Travel Blog: Surabaya - Not the Same as Bali

January 31

After seemingly dodging hundreds of cargo ships of all types and sizes to get there, we arrived in the port of Surabaya bright and early - well, maybe not bright, but at least it wasn't raining!

And the first thing we noticed was this gigantic statue standing over the naval base.

Rather than memorializing a past naval hero, it is a depiction of a naval officer in ceremonial dress looking out to the sea. It is apparently meant to convey the preparedness of the Indonesian Navy for any situation. The Jalesveva Jayamahe Monument represents the optimism of future generations to accomplish the Indonesian dream. It was built in the 1990s and also serves as a lighthouse.

We started off on our tour, City Sights and Flavours, which was an overview of the city with lunch included.

The Dutch East India Company colonized Indonesia in the 17th Century and ruled the country for over 350 years. Surabaya, the major city in East Java, was a main trading and administrative post even then, so a lot of the architecture in the old central area reflects the Dutch influence. But even among these buildings we passed a Chinese temple that is apparently over 100 years old.

As I mentioned in the Bali post, the overwhelming majority of Indonesians are Muslim, and the differences between these cultures was quite apparent as we rode through the city. We passed the Al-Ishlah Mosque, very large and ornate. Seeing one building that would house a couple of thousand worshippers was very different than on Bali where practically every building had its own temple.

Our first actual stop was at Kenjeran Park. As we entered it struck us that it looked like an amusement park of sorts, so we were somewhat confused that we were visiting a very large Chinese temple here. It is a large area that does in fact contain 'Atlantisland Amusement Park', and with buildings and eating areas that used to contain small restaurants, food stalls and shops beside a good sized tree-filled park, it would be similar to Toronto's Centre Island, but very much larger. I say it used to contain restaurants because it now looks very rundown. Our guide explained that the COVID restrictions caused many of these shops to shut down, and there has not been any incentive since then to bring the park back.

The Sanggar Agung Chinese Temple was built by a single family as a place of worship for Tridharma followers: Buddhists, Confucianists and Taoists, as there was no temple available to them in this area.

As we came into the courtyard, we were welcomed by a trio of dancers and some dragons. I don't know if there is any significance to these dances or if they are just for the tourists. The temple has become a destination to see the Guan Yin statue at the waterfront.

The temple itself is large and contains a number of altars, each with a number indicating the order in which a worshipper should pray. Each altar is dedicated to a different deity of the Tridharma followers. Most impressive were the huge candles that are lit when someone dies. These candles, which will burn for 5 to 6 months, symbolize lighting the way to the afterlife, and also a connection between the living and the dead through the candle's flame.

Once we had seen the inside of the temple, we were guided out to the courtyard to view the Guan Yin statue. The Guan Yin is the large figure on the top. She is accompanied by bodyguards, the four God Kings who protect the four corners of the world, and a pair of heavenly dragons. Guan Yin is a Buddhist deity who has 'miraculous powers to assist all those who pray to her'....sound familiar???

That bird in front is a Barn Owl. There was a guy
offering to pose the owl with tourists for money. I
didn't even realize he was in the photo.

When we were done at the gate, we walked back through the temple and across to the Phra Phrom to see the largest Four-Faced Buddha, or Maha Brahma in Indonesia. People will pray to one or another for particular reasons: 1- health and power, 2- freedom from negativity, 3- for positive things, and 4- for knowledge

Yes, and even a cat or two...this one
was near the Buddha

After this we headed back to the bus and drove to our lunch venue, the Hotel Majapahit. This hotel has quite a history, and we were given a tour before sitting down to the buffet lunch. It was built in 1911 by a Dutch family and was the place to go for members of the Dutch ruling class. The Japanese used the hotel as their headquarters during their occupation from 1942 to 1945, and after Indonesian independence it reverted to being a hotel, managed by the next generation of the original family. It has been owned by a couple of hotel companies since then, and is now an Accor M Gallery hotel.

It is a beautiful hotel. The Presidential Suite is enormous and only used for dignitaries. Even Charlie Chaplin stayed here in the 1930s when the Art Deco lobby extension (photo above) was opened. They do make a big thing about him staying in Room 47 - I wonder if it is still used, or if you have to pay a premium for it.

After our lunch, which was quite delicious but impossible to photograph, we stopped at the Heroes Monument. This is a park dedicated to those who died in the Battle of Surabaya in November 1945, not long after Indonesian independence was claimed from the Japanese after their surrender in World War II. The Dutch wanted to reassert their control over the country but there was a huge resistance here and many Indonesians were killed . November 10 is now celebrated annually as Heroes' Day.