Replica's of Singapore most famous monuments such as the Fountain of Wealth mark one entrance to CitraLand - a planned city 15 miles west of downtown Surabaya. To many Indonesians, Singapore is a familiar destination for shopping, schooling and medical care and is known throughout the world for its first class infrastructure.
"In 2003, Ciputra began turning a parcel of land larger than six Central Parks into a Singapore simulacrum, now complete with residential and commercial areas, a university, eight schools, seven banks, a hospital, a church, a mosque, a golf course and an amusement park," reports Norimitsu Onishi.
Pushing a cart through a supermarket in CitraLand recently, Carol Isbandi, 31, said she and her husband moved here two years ago with their two sons after tiring of life in Surabaya.
"We just wanted to live in a place that's as clean as Singapore," she said, "and where everything is in order."
