KEMNAS III, COBAN RONDO, MALANG, SURABAYA, INDONESIA

31st October- 9th November 2015

This year, I’ve gotten a chance to go on a camping trip KEMNAS III (Khemah Nasional) that was held in Indonesia representing Kadet Remaja Sekolah Musleh (KRSM) with the total of 315 participants from across the country as Malaysia’s ambassadors. I bet you wouldn’t believe the total of Indonesians participants participated. It was over 3000 participants participated in this camping trip! We were all in awe when we heard the news. It was no kidding news and it was real. That was like the population of a small town!

The program was organized by the Ikram Teens Malaysia and Pramuka Sekolah Islam Terpadu Indonesia (Pramuka SIT). This camp was the third time it was held in different countries. The program went on for 10 days. The purposes of this program were held was to strengthen the brotherhood relationship between the two countries as well as to build self-esteem amongst the participants.

Two days before we went to Coban Rondo, we stayed at Bima Sakti hostel, Kota Malang. We split into twelve groups before travelling to other places. We had to travel group by group and stick together all the time as to make sure of our safety. We were able to visit the apple orchard, Wisata Petik Apel, Kota Wisata Batu which is famous for its “krepek” and apple juice and Alun-Alun Park that was located in Malang. During those times, we were also able to ride ‘angkot”, a public old minivan which is famous in Indonesia for its ability of fitting 12 passengers in such a small space! You wouldn’t believe it until you try it out yourself! It was very compact as we had to squish ourselves to each other to fit in. ‘Angkot’ was our everyday transport during the whole journey.

Our next destination was Eco Green Park located in East Java. As always; we commuted to the park by using ‘angkot’. This park isn’t just any park. It’s a special park that was established by using recycled junks and turns them into sculptures. It was amazing! I would never have a thought about turning recyclable items into such a thing! It also combines itself with wildlife zoo. Don’t talk about the view! Who doesn’t like scenic views?! You could see spectacular views here. This park also consists of wildlife animals and most of the animals that were found there are almost extinct! It was a very extraordinary trip where you get to learn new things!

They also had a rare kind of pond where they used plastic bottles and other reusable items to make water musical instruments! Isn’t that awesome! The splashing and the current of the water produce the beautiful sounds as it hits the instruments. Who would think of that?! They even used recyclable glass bottles as decorations! It was just stunning to see those recyclable items were turned into good stuff.

Whoa! I almost forgot to mention the most important thing! They even have an upside down house! Everything in the house including the position of the house was all upside down. You know, roof at the bottom and floor above your head. The house was established for the remembrance of the Tsunami that hit Indonesia 11 years ago. There was a house that was found flipped upside down by the big and strong waves and they built the house from its original position where it was found after the tsunami to remark that most horrible natural disaster that had ever happened to the country. We were able to learned Indonesia’s black history and gained some knowledge at the same time.

Then, it was time for us to go to our campsite at Coban Rondo, Malang for 5 days 4 nights. It took us at least an hour by ‘angkot’ to get to the top of the mountain, where the campsite was located. The campsite was huge! We could see why the radiation of the campsite was 15 km. Fitting a huge amount of people in that place must have been a tough job to the organizers. Luckily, we as the guests didn’t have to build up the tents and cook food as the organizers had already prepared it for us. We had lunch box meals every day, with various of authentic food each day. Don’t forget about the dust in the air! It was terrible. The dusts from the fertile/arable soil make it hard for us to see and breathe. The dusts were flying around in the air and we had been advice to wear face mask.

After settling in, we had some free time and decided to walk around the campsite. We met with the Indonesians participants and the locals and greeted each other. We were told from the locals that Coban Rondo is famous for its beautiful waterfall flowing from above the mountain. We were also told that the waterfall is famous for its unique legendary story and told us why it was named after Coban Rondo. It all started with a couple that has just gotten married long time ago. On their 36^th day of marriage life, the wife, Dewi Anjarwati from Kawi Mountain asked her husband, Raden Boron Kusumo from Anjasmoro Mountain to visit her parents’ in law to show respect. 

Unfortunately, the in laws forbade both of them from visiting them in Anjasmoro Mountain as they had only been married for 36 days only. Despite the warning, they still went to visit them without taking a risk. In the middle of the journey, they were surprised with the presence of Joko Lelono, which his origin unknown. Joko Lelono was attracted to the wife’s beauty and wanted to steal her away from her husband. In order to protect his wife, he and his apprentices had a battle with Joko Lelono. As the battle was getting intense, he told his apprentices to hide his wife somewhere called Coban. 

The battle went on and both of them died in the fight. As the result of losing her husband in a fight, Dewi Anjarwati became a widow which was called “Rondo” in Javanese. And that was how the waterfall was named after. It was told that under the waterfall, there was a cave where Dewi Anjarwati hid and a big rock where Dewi Anjarwati sat while foretold her future.

