Central of beautiful jewelry in Banjarmasin

It took around an hour flight from Surabaya to Banjarmasin, capital of South Kalimantan. My friend and I arrived at Syamsudin Noor airport at lunch time, it's raining. The airport was not too big, from the plane we had to ride a bus to the airport building. I heard the new bigger airport was being built for the international flight. There are two parts of Banjarmasin, the old city and the new one, the government would move soon to the new part of the city.



Banjarmasin is famous as its jewelry, the central jewelry market is at Martapura. From the airport is nearer, around 30 minutes drive. We went directly there, because they close at 17:00 while we left airport at 14:00 already. No food and drink during the flight, we were starving, so we stopped by at Soto H. Anang in Martapura to taste the local food. We ordered the delicious yellow chicken sooup called "soto Banjar" and grill duck. You could eat soto with rice cake "ketupat" or rice.


After our stomach full we had a new spirit to shop the beautiful stones jewelry. Our driver brought us to a shop, Zamrud Plaza (Jl. A. Yani 125 Martapura, Phone: 62-511-4720751) not the market which's just a few block from our lunch place. The shop was quite convenience, it had a complete collection of stones, jewelry and Banjar handicrafts. If you lack of cash, there was also ATM in front of the shop. We shopped a lot there, no need to go to the market anymore. The price was much cheaper comparing to Banjarmasin city.


I was interested in crystal necklace with its bracelet, also some stone brooches. Bead wallets and small bag handicrafts were also the result of my hunting to give souvenirs to my relatives. If you like diamond, saphire, ruby, etc, they also had them, either as stone or already become accessories such as ring or earing. The salesgirls were kind enough, they didn't mind accompany us to select our preference. When I paid they were kind enough to give me discount.


Rattan Inn was the hotel where we stayed for a night, in the morning they entertained the guest with traditional music. The hotel was not too high, just 3 levels. My colleague in Banjarmasin office said that no high building in Banjarmasin because the land was swamp, so the foundation is not strong enough for building a high skycraper. The electricity was not good either, it's often off. In the hotel I experienced twice, at 17:00 and 22:00, it's not good for electronic stuffs, such as Air Conditioning, TV, refrigerator, etc.


At night we had dinner around 20:00 in Rudy H, a seafood restaurant at A. Yani Km 3.5 no.285 Banjarmasin. We ordered some fish, e.g. grill patin, fried lais, and seluang, and sweet sour shrimp & vegetable. While waiting for the food, we ate the delicious amplang (the fish cracker from Banjarmasin). The fish was nice, it's fresh, piquant and sweet. The restaurant was decorated with antique stuffs such as ceramics, and old cupboard. A life music with a singer and a keyboard player entertained us during the dinner.


Banjarmasin's waterfront of Martapura River. The city is laced with flood-prone waterways, and many houses are built on rafts or stilts over the water. Many of such waterways are also used for travel, using relatively small rowboats (only major rivers are accessible by larger speedboats, tugboats, longboats, and barges). Our driver offered to sea the floating market at 05:00 in the morning. I prefered to sleep because it's an hour earlier than Surabaya time, so it meant that I had to wake up before 04:00 if I wanted to see.


If you like stone jewelry, definitely you must visit Permatapura. The price was so competitive, you won't regret to visit it. You also could visit the place where they make the jewelry to polish it to become a beautiful ornament.

Read More ..