The world’s most volcanic country with the world’s biggest Muslim population and the world’s biggest lizards those are just three of the things that you are about to learn about Indonesia.
location
Indonesia is located in Southeast Asia straddling the equator it is known for being the world’s fourth most populous country with 255 million people, it also has the biggest Muslim population of any country in the world, and if you thought that Muslim equals Arab then I’m sorry you’re Wrong and Indonesia is the proof with a total land area of 1 million nine hundred and nineteen thousand four hundred and forty square kilometers.
Indonesia is the 15th largest country in the world it is slightly bigger than Sudan and slightly smaller than Mexico but you can see that Indonesia’s land is more spread out because it’s not all in one piece.
Indonesia is an archipelago consisting of unbelievable 17,500 and eight islands but only about 6,000 of those islands are inhabited.
Islands and cities
The five main islands of Indonesia are Java, Sumatra, Borneo, and Sulawesi, the four of which are called the Greater Sunda Islands.
island of New Guinea
As well as the island of New Guinea at the center of the archipelago is Java Island which is the most populous island in Indonesia with 141 million people or 56.4% of the population that also makes Java the most populous island in the whole world by the way if you’ve ever wondered why coffee is sometimes referred to as Java that’s because coffee is one of Indonesia’s biggest exports and Indonesia is one of the original sources of coffee to the Western world.
island of Java
The island of Java is where the capital city of Jakarta is located it is a chaotic urban jungle of ten million residents and 30 million people in the urban area, the traffic in Jakarta is an absolute madness and it is probably the worst traffic in the world if you visit Jakarta.
I highly recommend that you take your own private helicopter with its land area of 128 thousand three hundred square kilometers Java is not the biggest island in Indonesia it is actually the fifth biggest this and most populous island in Indonesia is Sumatra with 50 million people.
Sumatra
and if we only include the islands that are completely inside indonesia then it is the largest island in Indonesia actually the islands of Borneo and New Guinea have more area inside Indonesia than Sumatra does but those islands are split between different countries and Indonesia with a total land area of four hundred and seventy three thousand six hundred and five square kilometers, sumatra is the sixth biggest island in the world.
Sulawesi
The third most populous island is Sulawesi with the total population of eighteen million four hundred and fifty five thousand and fifty eight people; it is the fourth largest island in Indonesia and the 11th largest in the world.
Borneo
the fourth most populous island is Borneo which is split between Indonesia and Malaysia as well as Brunei who has a little bit of territory in there to the Indonesian side called Kalimantan in Indonesia has about fifteen million people Kalimantan is sadly the location of widespread illegal logging that is destroying the environment there or Wrangler tanks are native to callum Antin except that their habitat is being destroyed by logging and by development.
if we include both the Indonesian side and the Malaysian side then Borneo is the third largest island in the world the Indonesian side Kalimantan has a total land area of 544 thousand one hundred and fifty square kilometers and that is still bigger than the island of Sumatra.
island of New Guinea
the island of New Guinea is the second largest island in the world but it is split between Indonesia to the west and Papua New Guinea to the east the total area of western New Guinea is 420 thousand five hundred and forty Square kilometer’s western.
New Guinea is a remote and sparsely populated area with a population of just four million three hundred and sixty three thousand eight hundred and sixty nine people.
if we include the whole island of New Guinea then it is known for being the most linguistically diverse place on the planet where hundreds of languages are spoken some of which are only spoken by a few hundred people in one or two villages western New Guinea is also the site of punch at Jaya the highest peak in all of Indonesia with a total height Of 4884 meters.
Maluku Islands and the lesser Sunda island
There are two other groups of smaller islands in Indonesia namely the Maluku Islands and the lesser Sunda island, the lesser Sunda Islands are where you can find Bali and Lombok the famous resort islands as well as the island of Flores and Komodo National Park where the Komodo dragon is found, the Komodo dragon is the largest species of lizard in the whole world the archipelago is located near the edge of three major tectonic plates namely they Pacific the Eurasian and the Australian plates.
