near the parents’ house with this kind of layout. Also, if there are several related families in a compound, they usually have or build a small mosque within the compound.
Thankfully the rain let up a little bit. Since we really didn’t have a proper sit-down breakfast, I think we got hungry by 11:30a.m. and we tried to find a place to eat. Since there were hardly any to choose from, my friends settled on a small restaurant which advertised their “gule kambing” on a tarpaulin. It was a no-frills place, but we were thankful for an opportunity to go to a restroom as well. Not being familiar with the food, I let my friends order and they ordered “gule daging sapi” and “sate daging sapi” (beef soup and beef barbecue on sticks),rice and “es the” or iced tea. The sate was a bit tough but well seasoned. The gule had a yellowish, flavorful broth , served with some “sambal” and a few slices of lime and generous chunks of beef meat.
After the meal we tried to find some batteries for the camera and my friends also asked around for the address of the batik makers. Tanjungbumi in Bangkalan is the center of batik making in this area. We were wondering where all the batik makers were as we wanted to watch the batik-making process. My friends told me that usually they would all be out and going about their activities. In one backyard, we saw a “red lady”, meaning her whole body down to her feet looked red, because she was at that time doing the coloring for the red dye in the fabrics. In another backyard we peeped in and saw a woman working with a fabric traced with a design and the hot wax in a small copper pot with an elongated spout for tracing the design in hot wax. We knocked on the door of a house further on in the compound, and it looked as if there was nobody or the people were having a siesta. After a while the door opened and we were ushered into the sala with glass cabinets full of batik. The lady of the house and her assistants proudly showed off their best batik “tulis” meaning handmade or hand printed using the traditional process. They were mostly in shades of brown with flora & fauna motifs though there were some in blue, green, red, orange. There were so many nice designs and I would have wanted to buy almost everything if money was no object. In the end, I settled for a few small table covers in maroon and dark blue, a blue, red and white sarong for myself, a blue monochromatic fabric which I was hoping to use for a formal skirt, and a bright orange cloth I wanted to have sewn into a table runner. In the flurry of choosing some fabrics, we didn’t notice that “Ibu”, our host, had thoughtfully placed three cups of “kopi susu” or coffee with milk on the center table so we drank them thankfully and paid for our batik bounty. We took a souvenir picture then said goodbye, hoping we could come back again at another time.
We continued on the journey back, but not without my friends taking their quota of pictures. We passed thru the seaside with a view of boats and the Suramadu bridge. We got down near the place where the Madura portion of the bridge started. There was a festiveness in the air, with people of all ages strolling around and looking down below at the street where a big white tent was being prepared presumably for the following day’s inauguration by the president. I could not understand their language but their faces and gestures shone with pride and excitement about this new development in their town and in their lives. They were probably proud that their president was coming and they have hope for a better life and a better future for their children.
The “lima kaki”(five legs) or sellers of food in carts were having a heyday, and my friend asked if I wanted to try the “bakso” or meatballs which here were pierced on sticks and you are given a choice of the “kecap manis”(thick sweet soy sauce) or the chili sauce. One of my friends took a stick and I tried one, too. Quiet a bargain for IDR 1,000 (about P4.00) for the 2 sticks.
We were quiet tired by the time we made it back to the pier to take the ferry. We went up to the top level and it was very cold I had to take out my shawl. We posed for a few pictures in the blustery wind, while listening to the afternoon prayers playing on the loudspeaker of another ferry. We decided to go down to the lower levels to get warm. My other friend kept on taking pictures on the way of the Suramadu and a statue of a hero. There were more vendors with their baskets selling “onde-onde” (like our buchi) and a host of other goodies, plus the kopi boys.
There was a long wait for the cars and other vehicles to get out of the ferry, and to add to that we hit rush hour traffic going back to Surabaya. It was already somewhat dark when I got back to the hotel, tired but thankful for another day of bonding with new friends and knowing more about their country, their people and their culture.
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