The nineteenth-century Viennese traveller Ida Pfeiffer went backpacking through Indonesia before the term backpacking was invented. Gabriele Habinger tells the story of a remarkable woman who was the first white person to travel in the interior of Borneo.
This invaluable series of books on Indonesia from Periplus is gradually being completely revised and updated. Their Travel Guides have now become Adventure Guides but the changes are far more than merely cosmetic. The Travel /Adventure Guides are, as owners of any of the existing books will know, far more than just guides to travelling in the particular region covered. Travelling or not, the books are worth reading for their own sake. The historical vignettes are especially enjoyable.
In the afterword to this book, the authors state their intention: to demonstrate the richness and uniqueness of the material culture of the Southeast Moluccas. It was a laudable aim and, by any measure, they have succeeded admirably.
It was a big task. To put it in perspective, Maluku Tenggara-the Southeast Moluccas-is a remote chain of islands between Timor and New Guinea almost a thousand kilometres long. The region’s 300,000 or so inhabitants see relatively few visitors because it is so far off the tourist trail.
