Archipelago on the southernmost border South-East Asia... Together with the Greater Sunda Islands, it is part of the Malay Archipelago, which belongs to Indonesia. There are only about 570 Small Sunda Islands. They are mainly represented by the six largest - Timor, Bali, Lombok, Sumbawa, Flores, Sumba. The inhabitants of the island speak 68 dialects, follow the commandments of different religions, but are convinced that ultimately everything in the world depends on the will of the spirits.
FROM THE OCEAN
The Lesser Sunda Islands are one of the most geologically complex and seismically active regions on our planet.
The Lesser Sunda Islands (Nusa Tenggara, which means "southeastern islands" in Indonesian) consists of nearly 570 islands. 320 of them are so small that they remain unnamed. There are 42 islands inhabited. The archipelago is usually represented by six of them, the largest being Timor, Bali, Lombok, Sumbava, Flores, Sumba. Together with the Greater Sunda Islands (Sumatra, Java, Borneo), they make up the Malay Archipelago, which in turn is part of Indonesia, the largest in the world island nation... From the north, the island is washed by the Flores Sea and the Banda Sea, from the south - the Timor Sea and others, more shallow seas Indian Ocean... The eastern part of itself big island Lesser Sunda Islands - Timor is occupied by the independent state of East Timor (we wrote about it in No. 104 of the Atlas), which also includes several small islands off the coast.
Scientists date the beginning of the geological history of the Small Sunda octpodod to the Paleocene (about 65.5 million years ago), when some of them appeared on the ocean surface as a result of volcanic processes in the earth's crust at the junction of the Australian and Pacific plates. Another part of the islands of the archipelago is of coral origin. Magma flows that "heated" the islands, born of underwater volcanoes, moved them to the close southern tip of the Eurasian plate. From the interaction of three plates, the islands received new geological metamorphoses, decreased or, on the contrary, increased in size, but finally decided on their location. This can be said about most of the islands of the archipelago, but not all. Flores Island, according to some geologists, was once part of the Australian Plate, although others believe that it is of volcanic origin, because there is a volcano on it, although it is inactive.
This volcano, Kelimutu (1639 m), has three crater lakesthat periodically change color, which is unusually beautiful, but this phenomenon has not yet found an unambiguous scientific explanation. The islands of Sumba, Timor and Babar are also considered the remnants of Australia. It should only be borne in mind that not a single geological theory of the origin of the Lesser Sunda Islands, with the exception of islands with a visible volcanic history, can be called universally recognized in the scientific world. Most of these theories arose quite recently - at the end of the 20th century. - and still need verification. There is also such a theory: part of the islands of the archipelago are fragments of the Eurasian plate. One way or another, but today the islands stand at the junction of the Eurasian and Australian plates and are part of the Sunda mountain arc, which has an outer and inner contour and is surrounded by deep oceanic depressions. This arc is considered part of the Himalayan fold system. The Wallace Line (named after the British geographer and biologist A.R. Wallace, who explored the islands of Indonesia in 1854-1862) runs between the islands of Bali and Lombok - a biogeographic division between the natural systems of South Asia on the one hand and Australia and New Guinea on the other ...
The Lesser Sunda Islands are part of an area of \u200b\u200btectonic activity called the Pacific belt (ring) of fire. In 1815, the Tambora volcano erupted on the island of Sumbawa, which is still considered the most powerful eruption in the world. Its consequences were felt even a year later - 1816 remained in the history of Europe and North America as a “year without summer”: there were still clouds of volcanic dust from Tambora that reached these continents. By the time of the eruption, Tambor reached an altitude of 4300 m. Now this figure is 2821 m, but the volcano is active. And the most powerful active volcano of the Lesser Sunda Islands is Rinjani on the island of Lombok. In addition to Lombok and Sumbawa from large islands The archipelago has significant volcanoes and its most famous island is Bali, on it there are two active volcanoes: Agung (3142 m) and Batur (1717 m).
The border between Southeast Asia and Australia is designated by the Burman-Javan, or Sunda, mountain arc. It also includes the Lesser Sunda Islands. The northern ridge of the arc includes the islands of volcanic origin - Lombok, Sumbawa, Komodo, Flores, Dembata. The southern ridge - Sumba, Kaby, Rota, Timor, on these islands also find traces of volcanic activity, but very ancient. Small islands of the archipelago are of coral origin. The relief of the large islands is determined by wide, hilly plateaus cut by fast shallow rivers with deep valleys.
