Bromo: Jazz me up!

When the third time is a charm, one can wonder what the fourth might be. This trip served as the fourth time for me visiting Bromo because #whynot.

What lured me most was the event of Jazz Gunung that held annually on the Jiwa Jawa Resort. By all means, if we already spent the time and expense to go there then why would not spent another sleepless night to witness another majestic view of sunrise of Bromo.

I had several initiatives to cut the expense for this trip. First, what sounded as an impulsive act of watching some jazz performances far away across the island was a result of cheap ticket price. We managed to book some early bird promo tickets. Second, my shopping behavior in the past using the Garuda co-brand credit card saved me several thousand miles which could be redeemed into almost free one-way ticket of Jakarta-Malang. All reasons to justify the trip and its expenses.

After arriving at Malang, we already booked ourselves a one-day trip to Batu which located around one hour by car from our hotel in Malang. It was not our first time to pay a visit here, so we, by majority of vote, chose attractions that we hadn’t gone to yet which were Museum Angkut (later that day we got the knowledge that it’s called as Musang) and Batu Night Spectacular (this was where my vote overruled by the others).

#HonestReview – I was not that particularly in favor of Museum Angkut. The place itself is really huge and consists of almost everything that you can imagine of a theme park, such taking photos as Formula One racer, seeing the large collection of antique vehicles up to strolling around on New York’s Broadway miniature. Those wide range of activities that make the place, strictly from my point of view, feels distant and somehow lose focus on what actually it really should offer. There are a lot of replicas of European culture from the Eiffel Tower, Buckingham Palace, Pisa and others which lacking on some details. But perhaps, people at my age are not their target market for the Musuem, I am sure if I tagged along my younger nephews they would have all the fun just fine.

Our main agenda of enjoying jazz performance took place on the day after. It took around two hours by car to reach Jiwa Jawa, the place for the concert. Yet since the hotel rate at Jiwa Jawa is rather out of our budget, we booked a local hotel there where a seemingly average-rated hotel on Traveloka turned into a rather lousy one. I’m not recommend anyone for this hotel though. It was understandable that during drought season Bromo would generally look dirty. Dusts were literally everywhere. But that very hotel seems didn’t care about that notion and left every furniture and floor dirty. Well yeah.. it justified the room rate.

Upon arriving at the resort, we were astonished by the view of the stage.

Even one of the international performant honestly mentioned that the stage was probably the most beautiful one they ever performed. All of the lineup artists performed unbelievably great and, oh God, that harmony and improvisation just fantastic. As Indonesia’s Jazz legend, Idang Rasjidi brought along a soprano singer, Sastrani, and together they performed the song called Di Bawah Sinar Bulan Purnama or under the full moon light. And their performance timing was just perfect as the stars shone brightly above us. Just beautiful.

Tompi was next in line of my favorite there. Without any doubt, seeing his performance live on a place as beautiful as this was indeed a show of a lifetime. The highlight of his performance was his pianist ensemble. He practically was able to follow every impromptu notes Tompi sang and successfully turned them into romantic melodies.

The event was held for two days. On the second days, there were Sierra Soetedjo who in sudden invited East Java Vice Governor to sing and play the piano for her and me was #inspired; the Godfather of Broken Heart, Didi Kempot, who sang most of his Javanese songs it was indeed pretty shameful as I didn’t recall any of his song (maybe just that one, Stasiun Balapan) yet every audience knew them by heart. Didi Kempot’s stage act was funny and warm everyone out the cold night. I guess those were the takeaways of Jazz Gunung: learn piano well so you can accompany famous singer and listen to Didi Kempot songs more.

What is Bromo without witnessing the majestic sunrise?

As the fourth visit to this place, we were looking some different spots to enjoy the view from different perspective and pose from different angle because #content. Having to stay a bit longer on Penanjakan Area after all the hustle seeing the sunrise, it would give you the access to the place for yourself only. It something that probably most first-timer visitor didn’t know because they usually hopped to the jeep in rush to see the savanna and so called Whispering Sand beneath. Having the place to ourselves, we took bunch of pictures and enjoying the stunning view by feeling the cold morning air caressing your face and hair. Something that you didn’t feel every day in Jakarta.

We also skipped some of the busy touristy area of the savannah. For instant, we didn’t stop at Pasir Berbisik or Whispering Sand area. We also passed the steep climbing to the Bromo Crater as not only we already went there but one week prior to our visit this very crater had just erupted so government people put orange cones surrounding the perimeter, just in the worst case that the same eruption happened again.

Then, we chose to park the jeep on the Teletubbies Hills which nowadays to boost the tourism side of Bromo they actually put real Teletubbies clown there! How cool. Despite all the dusts and ashes, we deliberately walked quite considerable distance a far on the hill just to enjoy the place to ourselves. Plus, the fewer the people, the better the picture 🙂

In spite of shady hotel room and some unfriendly experience with the jeep driver there, we were fully grateful for the trip, especially me. Seeing a full jazz concert for the first time on one beautiful place like this surely increases the bar for my next concert. Sunrise tour in Bromo always had its own charm and, always, there were a lot of spots and places which I never went before. A short vacation such this one, on a frequent basis, it is maybe something that we need to balance all the already hectic working routine. Forever grateful.

From almost two months later, in my bedroom, dying for another vacation.

-R