Atap Bergonjong : From Minangkabau to Indonesia

Do you know the well-known restaurant in the entire of Indonesia? “Rumah Makan Padang” or Padang Restaurant. Everyone wherever you are, knows about it. Even in Yogyakarta, the first food I adore is Nasi Padang because I need to adopt first with Jogja’s cuisine. What a legend cuisine it is?

Unfortunately, this time I won’t tell about Padang Cuisine. I will tell you about the traditional architecture which is usually used at Nasi Padang Restaurant. That is “Atap Bergonjong”.

The special characteristics of Minang’s house is the spire roof like buffalo horn. There are several stories about the origins of Atap Bergonjong. The first story tells about the battle between Minang’s people as the landlord and newcomers who want to take control of Minang’s land. So, they made a battle of buffalo and the winner will be the landlord. In the end, Minang’s buffalo win the battle and the buffalo’s value has adopted to the Atap Bergonjong.

The second story tells about Iskandar Zulkarnain, who is the Minang’s ancestor. Then, the prow of Iskandar’s ship when he arrived at Minang Land is adopted to Atap Bergonjong. The third story, tells about the philosophy of arranged betel leaves. In Minang, betel leaf means the build of hospitality and used for traditional activities until know.

Then, where we can find the kind of that building?

Padang Restaurant…

No, I just kidding. Some of Padang Restaurants adopted Atap Bergonjong. But, If you wanna see the beauty of Atap Bergonjong, you can visited some famous building in West Sumatera. When I visited West Sumatera, I saw some iconic building with Atap Bergonjong, for example Minangkabau Airport, Pagaruyung Palace, Jam Gadang (Big Clock) and Grand Mosque of West Sumatra.

At the first time I arrived at West Sumatra, the first building with Atap Bergonjong’s was Minangkabau Airport. The Airport is like the other airport building, except the roof of course.

Pagaruyung Palace

From Pagaruyung Palace, I went to Bukit Tinggi. In Bukit Tinggi, I could see the most Iconic building, Jam Gadang. It was built in 1926 as a gift from Queen Wilhelmina, queen of the Netherlands. The internal mechanisms of the clock are twin to those in the Big Ben, London. So, Jam Gadang is Indonesia Big Ben version.

My friends in front of Jam Gadang

The last but not least is Grand Mosque of West Sumatra. It is located in Padang Utara and was built in 2007. This mosque doesn’t have dome, but the roof adopted Atap Bergonjong and full of Minangkabau carving.

Grand Mosque of West Sumatra with beautiful lighting at night

That’s all my story about Atap Bergonjong from West Sumatra. I hope, I can share another story about Indonesia. Thank youuuu….

Sources: Wikipedia.org, personal documentation.