CALL OF THE ISLANDS
The Lesser Sunda Islands is one of those places on Earth where the fusion of different cultures took place in an especially whimsical, although somewhat predictable.
It is believed that homo erectus (erectus man) entered Bali about 1 million years ago, through Sandaland (the Malac Peninsula, the islands of Kalimantan, Java and Sumatra with adjacent islands). Now these parts of the land are located on the continental shelf of Asia, and during the Ice Age they were the southern tip of the continent and the sea level between Java and Bali was significantly lower, if any. In addition, there is evidence of the development of this species ancient man other islands in Indonesia.
And the most reliable ancient evidence of the development of Homo sapiens, by Homo sapiens, of the Lesser Sunda Islands - silicon tools, which are about 130 thousand years old, found by archaeologists in East Timor, others, from the bones of elephants extinct here, they are at least 100 thousand years old - on the island of Flores. Migration to the Indonesian islands from Southeast Asia began about 40 thousand years ago. Linguists, based on the linguistic analysis of 68 languages \u200b\u200bof the archipelago, believe that the main wave of migration of the tribes of the Austronesian group from New Guinea and Australia happened about 5000 years ago.
At the same time, domestic animals appear on the islands - goats, pigs, dogs, and later - buffaloes. About 2000 years ago, merchants from China and India reached Timor for the first time. They were primarily interested in white sandalwood, a local endemic, and, of course, spices. They also delivered these goods to the countries of the Middle East and Egypt. Bronze drums (Dongzhong culture) from the Indochina Peninsula, 1st century BC e. - I century, were discovered on the islands of Sumbawa and Roti. In Bali, the first state formations (kingdoms) appeared in the 10th century. In the XIII century. Islam comes here, most likely with Arab merchants. In the XII-XIV centuries. the Islamic kingdoms of Java and Sumatra have repeatedly presented their claims to the islands, but, as a rule, these claims remained unfounded: the rulers did not have enough strength to conquer. The communal ancient way of life on the islands with rituals of worship of the spirits of the mountains, underground forces has survived to this day, and Islam is not at all an obstacle to this, like Catholicism and Protestantism, brought by Europeans in the 16th-17th centuries, and other religions.
In 1522 the ships of Magellan moored to Timor (Magellan himself was killed a year earlier on the Philippine island of Mactan), and in 1610 the Dutch appeared there (the Dutch East India Company). They failed to build a real colony, and they acted on the principle of "divide and rule", supporting one or another local king, and their main interests were in commerce, because of the primacy in which they competed with each other. In 1816 Indonesia entered the Dutch colonies under the name of the Netherlands East Indies. During World War II, in 1942, Japan occupied Indonesia. On August 17, 1945, one of the founders of the Indonesian National Party, Sukarno, proclaimed the independence of Indonesia, and himself - its president. After that, the wars of the Sukarno army began, first with the British, and then with the Dutch troops. The Indonesians won. In 1949, the UN recognized the independence of Indonesia.
The main product produced on the islands is rice (primarily in Bali and Lombok). By the middle of the XX century. the soil of rice plantations began to deplete, and in agriculture, coffee came to the fore, plantations of vanilla, cloves, citrus fruits and exotic flowers expanded. Further development The Lesser Sunda Islands is primarily associated with tourism and has become an economic priority since the 1970s. how tourist site Bali is in the lead. But something interesting can be found on all the islands of the archipelago. And no one will pass the Komodo Islands, where you can watch a huge monitor lizard - the "Komodo dragon". Lizards of this species also live on other islands - Flores, Rincha, Jili Motang.
FUN FACTS
■ In 2003 on about. Flores, the remains of the skeleton of a miniature go-minid species were found, about 1 m in height and with a brain volume of about 400 cm3, which is three times smaller than the brain modern man... This species was called the Man of Flores, although witches immediately stuck the nickname "The Hobbit" to it. It is assumed that this species appeared about 95 thousand years ago, and became extinct about 12 thousand years ago due to a volcanic eruption.
