Indonesia Trip Report

Every year Nick, Airin and children travel back to Indonesia to visit family and suppliers as well as looking out for new ideas, below is a small report of our last trip. Our next trip will be at the beginning of 2007 all going well.

On 27th December 2005 we flew out of Glasgow to travel directly to Jakarta via Dubai and Kuala Lumpur. We spent the first week with family in Jakarta and visited many furniture shops in Kemang, Jakarta and other areas. New year was spent in Jakarta and on the 2nd January we travelled by train to Yogjakart, a trip of approx. 10 hours. Yogjakarta is located in central Java and is surrounded by volcanoes and ancient temples, Borabudur, the largest Buddhist temple being one of them. Yogja is also a large university city and is also a centre for pottery and crafts for the area. Five days was spent travelling around suppliers and buying pottery, arts and crafts and stone ware.

Later on in the trip weisited Jepara, in central Java, the area is where the majority of furniture comes from. We spent two days with our main supplier in Jepara, Eko and Linda. They are a couple who like Batavia have set up a small business manufacturing furniture and acting as agents for ourselves, please see our section on our suppliers to see Eko and Linda.

More time was spent on the trip visiting furniture manufacturers, suppliers and retailers to see if any new designs are emerging on the market, there is also a healthy trade in antique furniture and reconditioned furniture, both of which had pieces of furniture that may make there way back to Dunkeld.

It is always with sadness that we drag ourselves away from Indonesia to travel back to Scotland, the country has so much to offer but so far to go, recent news from the area always raises an eyebrow when Indonesia is a topic of conversation but in reality it is like any other Asian country struggling to balance a rich diversity of cultures with the modern expectation of a developing nation.

Jepara	Full size dogs