Night time on the mountain was spooky. I am just kidding. It was really cold as if it was winter but with no snows. The air started to fogging up and we could each other’s’ breathe. Even the water was as cold like ice as it came from the waterfall.

We had one full day of free time before the program began. We took this advantage to visit the Indonesians campsite and greeted them. Surprisingly, we never knew that the Indonesians are really fond of us, the Malaysians. They were so excited and happy to see us and asked us to exchange souvenirs and photos as memories. It was fun to be able make new friends from your neighbor country. Night time falls down and we decided to make a visit to the stalls area just about 500 metres away from our campsite. The stalls that were there had everything like at the night market! Clothes, food, souvenirs, beverages and whole of other unique stuffs could be found there! We bought lots of stuff to bring it back home as souvenirs for our family members. 

The next morning, we began the program with ceremonials at the wide field. All the participants wore their uniforms and assembled together. Once again, we were all in awe as we were able to see the over 3000 participants assembling together. It was very crowded situation and I assure you its way more crowded than the being in shopping malls. Then, we all sang national anthems country by country. We were also welcomed with Indonesians traditional dances, marching and performances. It was amazing that each school from across the Indonesia has their own traditions!

Next destination was to the Human Body Museum, The Bagong Adventure. This unique museum is more towards to science. Visiting this awesome place would give you lots of beneficial if you want to be a doctor where the tour guides would give you a tour from the entrance until the exit, taking us exploring what is inside our body and explaining each function of every part of body and internal organs. What an amazing place to visit! They even have health check-ups site towards at the end of the touring where you could check your blood pressure, blood groups, eye sights and so on.

Never forgetting the most memorable place was the Jawa Timur Park (JaTim), a theme park just besides The Bagong Adventure. As a person who hasn’t been and gone to a theme park, I was pretty stunned. The place was filled with playgrounds, swimming pools and thrilling rides! They even have a haunted house! Although I didn’t ride any of the thrilling rides as I’ve really bad motion sickness, that wouldn’t let me down. Seeing my friends and enjoying ourselves and took lots of pictures together was more than enough. There was a traditional musical performance performed by the students from Kota Malang. They even performed with blindfolds on! To think that they were able to performed that, they must’ve had a lot of practice. Night time falls again and we all headed to back to the campsite to have a rest before thrilling activities start to kick in next morning.

As usual, the coldness of the mountain greeted us in the morning and it was another adventure day to start. All the activities that were in the tentative were all carried out through the day. Boys and girls were separated for these activities on different day. The boys went for the adventure while the girls were able to have free time and we would rotate the next day. Looking back at the tentative, it had said they would be a night concert. There were lots of performers performed at the night concert. They sang, danced and made jokes. Who would have thought that one of the famous bands in Indonesia would perform at the night concert?! We were all in shock as we were able to be there, watching them performing right in front of our eyes. It was amazing!

The next day was the girls’ turn. Name it whether it would be jungle tracking, traditional archery, scout challenge, science workshop, we had completed it all in one day. It was a very tiring day but it was worth it. On that very night, we had cultural night. Don’t worry, boys and girls were all separated and carried it out at their own campsite. Cultural night was full of fun. Each school showed off their traditions by singing and dancing. It was a cheerful night that I would never forget.

And yet, it was the last day of camping. All the participants wore their uniforms and assembled together in the wide field, sang national anthems country by country and heard some speeches from the SIT representative and head program. Then, they had a parade of Indonesia’s traditional clothes as the closing ceremony. The line was endless. There were various kinds of unique clothes from across the country. It was beautiful!

Upon waiting for the vans to arrive before departing to our accommodation near the airport, we all went to visit the legendary waterfall just before night time falls. We had to walk for about 2 km away from the campsite and I was super tired and my energy was depleting. The nature’s beauty got me recharged up my energy when we got there. Looking at the waterfall, it was breath-taking. Took lots of photos and headed back to the campsite as we were short on time. The vans were already waiting for us and we embarked the vehicles to our accommodation for the night. We accommodated at the Insan Permata SIT School for one night.

Time flies and it was the second last day in Indonesia. We rode ‘angkot’ to get to the bus station and embark the buses for our last night accommodation, an hour away from Juanda Airport. All of us were dead tired. We all slept through the whole journey. Our last stay was at the ‘Umrah & Haji’ hostel. We arrived there at noon and had free time till night time, which we had discussions of what we had gained during this trip and sorting out the plane tickets. We took this chance to have a good rest before going back tomorrow.

Realizing it was the last day, we departed to the airport first thing in the morning for our flight. We were separated into three groups for our flights as we did at the beginning. Wheels up in the early morning and it was time to say goodbye to each other before we all departed group by group. The first group safely arrived at KLIA2 at noon. Then it was the second group in the evening and last group at midnight.

I was so glad that I was able to experience lots of stuff from this camping trip! This camping trip was meaningful to me and I bet it was meaningful to everyone as well. I am proud to be able to represent my school and country as Malaysia’s ambassador and would like to have this chance another time!