■ There are about 230 holidays in Bali, and almost every one of them hosts ceremonial processions symbolizing reverence for the gods of the invisible world: if you forget about them, misfortunes will begin in the visible world. The processions are always very colorful, thanks also to the colorful umbrellas, which are extremely popular in Bali. Women carry baskets with gifts to the gods on their heads. And since they do this from an early age, they all have excellent posture as one.
■ According to the legends of the Flores Island, the three colored lakes of the Kalimuto volcano are colored for a reason: one lake, dark red, absorbs the dark souls of sorcerers, the second, also red, but lighter, - the souls of sinners; in the waters of the third, most beautiful color - azure, the souls of the innocent - babies and virgins - rest. Souls are constantly worried, so the lakes change the shades of their colors.
ATTRACTIONS
■ O. Timor: Kupang (colonial architecture), Taman Visata Kamplong Nature Reserve.
■ O. Bali: temple complex Pura Besakih (Mother's Temple) on the slope sacred mountain Agung, Taman Ayun - the main temple of the Mengwi kingdom, the Pura Ulun Danu temple on Lake Bratan, the Tanah Loh temple, the Uluwatu temple, where the Kecak dance performance takes place, Goa Gad-ja - the temple “in the mouth of a demon”, the Brahma Vshara ashram Buddhist monastery, Botanical garden in the Batur volcano caldera, Klungkung Royal House, Git-Git waterfall, Kavi volcano, Bali Museum, Arts Center.
■ O. Lombok: Chakranegara - Hindu temple Pura Meru, temple of three religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam) Pura Lingsar, Ampenan - Maritime Museum, Mayura Park. Royal garden Narmada, Rinjani volcano, Otokokok waterfall.
■ O. Sumbawa: Bima - Sultan's Palace (collection of crowns and daggers decorated with precious stones), Subava-Besar - royal Palace on stilts, Tambora volcano, National park Mauo.
■ O. Flores: three lakes of the cooled volcano Kelimutu, Larantuca - a Portuguese port on the nearby island of Salor.
■ O. Komodo - excursions to the habitats of the Komodo monitor lizard, which grows up to 3 m in length,
■ O. Sumba: megalithic monuments near the villages of Tarung, Pasunga, Sodan and in the vicinity of the city of Waikabubak.
Atlas. The whole world is in your hands № 155
The chain stretching east of the Indonesian island of Java is home to unique plants and animals. So, in the dense forests covering the territory of the islands, Rafflesia Arnoldi grows - the largest flower in the world, the diameter of which reaches 1 m, and the weight is more than 10 kg. It is interesting that this plant does not have roots, stem and leaves as such: it all consists of a giant flower that exudes a disgusting smell of rotten meat.
There is another unusual plant called hovenia sweet, or candy tree. Its fruits - nondescript dry balls - are inedible, but their thick stalks contain up to 50% sucrose and taste like raisins soaked in rum.
The island of Komodo, also part of the system, is inhabited by terrible monsters, in their own way appearance very similar to prehistoric dinosaurs. We are talking about giant reptiles - monitor lizards, which, at the behest of a Dutch pilot, the first of the Europeans to encounter them in 1911, are referred to as "the dragons of Komodo Island". The name is quite justified: monitor lizards reach a length of 3.5 m and weigh about 150 kg. The appetite of the bogeymen is brutal: their four-centimeter teeth allow them to easily tear meat into pieces, and then swallow them. There is a known case when a hungry monitor lizard ate half of a wild boar carcass. And once four dragons dealt with the corpse of a large deer in about an hour.
Inanimate nature also brings many miracles. What are they worth colorful lakes Keli Mutu, located on the island of Flores! The huge hollows of the Keli Lepembusu volcano were gradually filled with rainwater, and thus amazing reservoirs arose, each of which is characterized by a special color of water. The first lake - Tivoe Ata Polo (Lake of enchanted people) - is crimson-red, the second - Tivoe Noza Moeri Koo Fay (Lake of youths and maidens) - is dark green, and the waters of the third - Tivoe Ata Mboepoe - are distinguished by transparency and delicate malachite green color ... How did the water in lakes located at a distance of 10-15 m from each other acquire such a different color?
