Surabaya

Our next Indonesian stop was Surabaya, the country’s second largest city after Jakarta. After many stops exploring temples, rainforests, and various UNESCO world heritage sites our destination this day was…a mall. There were a few reasons for this. After looking for a while we didn’t see anything reachable that screamed “must see.” Even our cabin attendant, Akhmad, who is from Surabaya, described it as “just a big city.” Of course locals can get blasé about things in their hometown. And if you want to mingle with the locals you’re more likely to find them at a mall in the city center than at a temple. Plus the ship’s shuttle was running there, so transport was easy.

Off to the mall we went. Unfortunately it was only three of us as Thomas was under the weather with a stomach bug. To describe this place as a mall is to do it a disservice. It was more like a neighborhood under a roof. It’s nine stories tall, sprawls in four directions, and includes hotels, restaurants, medical services, grocery stores, plus all the usual mall shops and department stores. DJ wanted to do an exhaustive exploration of the place, but after walking a couple of floors we decided that was just not reasonable. We did make a couple of purchases, including a final gift for folks back home.

There was one other thing we wanted to do, which our friends Mike and Sarah had told us about. Close to the mall is a coffee bar inside an old passenger plane. It was indeed close by, but we had to figure out how to get across the busy street. We found an overpass and got over and to Javaroma, as it’s called. It’s an old 737 with the inside done up like a 70’s first class lounge. We actually ran in to Mike and Sarah coming out as we got there, so we chatted with them a bit. Then we went in and ordered some drinks and pastries and took it all in. It was very cool. We debated about the wisdom of ordering iced drinks, but went ahead as I just couldn't face a hot coffee in the sweltering heat. It was air conditioned inside, but the walk over in the steamy weather had me sweating freely.

We had an early departure time out of Surabaya, so after our refreshment stop we walked back over to the mall to catch the shuttle back to the port. Just based on our views from the bus, the city looked very lively, green, and interesting. I do think one could find plenty to do there given more time.Read more