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If you're traveling from Jakarta, I suggest you rent a car and drive (it's roughly 4-5 hrs drive from Jakarta). The vista along the way is picturesque as you'll be climbing up Puncak Pass to higher elevation passing pretty rolling hills of green tea plantations. Stop at the top of Puncak Pass and you'll find plenty of local restaurants that serve yummy food. It's a small city, so a weekend trip is plenty of time to enjoy Bandung and its surrounding areas.
Bandung is one of the exciting city in Indonesia besides Jakarta, cool place with lots of shopping, I always come to Bandung the destination to is : shopping and of course to the gazebo "Mang Udjo".
In the Dutch colonial period in the city of Bandung known as the "Paris Van Java" History tells us that the title given by the citizens of Dutch / European, especially British, French, Germany, Danish, Belgian etc. residing in Indonesia since the Dutch colonial era, and makes "Parijs van Java" as the center of their activities, ranging from political activities, intellectual, art, culture, and entertainment and recreation.
Bandung during the Dutch Colonial is famous as a shopping center and a place to display the latest fashions from Paris , in this way also often held performing arts any given night . Perhaps because of the atmosphere of Bandung that time very sparkling with ambiance to - Eropaannya , both day and night , so people call it Parijs van Java .European citizens "white people" who live in Bandung still retains the atmosphere of life in the midst of the indigenous people, either their home, lifestyle, diet and the way she dressed everyday.
Some Dutch heritage place until now the become "Icon" Bandung City .
I have a friend that married an Indonesian lady and often goes to Bandung when he goes to Indonesia...he says it's safe and has a near perfect climate and is safe. He does say the traffic is bad but not as bad as Jakarta.
I also heard that it was 'the near perfect climate', so it seemed very intriguing! However, the reality is that it's SLIGHTLY cooler than Jakarta, just ever so slightly. Bandung is still pretty damn hot, not much different from Jakarta.
The Postman - no, no Metro. It's a small city. It's safe for tourists though, I mean, as much as anywhere might be in Indonesia. Not better or worse.
It was about ten years ago, but I was thinking of teaching English in Indonesia, and researching various cities, I settled on Bandung. I liked that 'near perfect climate' I heard of, and it was relatively close to the big city of Jakarta as well, which seemed intruging. I brought all my stuff to Indonesia for this 'next adventure'. I think I lasted about 3 days in Bandung, and decided that it's an interesting enough place to visit briefly, but not interesting enough to stay and teach and make it into a home for awhile. I didn't find it all that different from any other city in Indonesia, except that other cities have more touristic qualities like Yogyakarta, etc.
In short, Bandung is A city in Java, but there are definitely more interesting cities or areas of Indonesia than Bandung. It's just the 'its slightly less hot than Jakarta' comments that Indonesians seem to really enjoy. To a non-Indonesian, it'll basically feel just as hot.
I think one of the things that surprised me most about Bandung was the fact that I was there in 2001 and they still left all the burned out chinese buildings and businesses standing, that had been attacked three years prior in 1998. I guess what shocked me about it is you'd think there would be enough embarrassment or shame in it to just leave them standing.
I don't think i saw debrises while there, the collection of Dutch colonial structures are interesting and abundance of mini art decos scattered around but that's about it, apart from that it's just another Indonesian city, typical scooter scenes and malls. There's an indoor themepark there but it was overly overrated by the locals and you can go out from the city for some trip to a lake nearby a volcanic crater.
all are said to be true in this comment .. 10 years ago I remember when I was a kid my age is approximately 8-9 years, I also felt Jakarta when it still does not look good, but the time has changed now JAKARTA being beautify themselves, but there is still hard to overcome ie "jam and flood" may have to wait 5-6 years will be free of jammed Jakarta.
Btw ... bandung very beautiful, but I prefer to go to the villages there to enjoy the natural coolness :
I also heard that it was 'the near perfect climate', so it seemed very intriguing! However, the reality is that it's SLIGHTLY cooler than Jakarta, just ever so slightly. Bandung is still pretty damn hot, not much different from Jakarta.