The fact is that the rocks that form the bottom and shores of the first lake contain a lot of iron. Dissolving in water, it reacts with atmospheric oxygen and forms iron oxide, which has a red-brown color. The lava, of which the basins of the other two lakes are composed, differs from the indicated one in chemical composition.
Of course, among local residents There are legends that explain the unusual color of the water in the Keli Mutu lakes in their own way. But no matter from which side one approaches this issue, the reservoirs will still not lose their uniqueness, being real natural phenomena.
Before you detailed map Western Small Sunda Islands with city names and settlements in Russian. Move the map by holding it with the left mouse button. You can move around the map by clicking on one of the four arrows in the upper left corner. You can change the scale by the scale on the right side of the map or by turning the mouse wheel.
In which country is the Western Lesser Sunda Islands
The Western Lesser Sunda Islands are located in Indonesia. It's wonderful beautiful place, with its own history and traditions. The coordinates of the Western Lesser Sunda Islands are north latitude and east longitude (show on large map).
Virtual walk
The figure of the "little man" above the scale will help to make virtual walk the cities of the Western Lesser Sunda Islands. By clicking and holding the left mouse button, drag it to any place on the map and you will go for a walk, while inscriptions with the approximate address of the area will appear in the upper left corner. Choose the direction of movement by clicking on the arrows in the center of the screen. The Satellite option at the top left allows you to see a relief image of the surface. In Map mode, you can get an in-depth view of the Western Lesser Sunda Islands' roads and main attractions.
The Sunda Islands represent an archipelago in Southeast Asia, between the Pacific and Indian Oceans. It is located between New Guinea and the Malay Peninsula. It includes large and many small islands, most of which belong to Indonesia. Kalimantan is the northern part of the island belonging to Malaysia. Part of the island belongs to the state of East Timor, a small part belongs to the state of Brunei. There are more than 3000 islands in the archipelago. The area of \u200b\u200bthe archipelago is 1.6 million km². The islands are divided into the Greater Sunda Islands and the Lesser Sunda Islands.
The Big ones include Sumatra, Java, Kalimantan, Sulawesi. The Lesser Sunda Islands are Bali, Barat Daya, Lombok, Sumbawa, Sawu, Timor, Flores. The area of \u200b\u200bthe Greater Sunda Islands is 1.5 million km², the area of \u200b\u200bthe Small Islands is 128 thousand km².
Basically, the territory of the islands is mountainous, its rather extensive lowlands in Sumatra and Kalimantan. The archipelago has more than 130 volcanoes and belongs to the zone of seismic activity. The South China and Arafura Seas wash the archipelago from the outside. Inside the archipelago there are inter-island seas - the Java, the Sulu, Sulawesi, Sava, Flores, Banda, Seram, Moluccan, Timor seas. Equatorial and marine tropical air dominates here, the temperature in January is + 24 ° С, in July + 32 ° С, constantly high humidity, a large amount of rainfall from 2000 to 3000 mm per year falls. Evergreen forests, with meeting shrouds. Vegetable and animal world rich and varied.
malay archipelago geographic
Greater Sunda Islands
The Great Sunda Islands (Ind. Kepulauan Sunda Besar, Sund. Kapuloan Sunda Gedé) are a group of islands within Indonesia. Together with the Lesser Sunda Islands, they form the Sunda Archipelago.
The Greater Sunda Islands represent the border between the Pacific Ocean (more precisely one of its seas, South China Sea) and the Indian Ocean. FROM with total area 1.5 million km² and a population of about 180 million inhabitants, the Greater Sunda Islands are the largest island group in the world (only Greenland is slightly larger in area).
The Greater Sunda Islands include Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, Bali and some others. In total, the Malay Archipelago has about 10,000 islands in the Sunda group. The Sunda Archipelago closes the tip of the main fire belt of the Eastern Hemisphere. Indonesia accounts for the most active part of this belt. There are 63 volcanoes here, of which 37 are active.
Notable is the sleeping volcano in the southeast of the island of Luzon, called Mayon ("beautiful"). Its height is 2462 m. Over the past 2 centuries, Mayon has erupted about 20 times.
The large number of victims is explained by the fact that the catastrophe happened exactly on the day when the believers gathered on the volcano for the sacrifice ceremony, performed once every 100 years.
