South China Morning Post
In the daytime, though, the street is – and has been for hundreds of years – full of bustling shops, a thriving thoroughfare in a Chinatown dating back to Dutch colonial times. The grand opening of the new night market saw the always popular Kembang Jepun area packed with thousands of people checking out the dozens of food stalls open for business.“To differentiate from the old kya-kya market, the new market is a local government initiative and the food on offer is the halal version of Chinese cuisine.
“It goes to show how attitudes have changed within government circles when it comes to accommodating Chinese culture,” he said. “When we first put forward the idea of resurrecting Chinatown in 2003, there was a lot of opposition to it from the authorities. We presented it to the municipal council and it was shot down immediately,” said Istanto.
The new face of Kembang Jepun was presented to the city of Surabaya in 2003 on the 710th anniversary of the foundation of the city. The kya-kya project, Istanto claimed at the time, would quickly become a city icon due to plenty of media attention, endorsements from well-known people, and, more importantly, funding from the city’s 50 most prominent Indonesian Chinese businesspeople.