The Postman - no, no Metro. It's a small city. It's safe for tourists though, I mean, as much as anywhere might be in Indonesia. Not better or worse.
It was about ten years ago, but I was thinking of teaching English in Indonesia, and researching various cities, I settled on Bandung. I liked that 'near perfect climate' I heard of, and it was relatively close to the big city of Jakarta as well, which seemed intruging. I brought all my stuff to Indonesia for this 'next adventure'. I think I lasted about 3 days in Bandung, and decided that it's an interesting enough place to visit briefly, but not interesting enough to stay and teach and make it into a home for awhile. I didn't find it all that different from any other city in Indonesia, except that other cities have more touristic qualities like Yogyakarta, etc.
In short, Bandung is A city in Java, but there are definitely more interesting cities or areas of Indonesia than Bandung. It's just the 'its slightly less hot than Jakarta' comments that Indonesians seem to really enjoy. To a non-Indonesian, it'll basically feel just as hot.
I think one of the things that surprised me most about Bandung was the fact that I was there in 2001 and they still left all the burned out chinese buildings and businesses standing, that had been attacked three years prior in 1998. I guess what shocked me about it is you'd think there would be enough embarrassment or shame in it to just leave them standing.
Bandung is a city 2 million, so it can't be that small, average temperature 26-29 degree Celsius and even lower to 20 degree at night, so its not overly hot for us who is living on average 30-33 degree celcius on average, and even hotter in some days. After living in Malaysia for a while i found the temperature in Java just right, Malaysia is too hot imo and the haze of KL just seems to be neverending, even without smoke from Sumatra.
The reason why Postman seems to be so curious of Bandung is because he's partially Malaysian who spent a lot of time in Malaysia. Malaysians seem to can't get enough of Bandung for some reason, lots of them loves the shopping part since Bandung is the textile capital of Indonesia and there's lots of cheap fabric at good quality. Your visit in 10 years ago seems to see Bandung before its boom, today it doesn't have that small city feeling anymore and traffic is terrible. The reason why it feels small is because of the short buildings and old buildings that dates back in the 1930s when Bandung it was just a town of 100,000 - 200,000 people, but of course its changing rapidly today. Glimmering malls, hotels and highrises apartments spots the cityscape.
Jakartans travel a lot to Bandung, for the lower temperature reason, cafe sceneries and food, also the gorgeous hills, mountains and plantation surrounding Bandung. But i agree Bandung is probably less interesting than some other Indonesian cities in Java, but as the center of Sundanese culture it does have some quality and plus the Dutch colonial history of the city. Lots of Dutch can trace their ancestry in Bandung, so for them its interesting. While the French built their villas in Dalat, the Dutch built their villas in Bandung and Malang, basically Bandung was a resort town due to the climate and plantation, and that particular reputation still survives today.
As for safety, its safe on average of Indonesian cities indeed, but some areas are infested with motorcycle gangs and petty crimes are quiet common due to its large population.
And yes even the capital didn't have metro so other cities doesn't have it, but there's transbandung bus (which is similar to transjakarta) for people to get around with, with less route however.
It's 3 years after the crisis when you visited the city, so the still debriese left in ruins and the economy back then was basically stagnant and buildings were not encouraged at all, but those debris are now changed into blocks of buildings. But areas in Jakarta seems to be greatly affected by the riot until today, like Kota area which used to be a major commercial centers and now is just empty rows of buildings.
From my experience is pretty safe. But i also heard about motorcycle gangs there, about 2 years ago it became a hot topics in Indonesian medias like Tempo, Detik, Kaskus, Kompas etc. Nowadays the gangs are almost unheard though. Perfect climate also. Perfect daytime warmth (27-28C) and cool nights (17-19C).
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.. 10 years ago I remember when I was a kid my age is approximately 8-9 years, I also felt Jakarta when it still does not look good, but the time has changed now JAKARTA being beautify themselves, but there is still hard to overcome ie "jam and flood" may have to wait 5-6 years will be free of jammed Jakarta. 
