Design
Located in Central Jakart,a the Monas towers 132 metres high at the center of Merdeka Square. The following are the dimensions of the Monas:
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Base – height: 17 meters
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Museum – height: 8 meters; 80 meters x 80 meters
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Obelisk – height: 117.7 meters
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Goblet – height: 3 meters
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Flame of Independence – height: 14 meters; diameter: 6 meters
Lingga & Yoni
Independence Date
Just like the Taoist concept of the Yin and Yang, Hinduism - a major religion in ancient Indonesia - has the Lingga and Yoni. Such concepts are embedded in the Monas. The Lingga resembles an alu rice pestle and the Yoni represents a lesung rice mortar, two important traditional Indonesian farming tools, a nod to Indonesia’s agricultural sector. The Lingga, a symbol associated with Shiva, one of the three main gods of Hinudism, represents masculinity, positive elements, and daytime. The Yoni, on the other hand, a symbol of the sacred passage or temple, represents femininity, negative elements, and night time.Put together, the Lingga and Yoni symbolizes harmony, balance, fertility and eternal life.
In the Monas, the obelisk represents the rice pestle (Lingga), while the goblet represents the rice mortar (Yoni).
Soedarsono designed the monument to have several special dimensions. The cup-shaped base of the Monas is 17 meters high and contains a museum 8 meters high, while the courtyard in front of the monument is 45 m x 45 m. There are also 17 steps to the to monument's entrance and its tunnel is 45 meters long. The surrounding fence even has 1,945 pillars.
These numbers are associated with the date of the Indonesian Independence - 17 August, 1945. The date is so ingrained that in the past, it was said that the monument's opening hours were from 8.00 to 17.00 (8.00 a.m. to 5.00 p.m.)!
