The best thing about travel is that you get to see vast amount of different cultures and different people. In many respects that influence the architectures in their respective areas, which is the subject of today’s post.

The photographs that I wanted to present today were taken in Indonesia and Singapore. This was taken late last year during my holiday but have left unprocessed since my Macbook Pro broke down.

In many respects, Singapore is in my opinion much more modern and organized than Indonesia, most of the buildings are of modern designs (eg. ION Orchard). On the other hand however, in Indonesia one can find many heritage buildings granted you go to the right places.

The photo on the left is taken from Marina Bay Sands (on the Sky Park), where most of Singapore can be seen clearly from above (here’s a link if you are interested about the building). It was an impressive view, buildings as far as the eye can see, a lot of development in progress and busy industrial ships. You’ll be able to see more shots from Singapore in the gallery below. Oh, and there are some shots from Singapore Universal Studio too, great place to have fun for a whole day!

During my short holiday though, I also went around in Indonesia, in particular Solo and Semarang city, both cities are located in Central Java. While Solo is very rich in its heritage and history of the old royal families and government, Semarang is a more populated area and is the capital city of Central Java. Visit these wikipedia article about Solo and Semarang if you are interested.

One of the most interesting photo in Solo is the interior of the meeting room in Solo’s Mangkunegaran, it consisted of great detailed and beautiful interior suited for royalties. You can see the photograph on the right. I won’t write more about the Mangkunegaran because obviously history isn’t exactly my expertise. I did had a bit of historical tour about the complex from the local guide though and it was very insightful!

On the left, is a photo of Semarang, taken from Gumaya tower and Grand Candi. Great scenery from up there, you can also see how populated the area is by looking from the photos.

All in all it was a great trip and it was great to see all the different cities and their unique cultures. Next time you visit different countries and cities, it always pays to learn a bit of its history from the locals.

Some tips and techniques when traveling around

1. If using an SLR, make sure to bring a wide angle lens (about 18mm would be enough), it’s handy when photography the cityscapes. If it’s a point and shoot, try to use one with wide angle lens, I think most point and shoot these days have these lenses.
2. When photographing architectures, when possible try to use smaller aperture, about 11 and above would be good. This is a good way to preserve all the details of the scenery.
3. Depending where you shoot, a tripod can be handy, especially at night time. In my case however, since I mostly photograph during the day, hand-held was enough.

The architecture photographs gallery

I guess I’ll start of the 2009 post with a little bit of my short trip to Indonesia. I went to a small town of Pati in Central Java to look for something different than the capital city Jakarta. Of course, while there is not much modern entertainments like those large shopping centres, pubs, etc. This town has its own unique appearance.

The buildings remains the same as it was when I went here a few years ago, time seems to go slower here. If we look at the picture of the houses, those are the typical house + shop buildings.

Among other things however one of the best activities that I did was hunting for food. My favourite would be the traditional food called “Nasi Gandul”.

Its most prominent characteristics is having to place the food on top of a sheet of banana leave, giving the dish a very traditional look. I’m not quite sure what part of the cattle is the meat , all I know is that this food taste great and I love it! By the way, this is why we have to bring our camera everywhere including restaurants, so that we can take a picture of those different looking foods.

That was all exciting, unfortunately there are some sad aspect of this city (probably throughout the nation); it is the fact that most of the historical and old buildings are not being cared for. Take a look at the picture below, this was the once great looking sports hall, now a “ghost” looking hall.

From this city, I then moved on to a village, kind of rural suburb area I guess; it was called Trangkil.

Trangkil Sugar Factory

This place was once one of the biggest sugar factory in Central Java during the time of Dutch Colonial. I went there because my Grandpa was one of the head machinist in that sugar factory. Let’s take a look of the few shots that I took during the visit:

Although looking like a worn out factory, according to the caretaker there, this factory is actually operational. Too bad they didn’t take care of the facility like it used to be, could have been a good tourist attraction, especially there are still a lot of younger visitors who are the family members of the ones who used to work here. The saddest part is when the caretaker said that the last remaining old building will be destroyed as well.

The factory visit was a great thing to look at a portion of the Indonesian history.

Photo Tips: In the dark places like the factory machines above, use high ISO settings and the highest aperture (eg. f/2.8) possible to ensure sharp result. If you use a zoom lens, use the lowest focal length.

From the visits in Pati I then moved to the Semarang city. It is much larger than Pati and more modern in a sense. As usual however, I prefer to visit historical places. I’d like to show you one of the interesting place in there, the Pagoda Avalokitsvara.

This is a realtively new place with great aesthetics. Maybe with a little bit more publication it can be a good addition to the city’s tourism. The pictures that I took here could have been better. The rainy day when I came here didn’t help with the photography aspect of the visit . Here’s a little bit more shots from the site.

All in all, I am delighted to say that my trip had been a wonderful one. Great sites to see, great historical view, great food and most of all great chance to take good photos!