Indonesian Heritage Society

Night in Yogyakarta will feel alive if you look at shadow puppets (wayang kulit). Gamelan rhythms fused with dynamic sinden melodious voice will not let you sleepy. The story that brought the puppet masters will take you to be late coming in as one of the characters in the story that was delivered. You will soon realize how great of Javanese culture in the past. Wayang kulit is performance art that has been hundreds of years old.

Showing it has its own story, is associated with the advent of Islam in Java. One member of the Wali Songo created lyrics by adopting puppet that developed in the heyday of Hindu-Buddhist. Adoption was done because the puppet already attached to the Javanese to become an excellent medium for spreading the propaganda of Islam, while Islam forbids visual art forms. As a result, created shadow puppets where one can only see shadows.

Leather puppet played by a man who would be called the greatest public entertainer in the world. In a night, the mastermind played the entire Wayang Kulit character actor who is the leather puppet motif decorated buffalo with Tatah decoration handicrafts (leather carving). He had to change the sound character, changing intonation, issued a joke and even sing. To liven up, the masterminds aided by musicians who play gamelan and sinden who sang songs of Java. The characters in total amounted to hundreds of puppets. Those puppets being played not placed within the existing banana bar near the mastermind. When played, the puppets will be shown as a shadow on the white screen in front of the puppeteer. The shadow is created because each puppet show put on the lights as lighting a fire that helped the puppets being played. Each puppet bring a different story or play. Variety of play is divided into four categories, namely the Lakon Pakem, Lakon Carangan, Lakon Gubahan and Lakon Karangan. Pakem has a story based entirely on library puppet plays while in the course outline Carangan only obtained at the library puppets. Gubahan is not based on wayang story but wearing the appropriate places in the library puppet, while the Karangan is entirely free.

The Puppet stories based on some old books such as Ramayana, Mahabharata, Pustaka Raja Purwa and Purwakanda. Today, there are also books that contain Gubahan and Karangan of the play for hundreds of years has been appreciated by the public Abhimanyu Kerem, Doraweca, Suryatmaja Maling and so forth. Among all the old books used, the Book Purwakanda are most frequently used by the puppeteers of the Kraton Yogyakarta. Leather puppet begins when the puppeteer has issued Gunungan. An all-night puppet Yogyakarta style divided into three rounds with a 7 Jejeran (scene) and seven scenes of war. First round, called the Pathet Lasem, has three Jejeran and two scenes that accompanied the war-gending, gending Pathet Lasem. Pathet Sanga who became the second half has a second Jejeran and the second battle scene, while the Pathet Manura who became the third act has the second Jejeran and third scenes of war. One of the most awaited part of many people at each puppet is Gara-Gara presents the typical joke of Java.

Sasono Hinggil located in northern South Square is the place most often held a one-night wayang performances, usually held every second and fourth weeks starting at 21:00 pm. Another place is the Hall of Sri Maganti located in Yogyakarta Palace. Wayang Kulit  staged during two hours starting at 10:00 pm every Saturday.

What you may have already heard is absolutely...true! One of the world's most expensive coffees in the world comes not only from Indonesia, but also from a wild animal's...behind. Okay, so I assume you are wondering why someone would take a sip of such a 'repulsive' product, but one thing that needs to be mentioned is that the beans are, in fact, cleansed before use. Thought that would settle your stomach. No Alright, let's just learn a little about this true-to-the-core rumor that we have been hearing about.

The wild beast-like creature that produced the exotic delicacies is called a civet cat. It is a fact that this coffee bean is not harvested by human hands. It is handpicked by those little, exotic looking cat-meets-a-weasel looking thing with long narrow noses that have quite a penchant for the finest Indonesian beans. The civet cat is a nocturnal creature which feeds among the Robusta and hybrid arabusta trees at night, searching for the prized berries and making themselves quite a rewarding meal on the seed (or coffee bean-to-be) inside after chewing away all the luscious fruit.

This lucky animal produces the coffee product cleverly named Kopi Luwak, from the Indonesian words coffee and civet. Now, even though I have never paid the $600 many fans prefer to pay, nor have I paid the $30 for a cup of the wildcat brew, but the resulting product does sound a bit interesting. Once the civet cat consumes the cherry and it enters its stomach, the enzymes in the animal's gastric juices sift through the beans which removing the harsher outer layer which is known to cause bitterness in coffees as well as some of the caffeine. So, that's it That is why there is such a hefty price tag on this drink-gone-wild Well, that and the fact that not too much more than 1,000 pounds of this style of coffee are produced each year.

So, overall, we have learned that the reason individuals and coffee enthusiasts alike enjoy sipping on the left-behind bean brew is simple because of the lower bitterness, caffeine, and rarity. Now, I don't get the caffeine part, but I guess it's a lot more of an organic way to go versus the traditional way of chemically decaffeinating coffee beans.