I visit the Institute of Technology Surabaya every summer since 2005.

Dr. Agus Zainal Arifin, who was a Ph. D. candidate in my lab and is currently a lecturer of the Institute, guide me in Surabaya city on the holidays during my stay. He is very religious, and I visited several mosques with his guide. I present some photos of Indonesian mosques, which we do not visit so often for sightseeing, on this web page.

I also introduce sirsak, in English soursop, which is a fruit I saw first in Indonesia. I was really favorite in it at my first visit, so the personnels in the Institute always recommend me sirsak juice since then. It is sometimes found in Japan recently.

* Click a photo to enlarge.

Mosques

A mosque in a sightseeing tea field on the way of the trip with the personnels. Since we dropped by there at the time of Maghrib (sunset) prayer, they prayed there.

There are such mosques everywhere in the city, and people can stop by at the time of prayer. The Maghrib prayer is the most important in a day, and the azan, call for prayer, is broadcasted on the TV and the radio at this time.

 

The outside of "Masjid Al-Akbar" in the suburb of Surabaya, which I visited 2005. The mosque is a very large hall without anything like altars. I felt very tense inside since the floor and the wall are completely clean. I told this impression of mine to a muslim there, and he replied, "Cleanliness is a part of Islam."

   

A mosque (left and center) and a tomb (right) that I visited 2007. The muslims make their hands and feet clean when they pray in a mosque. There is a water pool to wash feet in front of the hall in this mosque.

Sirsak

 

Sirsak, or in English soursop. Its scienfic name is Annona muricata, and "graviola," which is used as a medicine in South America, is the same kind of fruits. Sirsak juice is purely white, very tasty, comfortably sweet and sour.

 

It is found that it contains a lot of fiber if it is cut as shown left or peeled as shown right. Making juice is prefered to eating directly because of the fiber. I think such fruit not too much sweet and containing a lot of fiber is attracting in Japan recently.

 

I saw sirsak juice at a crape shop in Japan in December 2007. It was called "guanabana" there, and aliased "custerd icecream from forests."