VERY early in the morning I touched down on Jogyas Adiscipto Airport, flying low over a muddy grey river and velvety soft green creases in the earth, both phenomena caused by the citys major nemesis, Mount Merapi, which towers over the whole region to the north.

Geophysically, Indonesia is extraordinarily complex, the only region on earth where so many different tectonic platesdivergent, convergent, and slidinginteract. All along this 4,200-kilom