Travel: Sam Po Kong Temple, Semarang

After all those years just driving through, we finally got the chance to visit this historical temple last long weekend (August 20^th, 2006). The temple was located in the city of Semarang, central Java. You can easily drive past it on the way to Yogyakarta from Jakarta. No charge on admittance but I think it’s best to wear something modest—there were no written dress-code at the temple but nevertheless… after all the temple was a sacred place and many people still come and pray there.

I was really surprised to see how spacious it was. Up until now I always pictured it as one big temple, but instead I got to see a complex of one big main temple, two small temples each on its side, and one under construction—I think this one is going to have some kind of water features in front of it, also a quite large inside-ground in front of the temples, and all of this was surrounded with high, so very forbidden city like, walls. Lovely.

The complex was so much bigger than the one I went to see in Melaka, Malaysia, and Sam Po Kong’s statue was thinner in Semarang ;-p If you enter the main temple, you will find a long relief that told the story of Sam Po Kong’s journey in three languages: English, Indonesian and Chinese, at the back of it.

In addition, there were also some construction works for the gate. Looks like they’re going to make it grander than the main entrance. Maybe we can expect a complete new Sam Po Kong temple next year.

Though the toilet was better off to be left unmentioned (the toilet for gents was an open row of urinoirs under a big tree! Hehe), there was a small shop at its side that sells beverages, T-shirts and stickers for those who like souvenirs. Don’t expect designer’s work, though.

Too bad I didn’t bring along the camera with a bigger memory space, so there were not much space left for pictures.