Surabaya

The second largest city in Indonesia. You can definitely tell the differences in size though, it's a obviously a smaller city than Jakarta. Surabaya is nice, good-size city, just don't expect to see high rises like in Seattle or Atlanta. You are not going to see that here. There are some skyscrapers off course, even The World Trade Center is here in Surabaya, but you just don't have that downtown area like in Seattle, Atlanta, Boston, or say... Houston.
It's a more down-to-earth town, relaxing and subtle.

If you've been to LA and Seattle, you get the same feeling, LA is like Jakarta and Surabaya is like Seattle. LA is hectic and the traffic is stressful, but you can get anything since it's quite a Metropolitan, Seattle is obviously less stressful, not as crowded, and you still can get some of the stuff you can get in LA. In Surabaya most people speak with THICK East-Javanese accent, and they are well-known for their distinctively loud and at times harsh uses of the Javanese language, totally different from their Central-Javanese counterparts who are more soft, delicate, and well-mannered.

Surabaya offers great food selections and contradictary to the national stereotypes, although they're Javanese, they like HOT food and HOT chillie sauce, off course they also like sweet stuff. Some of their famous specialities are : Rujak Cingur, Bebek Goreng, Bakwan, and off course the world-famous Kue Lapis Surabaya. Surabaya also offers numerous malls and not too exciting night life. However, it has its own charms.

Not to forget, however, that Surabaya has the largest red-district area in a single compounded area in Asia , not too many people know this because it's not highly publized and marketed like Thailand, and it's like a public-secret, obviously the government and the society condone it but they know it's there and it's there to stay. Not even people from other parts of Indonesia know this fact.

It's okay to spend 2-3 days there, just to experience the city and to get away from the crowded, poluted Jakarta, but once you try all the local food and restaurants, visit some friends and relatives, not too exciting night life and the generic malls, it gets really boring. In this respect, Bandung in West Java is a much more exciting city.