As I felt shitty the other day, I booked a train ticket to the east and visited a city that’s known for breathtaking hills, eco-green park and numerous pricey theme park and vintage looking building.Yet, as usual those attracted me less.Instead, I visited a places that took me to learn about life as I saw it.

My journey began at 11 am right after I visited the bank to solve my problem. I called up a relative to take me to the area they call “ kampung 3D pelangi” which translates literally as 3D Rainbow village. The area is located below a trail bridge and adjacent to the river. It is an urban slum neighborhood where its citizen works as garbage collectors, street food sellers and numerous informal jobs. And these days, urban slum has turned into another attraction site. This place is just one among the other similar movements in Indonesia.

Upon the arrival, I was greeted by a decorative main entrance that says something along this line' Welcome to kampung 3D'.Then,my relative had to park the motorbike and they charge us 4000 idr/person. As I paid the entrance fee they told us to pick one of the keychain from this box below. I picked a foxy key chain with a stamp behind it that says “ kampung tridi Malang”. I tried to make the sense, what’s so 3D about it?

Right, What’s so 3D about it?

On the right of the main entrance, the visitors can see a gazebo shaped like a ship and painted like a rainbow. Also the houses was painted in various animation in which if you take a picture it was as if (insert animals, places). It did not really attract me as I’ve been to many places like that.

The path walk took me to the narrow alley where I saw houses painted in different colors and animation. It was such a lively neighborhood where I saw little children were playing classic hide and seek. I saw none of them glued to any electronic device unlike myself, a halfwit visitor who was glued to my phone taking pictures of the houses as if that was something strange.

I slipped my phone as I walked to narrower alley where I saw a woman who was sitting on the house floor and grinding green leaves.I was fascinated as she was using a traditional grinding method andI immediately crouch so I can politely talking to her.Our conversation began as I asked her what was the name for the leaves and why she was doing that.

As she told myself, she is a street food seller who use natural coloring in the food. She will be using the extract from the leaves to produce a green color. And that moment, in my head I wonder how much her profit was or was she even care of gaining more profit through an easy way? I left my thoughts behind and walked away as my relative was pouting because it was way too hot for her.

I was like, “ Hot is what I am looking for, so just follow me’ I insisted.

While I was walking further down the alley two women who were gossiping about their neighbor waved and pointed out myself to the right direction of where the glass bridge located. I was not too excited about the bridge which connects two colorful neighborhood but anyway why not seeing the whole area through there?

To reach there, you have to walk down through the steep stairs in which you can trip and die if you’re not careful. There, I saw people were taking selfie in the bridge.

What’s so special about the bridge?

Well it has glass floor overlooking the brown river below. I b always think if people are not being wasteful and careless about where they throw their garbage, definitely there will be fishes swimming around. In the end, I stayed there a little bit.

“ Finally! A sun”

Up above, I saw little children were playing on the edge of the river and I spotted a local who was painting the house wall which I was thinking to get there although that means I have to get down to the river.

I left the bridge and tried to approach the guy who was decorating the house wall. It started to feel like a maze and I had no idea where I was going. In the end, I ended up going down to the river,bitten by mosquito and having to hold my breath for the revolting smell. My relative was looking at me from above annoyed and shook her head looking at me, down to the dirty place only to see some art in the making.

Unfortunately, I was taking a wrong stairs and the guy was a bit father from where I was coming down. So I decided to come up again and I spotted a woman who sells satay and some rice steamed inside a banana leaf plus simple coal mine burner. I also spotted two black rabbits living in a cat's cage sharing a tiny space.

Satay is traditional indonesian barbeque meal consist of meat coated in peanut sauce and served along side steamed rice, shallots,fried shallots and chili paste.

I was then approached by another woman and we had a simple chit chat of where I was coming from. I learned that the satay seller was coming from another island to make a living in the city. In the end, I got myself one portion of the satay.

It was very delicious and had distinct taste than the one I occasionally eat. There was this mixture of sweet, spicy and sour in that tender meat. Then, I saw a guy coming with an incense burner and told the woman that he was going to start practicing the show for the children.

‘ oh that’s exciting!’ I exclaimed

The woman soon told me that I should stay and watch the children perform local dance called jaranan. I recalled having to watch this in another part of east java.I would say jaranan is a mythical show as they say it involves supernatural being that grants them immunity to eat pieces of glass or stabbing themselves without getting injured.

Well, since it’s a children day, there will be no such act involved. Below you can see the footage of the children enjoying a mythical music and practicing their moves with the whip and the masks.

I stayed a little bit when my relative was annoyingly asking me to go as it was about to rain. I said okay and before we left, I met a traditional ice cream seller and definitely I got myself one.

As we left, I thought to myself, why these days it's becoming common for slum place turned into a rainbow village and becoming a tourist site?. I think it's empowering but at the same time, do they feel their space is invaded by the visitors?

Do the visitor come to this place only to take pictures for the instagram and leave without trying to learn a story or two from these dwellers?. This place should teach the visitors to be grounded but that was something missing I've seen from the visitors but who knows? I am not a mind reader.

_{all pictures are private collection.}

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