[This article is as seen as published on Kanekin online magazine]
Places contain stories, and so does the Mount of Merapi with its rocky roads; making it impossible for personal cars to access, but creating a greater work field for those who offer jeeps renting services scattered everywhere around the corner—one and another in just every few steps. When the jeep I hopped onto was making its way up to the top,
I recalled the moments of my first visit to this exact same site—back then when I was only a little girl being in fear of, yet astounded by how dangerous the mountain I was standing before could be; as smokes were blown out of its top, signaling that it could explode in anytime soon. But it was only years later that the eruption finally happened.
The jeep driver who was a local himself expressed his grief in words for the umpteenth time as he continuously does to the visitors he brings around; sharing his feelings about how painful it feels every time he sees the remains of houses being burned down into debris, living creatures into bones, and everything else into ashes—all because of the lava and hot volcanic clouds. Yet just as how he chose to step out of his agony and rather decided to embrace the beauty behind the stories by telling them to the foreigners, there's this one big-hearted family who crawled of whatever they have left; turning what used to be a home for them into a museum to display the remnants of the catastrophe. Broken television, scorched motorcycle engine, shattered plates, dusty coins from a moneybox, skeleton of pets—name it and there they have it.
There was admittedly more power in the 2010 eruption than expected, that even the people who managed to get into the specially designed bunker did not survive. It was so strong that nature had to fight against nature itself; ending up with rivers and the flowing waters deformed into nothing but resemblance of pathways of sands and stones.
While standing in front of the Mount of Merapi and observing every of its curve in awe, I was made aware that I had witnessed how excessive power created pain. Yet the locals who rose up again with bravery and courage to open the area as what is now referred to as the Mount Merapi National Park; reminded me that pain is never eternal and that unthinkable power could be produced out of pain once it has been overcome.
A trip to Merapi is not only another travel experience, but rather a privilege of discovering lessons of life that should never be forgotten nor taken for granted. I am here to say that it is no longer a doubt that traveling opens the eyes of the heart to what is unseen yet.
