JAKARTA

1. Hotel
I stayed at the Four Seasons, which was super-expensive but very nice! :-) One of my friends was there recently and she stayed at Crowne Plaza which she said was pretty good. It's also close to the highway to the airport, so should be quite OK. The shopping areas are quite spread out, so no really good place to stay. Better to stay at a more central area, so that easy to go out for makan and to move around, I think. A cheaper hotel that some of my colleagues have mentioned is Ibis, but I don't know the location, sorry.

2. Shopping:
I think many people like to go to WTC Mangga Dua, to buy all sorts of stuff, like Handbags, cheap baju, etc. It's like Sungai Wang, but 10 times bigger and 10 times more crowded! It's quite far out and traffic getting there is quite bad (esp on a Saturday afternoon), so it's worth it only if you REALLY want to do and see the place.
Another place that people always talk about if they want to buy kain/material is Majestic (Mayestik), I don't know where that is, but seems like that's the best place to buy materials.
If you want to buy/just look at Indonesian handicrafts, the best place to go to is Pasaraya. It's got an amazing collection of Indonesian products on the 5th floor, really a nice way to spend an afternoon....it's also very peaceful and relaxed...!! The other floors are like normal malls, so you may find something nice or a bargain there as well.
The shopping malls are pretty OK, but mostly expensive. Plaza Indonesia and Plaza Senayan are the most posh, and most likely you wont want to pay to buy anything there...!! Plaza Semanggi is a bit mid-range, and OK to spend a couple of hours just jalan-jalan... The malls are open until around 9-10pm, so if you have nothing to do in the evening, then can go there. Another place is Jalan Surabaya, which is just one street of antiques (and "fake antiques")...nice to walk around and look at the stuff, but can get hot in the afternoon.

3. Makan
I would be careful about eating things on the street...generally it's OK (and I've eaten at some really dirty-looking stalls), but I would only do that if someone local, like my colleague, takes me there. One place I'd definitely recommend is Salero Jumbo for Nasi Padang. It's very good and authentic Indonesian food...the place is behind BII bank at the back of Jalan Thamrin. Usually the hotel will know.
Another place you should try is Bakmi GM, which is all sorts of rice and noodles, Chinese/Indonesian style. Some of it is pork, but mostly chicken - the ayam cabai hijau is good, and the chicken with mushroom (can't remember it's name). They have a few branches around, so if you ask the local people they should be able to tell you.
If you're really adventurous, on your way to Pasaraya, you can try to find this place called Soto Kudus...it's in a nice building, and clean. They make a special kind of Soto Ayam, where the rice is in the soup. Pretty good!!
The hotel food (room service) should be pretty affordable as well, not cheap, but not that expensive either, so you might want room service one of the nights...and there is also Secret Recipe in Plaza Indonesia, and all the other usual food chains. There is a good Indian restaurant called Ganesha in the BRI building quite near your hotel as well, a taxi should know how to take you there, or check with the hotel. But not sure how expensive it is, coz I never paid the bill-la :-)

4. Cultural
The museums and all are quite poorly taken care of, and there's nothing really that is a "must-see"...you might want to take a walk around the Monas park...especially on a weekend, you will see a lot of locals out with their families, so that's quite a nice thing to do. The National Museum (locals refer to it as the Muzium Gajah coz there's an elephant statue outside) is very nice with a lot of things that we can identify with, from Indonesia's Hindu past, and it also shows all the different types of Indonesian people and culture...but it closes at 1pm or sthng funny like that, so make sure you go early. we couldnt see the upstairs coz we were too late.

5. Getting Around
It might be worth asking at the hotel about renting a taxi/car for the day and have the driver take you around, prob works out cheaper and more convenient for moving about the city. ONLY use blue bird or silver bird taxis. They are safe and reliable. Silver bird is the luxury taxi but it's not that expensive. You should use this when you're coming into town from the airport. (Make sure they don't offer you Golden Bird, coz that's SUPER expensive).
It's quite easy to hail a cab here and there, and if you're in a group, quite safe. Just make sure it's BlueBird, coz there are some copies which look similar!
Another option you may want to consider is using the BusWay...it's safe, cheap and convenient, but a bit crowded. Depending on where you want to go, it's an easy way to get out of all the horrible Jakarta traffic. Ask at the hotel each time, whether you can use the Busway to get there...they will try to discourage you, but I've used it a few times and it's totally fine...like LRT but in a bus! :-)