The eruption of Tambora (2821 m) on the island of Sumbawa occurred in 1815. 3 years before this disaster, the volcano showed concern. On its slopes near the summit, numerous cracks formed, from which jets of hot gas hissed out. The gases in the Tambor volcanic channel exploded on April 5, 1815. The volcano had a height of 4 km, but the explosion tore off its top. Almost 100 kmі of rocks turned into fragments, and the height of the hill decreased by 1200 m. At the top of the cone, there was the widest caldera, the depth of which reached 700 m, and the width was 6 x 6.5 km. The roar of a monstrous force was heard within a radius of 1400 km - on Kalimantan, Java, Sulawesi, Timor and other islands.
The largest Sunda Islands are of considerable age. This is part of the landmass of Southeast Asia, largely completed by volcanoes.
Tremors periodically shake the island of Sumbawa, recalling the eruption in 1815 of the highest local volcano, Tam Bora, the geological structure of which is shown. The eruption of Tambora killed 92,000 people.
About 5 million years ago, almost all of these islands had land connections, however, when the level of the World Ocean rose significantly at the end of the Ice Age, the land areas immediately became isolated.
The Keli Mutu (Kelimutu) volcano has three craters, each containing a lake with colored water: one is blue, the other is scarlet, the third is milky white. The water in the first two acquired color due to the salts of copper and iron, and in the third - due to the work of sulfur bacteria.
Since then, volcanic processes have proceeded very rapidly, as a result of which many real volcanic islands have arisen in the vicinity of the former mainland land. Violent volcanism, typical of many islands from the Sunda group to this day, significantly affects the local relief, changing their outlines.
Sumba. Together with the Greater Sunda Islands (Sumatra, Java, Borneo), they make up the Malay Archipelago, which in turn is part of Indonesia, the world's largest island state. From the north, the islands are washed by the Flores Sea and the Banda Sea, from the south by the Timor Sea and other, smaller seas of the Indian Ocean. The eastern part of the largest island of the Lesser Sunda Islands, Timor, is occupied by the independent state of East Timor, which also includes several small islands off the coast.
History
Scientists date the beginning of the geological history of the Lesser Sunda Islands to the Paleocene (about 65.5 million years ago), when some of them appeared on the ocean surface as a result of volcanic processes in the earth's crust at the junction of the Australian and Pacific plates. Another part of the islands of the archipelago is of coral origin. Magma flows that "heated" the islands, born of underwater volcanoes, moved them to the close southern tip of the Eurasian plate. From the interaction of three plates, the islands received new geological metamorphoses, decreased or, on the contrary, increased in size, but finally decided on their location. This can be said about most of the islands of the archipelago, but not all. Flores Island, according to some geologists, was once part of the Australian Plate, although others believe that it is of volcanic origin, because it has a volcano, although it is inactive.
This volcano, Kelimutu (1639 m), has three crater lakes, periodically changing color, which is unusually beautiful, but this phenomenon has not yet found an unambiguous scientific explanation. The islands of Sumba, Timor and Babar are also considered the remnants of Australia. It should only be borne in mind that not a single geological theory of the origin of the Lesser Sunda Islands, with the exception of islands with a visible volcanic history, can be called universally recognized in the scientific world. Most of these theories arose quite recently - at the end of the 20th century. - and still need verification. There is also such a theory: part of the islands of the archipelago are fragments of the Eurasian plate. One way or another, but today the islands stand at the junction of the Eurasian and Australian plates and are part of the Sunda mountain arc, which has an outer and inner contour and is surrounded by deep oceanic depressions. This arc is considered part of the Himalayan fold system. The Wallace Line (named after the British geographer and biologist A.R. Wallace, who explored the islands and travels to Indonesia in 1854-1862) runs between the islands of Bali and Lombok - a biogeographic division between the natural systems of South Asia on the one hand and Australia and New Guinea - with another.
