Beautiful view from the Purwosari Hills on the Borobudur temple

by Ardi Mulder

It was quite cloudy until this moment when the sun's rays appeared through the clouds. So in the end we can shoot a nice photo. Unfortunately, it was so cloudy that the mountains were not visible in the distance. In the right you see the Borobudur temple.

Borobudur, or Barabudur is a 9th-century Mahayana Buddhist temple in Magelang Regency, Central Java, Indonesia. It is not far from the town of Muntilan, and approximately 1.5 hour from Yogjakarta city centre. It is the world's biggest Buddhist temple. The temple includes 9 stacked platforms, 6 square and 3 circular, topped by a main dome. It is embellished with 504 Buddah sculptures and 2672. The main dome is surrounded by 72 Buddha statues, each seated inside a perforated stupa.

Constructed in the 9th century throughout the reign of the Sailendra Dynasty, the temple style follows Javanese Buddhist architecture, which mixes the Indonesian native cult of forefather praise and the Buddhist idea of obtaining Nirvana. The temple shows the impacts of Gupta art that shows India's impact on the region, yet there suffice native scenes and aspects included to make Borobudur distinctively Indonesian. The monument is a shrine to the Lord Buddha and a location for Buddhist pilgrim's journey. The pilgrim journey starts at the base of the monument and follows a route around the monument, going up to the top through 3 levels symbolic of Buddhist cosmology: Rūpadhātu (the world of forms), Kāmadhātu (the world of desire) and Arūpadhātu