The Giant Mosque and its Large “Terrace”

Grand Mosque of Bandung
photograph by Ikhlasul Amal

In 2006, the last renovation of the grand mosque of the city completed.  “Grand mosque” of Bandung became “giant mosque” of Bandung. Two hyper-scale minareth added to the compound, and the extension of the entrance took almost quarter of alun-alun. Whole picturesque of the giant mosque doesn’t fit the human-eye view. The two minareth whipped down the scale of the old compound and dwarfed other surrounding buildings, beside also give a new skyline. It is now attached directly to alun-alun, with its front extension stands on a former western-street that enclosed alun-alun. As a result, there are some spaces: corners or just paved surfaces that became negative-unused space, due to its orientation to Mekkah. The orientation was never before a problem, because it was stand on as a separate entity from alun-alun, with the street as adjustment buffer. Old Swarha building which stands next to it on the north is a witness to the street take-over and the land expansion by the new giant. Once a prestigious commercial centre on the area, it is now an abandon heritage-tagged building with wide ineffective space on one side, a former part of the same street that had been taken over.

Undeniable, the new grand mosque has become a new landmark in the city; a new spectacle to see and a new commodity for tourism with its two minareth. But to alun-alun, the compound and further to the city, its last chosen face has also cause space enslavement and questionable meanings, as well as the late social problem in the surrounding because of negative spaces around and its influence to alun-alun as social urban space.

As a complete fabrication, casting a magical spell like the camera obscura, it set itself up as an authentic experience and covered all the contradictory of reality it failed to include. This was the art of spectacle, the city space and urban compositions that the visual image controlled.~Christine M. Boyer~

Alun-alun now is a terrace, a front yard of the mosque. It is no longer a large open ground, as the increasing capacity of the mosque has made the city municipal to add a parking ground as basement of alun-alun. It is now practically a green roof to mosque’s parking ground, that by chance still bear the name alun-alun.

Sometimes, all that remain of the past is a name – it becomes a connective space, the passage to other experiences.
~Christine M. Boyer~  

Alun-alun from above
photograph by Yusuf Maulana

"Front yard" of the grand mosque
personal collection

It is now a paved roof garden, with a big permanent fountain inherited from the time of new order - placed in the ‘middle’, which seems barely functioned in a year. Several wide flower benches placed in grids, as hard permanent furniture providing seats. There are stairs on corners lead to parking ground in the basement, and two openings for vehicles to enter the basement. More stairs added to it on three sides of it, lift it from the pedestal with double enclosure fences around. Black light poles with white glass covering the bulbs added to the grid, for ‘security’ and social reasons. Only several trees survived today, lines on the pedestal in two sides of alun-alun: one along Jl. Dalem Kaum and the other facing former Palaguna building on Jl. Alun-alun Timur on the east.

The newly decorated alun-alun is now only used during several mosque’s events like annual Aid’l Fitr morning prayer. It is barely visited by locals and tourists, no longer place for upacara bendera, neither for festivals. Peddlers gather all around the enclosures, where people come and use the pedestal as their social urban space. Thus it makes the enclosures a place for stop by, eat and chat; serves like terraces and expand the commercial area next by. These pedestals around alun-alun, especially one side on Jl. Dalem Kaum are now places for people; spaces open and free that serves like public space. But since it swarmed by “unpermitted” peddlers who occupied the pedestal and practically “gathering mass”; it contributes cause for traffic jam, takes the space provided for pedestrians, and sometimes becomes a place potential for drug dealers and pickpockets. Thus, the municipality consider it a problem, together with many other pedestal with peddlers and people; despite the fact that those peddlers are usually have their “given permit” by some particular municipal officers.  Alun-alun Bandung today only left a name to this space. It is a romantic name with memories and myths on people’s mind; a name that bears stories and history.