Bandung visitors only there to shop
T. Sima Gunawan, Contributor, Bandung
Once called Parijs van Java, Bandung has various tourist attractions from rich arts and culture to beautiful panoramas. But for Jakartans who often visit the city, the main attractions of Bandung are its numerous fashion shops and food outlets.
Shopping and eating are indeed two things they like to do best. They are not interested in watching traditional Sundanese wayang golek (wooden puppet) shows or traditional music performances like angklung (bamboo instruments) recitals or kecapi (fiddler) and suling (flute) shows. They also do not really care about other things like Gedung Merdeka, the museum that keeps records of the 1955 Asia-Africa Conference, and the Museum of Geology, where important geological and archeological artifacts such as the remains of the ancient pre-human species Pithecanthropus erectus are on display.
The West Java capital of Bandung, which is 750 meters above sea level and is like a huge bowl surrounded by mountains, has long been a favorite place for Jakarta residents to unwind. And domestic tourists may come even more often now because of the opening of the Cipularang toll road in April following the last Asian-African Summit. From Jakarta it used to take at least three hours to ply the 180 kilometers to Bandung, but today, it takes only two hours. It is also easy to get there by train.
On weekends, many Jakartans drive to Bandung. Traffic jams are a common experience here, and many cars can been seen bearing "B" number plates, indicating that they belong to Jakartans. Shops, restaurants and hotels enjoy a thriving business.
"I like going to Bandung just to enjoy a different atmosphere," said a Jakarta resident who often spends her weekend at a Bandung hotel with her husband.
According to the West Java province's tourism office, the province annually attracts some 45 million visitors, mostly Indonesian, with estimated spending of Rp 9 trillion. Seventy- percent of the money goes to Bandung, which gains its biggest revenue from the tourism sector.
Being a great place to shop, Bandung is popular for its "factory outlets"; shops offering latest fashion clothes at very cheap prices. These shops can sell products at cheap prices because the items, including overruns and seconds on export garments, are brought directly from factories. But today, what is called an "FO" does not necessarily follow that concept, merely emphasizing that the clothes are trendy and low-priced. Items with international brands such as D&G, DKNY, Channel, Esprit and Gap are also available at bargain prices, even though they might be fake.
One of the great places to go shopping is Jl. Cihampelas. Scores of stores are found on both sides of the street, offering various kinds of fashionable clothes for children and adults alike. Prices are reasonable. For example, you can buy a tank top for just Rp 10,000, an "Esprit" T-shirt for Rp 40,000 or a pair of denim trousers for Rp 70,000. There are also a few street tailors who are ready to serve customers who find their newly bought trousers a tad too long.
Jl. Cihampelas experienced its heyday in 1980s as a jeans center. In the 1990s several factory outlets opened on the street, coinciding with the mushrooming of such shops in various other parts of the city.
In order to attract visitors, shop owners erect not only huge billboards but also giant dolls, like those of superhero characters Superman and Spiderman. Last year an old building dating back to 1917 with Dutch architecture was turned into a fashion house called Parijs van Java.
But the highlight of Jl. Cihampelas now is Cihampelas Walk, or CiWalk, a shopping attraction with an open-air concept that opened last year.
It covers a total of 3.5 hectares with only one third of the area used for buildings, including the main three-story shopping mall, while the rest is used for parks, pedestrian walkways and parking space. It has a total of 150 shops, including cafes, restaurants and a movie theater, a game zone and a children's playground. A combination of modern shopping malls and a green view, it allows visitors to stroll and have fun in the compound, enjoying a different atmosphere. You can find big old trees and can breathe fresh air that will make you forget for a while the busy traffic up the street.
The walking paths are named after streets in Western countries, such as Broadway, and various kinds of Western food are also offered in the many restaurants and cafes of Cihampelas Walk.
If you want to buy traditional cakes and snacks on Jl. Cihampelas, the best place to go is Karya Umbi, which produces various kinds of chips made from tubers like cassava, yams, potato, sweet potato and taro. The shop, which opened in 1965, also sells other traditional snacks like dodol (sweet cake) and sale pisang (banana cake).