Volcanoes and nature
These results in frequent earthquakes and lots of volcanic activity there are more volcanoes in Indonesia than in any other country in the world there are even more in Indonesia than there are in Japan there were 127 active volcanoes in Indonesia.
And about 5 million Indonesian people live under the threat of eruption the most active volcanoes are mount kelud and mount merapi which have both erupted dozens of times over thecenturies Mount Merapi last erupted in October of 2010 but I personally climbed Mount Merapi in 2006.
And I could still see the remnants of the eruption in 2004 I saw entire villages covered in ash from the eruption Indonesia is part of the Pacific Ring of Fire which is an area stretching around the edges of the Pacific Ocean.
Where there are 452 volcanoes and where the majority of major earthquakes in the world take place in 2004 a huge 9.3 magnitude earthquake struck off the coast of Sumatra and that resulted in the death of hundreds of thousands of people both from the earthquake and from the tsunami.
that followed as tragic as that volcanic activity can be it does have a side benefit the minerals in the volcanic ash make the soil very fertile that results in a lot of vegetation and a lot of beautiful scenery outside of the big cities the scenery in Indonesia is indeed absolutely amazing taking a train journey across Java just might be one of the highlights of your life.
Climate
Adding to that beautiful scenery is Indonesia’s tropical climate the Temperature stays relatively the same all year round generally hovering around 30 degrees and the amount of daylight per day doesn’t really change depending on the season that makes it possible to grow crops all
Year round there are basically two distinct seasons the dry seasons from april to October, and the rainy season from November to March, and the level of humidity ranges from 70% to 90% depending on the season.
Religion
Indonesia is a majority Muslim country with approximately 87 percent of the people being Muslim however the country is officially secular and it is not governed according to Islam approximately, 10% of the population are Christians with 3% comprised of Hindus Buddhists and others, Islam was first introduced to the archipelago in the 13th century by traders who happen to be Muslim and Roman, Catholicism was introduced to the archipelago by Portuguese traders, and Protestant Christianity was introduced by the Dutch during the Dutch colonial period.
Indonesia was unofficially a colony of the Netherlands when it was controlled by the Dutch East India Company starting from the Year 1602 and when the Dutch East India Company went bankrupt in the year 1800 the colony they had created in Indonesia was taken over by the Netherlands and became officially a colony of the state and it remained a Dutch colony until 1949 when Indonesia gained independence the Dutch left less Cultural influence on Indonesia than other colonial powers did in
other Countries their interests in Indonesia were mainly economic and they didn’t seek to make the Indonesian people behave like Dutch people but some architecture and infrastructure from the Dutch period remains and law and education were highly influenced by the Dutch and there were also a lot of Dutch loanwords that made their way into the Indonesian language.
Language
The Indonesian language or Bahasa Indonesia is the only official language of Indonesia it is used to unite the speakers of seven hundred and forty different languages in indonesia yes seven hundred and forty languages you heard correctly when Indonesia became independent in 1949 bahasa indonesia was spoken as native language by only five percent of the population but nowadays it is spoken by about 17% of the population as their native language but the majority of people speak a different regional language as their native language and they learn bahasa indonesia it is the language of administration of education of media and all of those things you would expect of an official language bahasa indonesia is a standardized form of malay.
Indonesian flag
The Indonesian flag consists of two horizontal rectangles the bottom one White and the top one red the white represents spirit and the red represents blood these are the two elements required in order to achieve
independence the largest ethnic group in Indonesia are the Javanese who make up 52% of the population but Indonesia is a very multicultural country with over 300 ethnic groups most of which speak their own unique language or dialect it’s a country where you can experience a diverse range of cultures of landscapes and of activities if you avoid the crazy Urban jungle as much as you can then you can have a wonderful experience that is unlike anything else.
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