The original design was by Henk Ngantung,  the Vice Governor of Jakarta.  He wanted to call it  “Indonesian people greet their future”. The sculptor was Edhi Sunarso. Work started on 17 August 1961, Independence Day.

Thirty meters above the ground the two bronze statues are a man and a woman, five metres tall from head to foot, with outstretched arms. She has a bouquet in her left hand.  They stand on a pedestal and welcomed visitors to the Asian Games and now Jakarta.

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This glorious roundabout is called Bundaran Hotel Indonesia (Hotel Indonesia Roundabout) after Hotel Indonesia, Indonesia’s  first 5 star hotel, now The Kempinski. 

It’s positioned in the cenre of Jakarta on the intersection of Jalan M.H. Thamrin, Jalan Imam Bonjol, Jalan Sutan Syahrir and Jalan Kebon Kacang.

The pond, fountains and lighting were renovated in 2002. It’s a favourite place for demonstrations. On Sunday mornings Car-Free Day the place is thronged with joggers, cyclists, strollers and vendors.

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Where am I?

Bali

 Map of Bali made in 1760 by the celebrated French cartographer Jacques Nicolas Bellin (1703-1772).

Bali is a small island, more or less in the middle of the Republic of Indonesia, which currently is divided into 32 provinces. Bali constitutes a province, the smallest in terms of area and highly populated. There are about three million people. For rural Balinese life expectancy is 64.6 years and 61.1 years for people living in urban areas.

To be precise, the census held in June 2000 indicated a population of 3,124,674 people, a population growth of 1.22 per cent. between 1990 and 2000 and a population density of 555 people per square kilometre.

According to Raffles in his History of Java:

“The natives of Bali, although of the same original stock with the Javans, exhibit several striking differences, not only in their manners and the degree of civilization they have attained, but in their features and bodily appearance. They are above the middle size of the Asiatics, and exceed both in stature and muscular power, either the Javan or the Malayu.”

Bali measures about 150 kilometers (90 miles) east to west and about 80 kilometers (50 miles) north to south. The area is a little over 5,000 square kilometers (2,100 square miles) or 0.29 per cent. of the total area of Indonesia. It lies about 8 or 9 degrees south of the equator and between 114.6 and 115.5 east longitude. Bali has about 1,500 traditional villages.

The famous Wallace line, which divides the lush vegetation of sub-tropical Asia from the arid landscape of Australia, runs along the narrow strait that separates Bali from Lombok, which is its nearest neighbouring island to the east. Java is to the west.

Bali is about 95 per cent. Hindu or rather Bali-Hindu.

Indonesia

And, of course, you are also in Indonesia, which is the fourth most populous country in the world, currently about 203 million inhabitants, only overtaken by the Peoples’ Republic of China, India and the United States. (The Roman Empire had a population of 100 million.) It is also the biggest Muslim nation in the world: about 90 per cent. of all Indonesians are Muslim. There are 250 ethnic groups. The country is a diverse entity – the Indonesian motto is “Unity in Diversity”, a statement of fact and hope.

A British scholar coined the word “Indonesia” in 1850 from the Greek words “indos” meaning “Indian” and “nesoi” meaning “islands”.

Indonesia is a very long chain of islands, over 13,677. More details are in Secrets of Bali.

Dutch colonialism effectively defined Indonesia’s modern borders. The 1945 Constitution states that the Republic of Indonesia encompasses “the areas that were formerly the Netherlands East Indies.”

The capital, Jakarta, called Batavia under the Dutch, is the most crowded place in Indonesia. There are almost 8.4 million people with an astonishing density rate of 946 people per square kilometre. It is in West Java, Bali’s westerly neighbouring island. Java is the most densely populated island in the world and possesses over half of Indonesia’s population (about 120 million). It is about 1,000 kilometers (600+ miles) away from Bali.

The Balinese Barong Safety Matches.

The census held in June 2000 indicated a population for the whole country of 203,456,005 people, a population growth of 1.35 per cent. between 1990 and 2000 and an average population density of 106 people per square kilometre. Life expectancy is 63 years.

Indonesia is one of the world’s primary oil-producing countries and is the most dominant country in ASEAN, the Association of South East Asian Nations.  Details  about ASEAN are in Secrets of Bali.

Balinese weather

Every year several hundred inches of rain fall on most of Bali. This has resulted in the growth of dense tropical forests, which would have covered the island until about 1,000 years ago when the irrigation system was instituted. Today there are forests only at high elevations and in the west of the island.

The western forest, which is now a national park, was home for tigers until Europeans hunted them to extinction at the beginning of the 20th century. There are still a few rare species of birds found only in these parts, such as the Rothschild mynah.

Temperature

Bali has a uniform temperature throughout the year. The average annual temperature is 27 C or 81 F.

There are three reasons for this as set out in Secrets of Bali.

Seasons

There are only two seasons: the wet season and the dry season. In December, January and February the average rainfall in Denpasar is about 12 inches (300 mm) per month and the rest of the year 4 inches (100 mm) per month. The figures change depending on altitude.

The principal reason for the two seasons is wind direction as described in Secrets of Bali.

El Niño

El Niño, which means “boy child” in Spanish, is a Pacific Ocean climate pattern that has been evident for thousands of years. It is an abnormal warming of the waters in the eastern Pacific Ocean described in Secrets of Bali.

Bali – Indonesia

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