The Lesser Sunda Islands are part of an area of \u200b\u200btectonic activity called the Pacific belt (ring) of fire. In 1815, the Tambora volcano erupted on the island of Sumbawa, which is still considered the most powerful eruption in the world. Its consequences were felt even a year later - 1816 remained in the history of Europe and North America as a "year without summer": there were still clouds of volcanic dust from Tambora that reached these continents. By the time of the eruption, Tambor reached an altitude of 4300 m. Now this figure is 2821 m, but the volcano is active. And the most powerful active volcano of the Lesser Sunda Islands is Rinjani on the island of Lombok. In addition to Lombok and Sumbawa, of the large islands of the archipelago, the most famous island of the archipelago has significant volcanoes - Bali, on it there are two active volcanoes: Agung (3142 m) and Batur (1717 m).
The Lesser Sunda Islands is one of those places on Earth where the fusion of different cultures took place in an especially whimsical, although somewhat predictable.
It is believed that homo erectus (erectus man) entered Bali about 1 million years ago, through Sandaland (the Malacca Peninsula, the islands of Kalimantan, Java and Sumatra with adjacent islands). Now these parts of the land are located on the continental shelf of Asia, and during the ice age they were the southern tip of the continent and the sea level between Java and Bali was significantly lower, if at all. In addition, there is evidence of the development of this species of ancient man on other islands in Indonesia. And the most reliable ancient evidence of the development of Homo sapiens, by Homo sapiens, of the Lesser Sunda Islands - silicon tools, which are about 130 thousand years old, found by archaeologists in East Timor, others, from the bones of elephants extinct here, they are at least 100 thousand years old - on the island of Flores. Migration to the Indonesian islands from Southeast Asia began about 40 thousand years ago. Linguists, based on the linguistic analysis of 68 languages \u200b\u200bof the archipelago, believe that the main wave of migration of the tribes of the Austronesian group from New Guinea and Australia happened about 5000 years ago. At the same time, domestic animals appear on the islands - goats, pigs, dogs, and later - buffaloes. About 2000 years ago, merchants from China and India first reached Timor. They were primarily interested in white sandalwood, a local endemic, and, of course, spices. They also delivered these goods to the countries of the Middle East and Egypt. Bronze drums (Dongjong culture) from the Indochina Peninsula, 1st century. BC e. - I century, were discovered on the islands of Sumbawa and Roti. In Bali, the first state formations (kingdoms) appeared in the 10th century. In the XIII century. Islam comes here, most likely with Arab merchants. In the XII-XIV centuries. the Islamic kingdoms of Java and Sumatra have repeatedly presented their claims to the islands, but, as a rule, these claims remained unfounded: the rulers had little strength to conquer. The communal ancient way of life on the islands with rituals of worship of the spirits of the mountains, underground forces has survived to this day, and Islam is not at all an obstacle to this, like Catholicism, Protestantism, brought by Europeans in the 16th-17th centuries, and other religions.
In 1522, Magellan's ships landed on Timor (Magellan himself had been killed a year earlier on the Philippine island of Mactan), and in 1610 the Dutch appeared there (the Dutch East India Company). They failed to build a real colony, and they acted on the principle of "divide and rule", supporting one or another local king, and their main interests were in commerce, because of the primacy in which they competed with each other. In 1816 Indonesia entered the Dutch colonies under the name of the Netherlands East Indies. During World War II, in 1942, Japan occupied Indonesia. On August 17, 1945, one of the founders of the Indonesian National Party, Sukarno, proclaimed the independence of Indonesia, and himself - its president. After that, the wars of the Sukarno army began, first with the British, and then with the Dutch troops. The Indonesians won. In 1949, the UN recognized the independence of Indonesia.
The further development of the Lesser Sunda Islands is primarily associated with tourism, it has become an economic priority since the 1970s. Bali is in the lead as a tourist destination. But something interesting can be found on all the islands of the archipelago. And no one will pass the Komodo Island, where you can watch the huge monitor lizard - the "Komodo dragon". Lizards of this species also live on other islands - Flores, Rincha, Jili Motang.
general information
A group of islands in the Malay Archipelago of Indonesia... Together with the Greater Sunda Islands, they form the Sunda Archipelago.The Lesser Sunda Islands are an administrative region of the Republic of Indonesia.
Administrative divisions: Bali provinces, Western Lesser Sunda Islands (Nusa Tenggara Barat) and Eastern Lesser Sunda Islands (Nusa Tenggara Timor).
Administrative centers and largest cities:
Mataram on the island of Lombok (Nusa Tenggara Barat province), Kupang on the Timor island (Nusa Tenggara province of Timor), Denpasar on the Bali island.
