Lawang Sewu // 'A Thousand Doors'

Not gonna lie, this is a great candid!

Over the weekend, I went out of town and visited my parents' hometown, Semarang. It was such a short trip, but we did so much in a span of three days, all thanks to my relatives. Not gonna lie, the trip went for a downfall when I got sick on the second day. And as I'm writing this, I'm not 100% myself yet. I planned to get this up yesterday or on Sunday night, but that didn't happen, so I'm sorry for that!

I've known about Lawang Sewu for two years now (that was the last time I visited Semarang). My cousins and I planned to go there back in 2013, but that didn't happen because time was limited. So fresh out of the plane, after lunch, my parents and I headed out to Lawang Sewu. Never been to an Indonesian museum/historical place (unless I was on a fieldtrip), so my trip to Lawang Sewu was a great one.

The entrance fee to the museum was so cheap (only 10.000)! And if I'm not mistaken, if you have a student card with you, you can enter Lawang Sewu for 5.000 only. I was surprised that quite a lot of people were inside of the museum. But they mainly just visited to take pictures (or selfies). The experience was quite different to the other museums that I went to because, this one had no AC, and the historical explanation wasn't quite in detail, so that was quite disappointing.

'Lawang Sewu' literally means 'Thousand Doors' in Javanese. It was named by the citizens of Semarang because it (obviously) had a lot of doors. It was built on 27 February, 1904 and finished on July 1907. The Dutch continued to expand the place until 1919.

When the Dutch occupied Indonesia, Lawang Sewu was called Nederlandsch-Indische Spoorweg Maatschappij (NIS). They were the company in charge of rail transport, and the main headquarter was in Semarang.

European architecture is my favorite, and although the built of Lawang Sewu is quite different from the architecture I usually tend to fall in love with, I fell in love with Lawang Sewu anyways. Probably because I rarely see old buildings/historical places in Jakarta.

Credits to my dad! 

Picture number 2 and 3 is probably the reason why they called the place Lawang Sewu. They're not kidding when they said there were a lot of doors! There was a lot of hallways and corridors that were empty, which was quite scary, but I went along with my dad, so that's alright!

I didn't stay long inside because it was so hot! Although the doors and windows were all open, the rooms inside were all stuffy and it was getting harder to breathe the longer I stayed inside. When I went outside and breathed in the fresh air, I was a happy girl!

I think my most favorite part of Lawang Sewu was the courtyard (picture number 4) and the doors all opened up in the hallway. If you're ever around Semarang, I do recommend going here because the place is beautiful and also you don't have to pay a lot of money to get inside!

Credits again to my dad!

I didn't plan on going to Lawang Sewu when we booked a flight to Semarang. But hey, unexpected plans are the best right? :)

Like I said before, on the second floor, there weren't people around (only my dad and I). It was quite eerie and the vibe wasn't so great either. There are some reports of people who saw two Dutchwoman who committed suicide in Lawang Sewu and another report of visitors seeing a kuntilanak. I don't believe in those things and although the vibe from inside was something that I would greatly avoid, I was happy that the pictures I took were great!

Much love, Ashley xx