Languages: Indonesian (Bahasa Indonesia, approved in 1945 as official, by origin - one of the Malay dialects), as well as 67 more languages \u200b\u200bbelonging to the Malay-Polynesian or Austronesian language family, in addition to the Malay-Creole language, Kupang Malay, which 200 thousand residents of the city of Kupang use it.
Ethnic composition: the most numerous ethnic groups are Balinese (Bali island, about 4 million people), Sasaki on Lombok island and Sumbawans on Sumbawa island, as well as Chinese, Indians, Pakistanis, Arabs, Japanese, Polynesians. The number of whites from Australia and Europe is small.
Religions: Islam (Sunni persuasion), Hinduism with a strong influence of Buddhism (Hindu-Bali) on the island of Bali, and part of the Sasaks on the island of Lombok adhere to it; Christianity: Catholicism (mainly on the island of Flores), Protestantism (mainly on the island of Timor), Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, animism, combined with official confessions.
Major airports: international airports Ngurah Ray (Denpasar, Bali Island), Eltari (Kupang, Timor Island), Bandara (Praia, Lombok Island).
Numbers
Total area: 87,000 km 2.Population: 12,000,000
Population density: 137.9 people / km 2.
The most high point: Rinjani volcano on Lombok island (3726 m).
Climate and weather
Subequatorial monsoon, relatively dry.
During the southeast monsoon emanating from the deserts of Australia, there is a dry season, it rains, but the moisture evaporates quickly.
Precipitation falls under the influence of the northwest monsoon, which prevails in the local latitudes from October to April.
Temperature on the coast all year round:
+27 - + 29 ° C.
Daily temperature fluctuations in lowlands: +24 - + 33 ° C.
Average annual rainfall: 1500-2000 mm.
Air humidity: 80-90% during the rainy season, 40-60% during the dry Australian monsoon.
sights
■ Timor island: Kupang (colonial architecture), Taman Visata Kamplong reserve.■ Bali island: temple complex Pura Besakih (Mother's temple) on the slope of the sacred mountain Agung, Taman Ayun - the main temple of the Mengwi kingdom, the Pura Ulun Danu temple on Lake Bratan, Tanah Lot temple, Uluwatu temple, where the kecak dance performance takes place, Goa Gaja - the temple "in mouth the demon ”, Buddhist monastery Brahma Vshara ashram, Botanical garden in the caldera of Batur volcano, Klungkung royal house, Git-Git waterfall, Kavi volcano, Bali Museum, Arts Center.
■ Lombok island: Chakranegara city - Pura Meru Hindu temple, Pura Lingsar temple of three religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam), Ampenan city - Maritime Museum, Mayura Park, Narmada Royal Garden, Rinjani volcano, Otokokok waterfall.
■ Sumbawa Island: the city of Bima - the Sultan's Palace (a collection of crowns and daggers, decorated with precious stones), the city of Subawa Besar - the royal palace on stilts, the Tambor volcano, Mauo National Park.
■ Flores Island: three lakes of the cooled volcano Kelimutu, the city of Larantuca - a Portuguese port on the nearby island of Salor.
■ Komodo island - excursions to the habitats of the Komodo monitor lizard, which grows up to 3 m in length.
■ Sumba Island: megalithic monuments near the villages of Tarung, Pasunga, Sodan and in the vicinity of the city of Waikabubak.
■ In 2003, the remains of a skeleton of a miniature hominid species were discovered on the island of Flores, about 1 m in height and with a brain volume of about 400 cm 3, which is three times smaller than the brain of a modern person. This species was called the Man of Flores, although witches immediately stuck the nickname "The Hobbit" to it. It is assumed that this species appeared about 95 thousand years ago, and became extinct about 12 thousand years ago due to a volcanic eruption.
■ There are about 230 holidays on the island of Bali, and on almost each of them there are ceremonial processions symbolizing respect for the gods of the invisible world: if you forget about them, misfortunes will begin in the visible world. The processions are always very colorful, thanks also to the colorful umbrellas, which are extremely popular in Bali. Women carry baskets with gifts to the gods on their heads. And since they do this from an early age, they all have excellent posture as one.
