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Blogs from Shanghai, China, Asia - page 252
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March 11th 2006
SOUTH AFRICA 3 ----------- austraila 2 Love it, love it. Let me see, Shanghai. 14 million people, big buildings and wide streets. It has it all, but to be honest it did not live up to its hype in my opinion. It still has a long way to go for it to be up there with New York, London, Milan, HK and the rest of them. It certainly is a fascinating combination of old and new with brand spanking new BMW's taking over dilapidated bicycles on the city streets. One of the coolest things is that at most bus stops they have TV's built into the timetable area where they usually are showing sport. I liked that. We stayed in the Captain Hostel, once again the LP map was off and we wondered around in utter ... read more
March 9th 2006
Not too much to update. I have a headache today from the pollution, and it seems like everyone is sick from something. I just took the bus home from classes, and am really upset because there was a crazy old chinese man just outside the university gates who had a pet monkey on a chain. He dressed the monkey up as if he were in a circus in a vest and tall hat and it was the second time today I'd seen him and I was really trying to avoid him but he came up to my friends when we were waiting at the bus stop and I felt awful and so angry. My friend kelly already knows that those things really really disturb me and she was covering my eyes but he wouldn't go away. ... read more
March 8th 2006
Yes! we are back!! After Tibet we had lots of visitors, my brother Jose visited for 3 weeks, we went together to Beijing and Hong Kong... We never really had time to travel together so I was really excited and enjoyed every single day, especially the last day when we had a bottle of champagne together. After Jose came my friend Laureen and her daugher Emilia. They stayed for 2 weeks and we also had a great time, part of the experience included a US$4 but an hour long foot massage, getting surrounded by dozens of Chinese in a park when they heard Laureen was American (this is something like having super powers here) and a visit to the local Walmart (not your neighborhood supermarket in the US, here Walmart features live eel, all kinds of ... read more
March 5th 2006
Today was such a happy day. I was probably completely irresponsible last night and went out even though I was sick, and had another night where I didn't get home until around 4am. After going to Windows Tempo, we all went out to probably my favorite nightspot so far, Barbarrosa, which is a 4 or 5 story bar/lounge with a middle-eastern feel which is surrounded by a man-made lake. It's really a beautiful place & a nice atmosphere and it was all in all a really good night. We left there around 3:30 and were in the mood for dumplings & noodles, so we had a midnight snack at the dumpling place across the street from our apartments. I woke up this morning and was in a really good mood after having checked me email and ... read more
March 5th 2006
I'm not sure how to sum up my thoughts on Shanghai in a way that hasn't already been said by others. I just finished a history of Shanghai written by a woman named Stella Dong and in many ways, Shanghai has not really changed much since the days of it rule by foreign governments. It is still a commercial city at heart with people trying to make a living anyway they can. Until the communists took over (and maybe even after), Shanghai was a decadent city, filled with prostitutes, gambling, and any manner of vices for the foreigners just arriving off the boat and the Chinese arriving from the countryside to get sucked into. Today, it's the western tourists that are mobbed at every turn with sales pitches and mildly fleeced with the two or three-tiered ... read more
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March 4th 2006
Went to one of Shanghai's big antique markets today at Dongtai Lu. Most memorable was the Mao paraphanalia at nearly every stall (Mao posters, bags, watches, statues, plates, clocks, etc, and even lots of copies of Mao's little red book), and the few items of torture that we managed to find. In one of the last stalls we found something that looked like a metal glove with spikes all over it, and the guys we were with convinced me to put my hand in it. Pretty scary stuff! I also came away from there feeling really dirty, but was impressed by how much the antique markets here reflect Chinese culture, all the way from ancient times until pretty recently, at least until the Cultural Revolution. I'm not sure what or how much Mao paraphanalia I'm going ... read more
March 2nd 2006
I've been in Shanghai for nearly 24 hours and I was correct in assuming that it would be a good place to start my second trip to China. Generally, getting around is easy and I haven't had to much problem find inexpensive and filling food. I arrived yesterday afternoon (March 1st) about 3 in the afternoon, got myself through customs, found someone to ask directions for the Maglev train and caught it to Shanghai. Now, this Maglev is pretty cool...we were travelling at 430 kph at it's fastest and it got me near Shanghai in just a few minutes. It was expensive by China standards, but it was worth the price. I then transfered to the metro carrying my huge backpack and then, carefully following the directions, I made my way to the Hiker Youth Hostel. ... read more
March 2nd 2006
A very incomplete list: NEW LOVES: 1. ~Street Food~ My favorite part of the day now just may be lunchtime, when we take the bus to East China Normal University campus in enough time to partake in the wonders of cheap, cheap, cheap & greasy Chinese food that's sold on the street. I'll have to admit that my first day I was a little timid and stuck with what I know, chao mian (stir-fried noodles) for 3 kuai (If 8 kuai is a dollar, that's less than 50 cents). Yesterday I went with the recommendations & had a Chinese-version of a burrito?, which was basically a crepe with egg and some greens and something brown that is supposedly bean curd sauce, for 2 kuai. It was incredible! Today I had a most interesting lunch of a ... read more
February 27th 2006
So this is coming a couple of days after the fact. On the way home from our first day of the Scavenger Hunt all around Shanghai, I was riding back on the super-crowded Metro. When I turned around to look at my bag, I realized it was completely unzipped, which I thought was weird. I started looking through it and then basically started hyper-ventilating because my wallet wasn't there. After checking it again and again to make sure, it was pretty clear that I had been pickpocketed. So sucky because I lost all of my credit cards & my ATM card & drivers liscence & health insurance card, etc, all of the things you make sure you have before traveling in a foreign country. And it was also so sad because god knows what I keep ... read more
February 26th 2006
I decided to upload all my pictures to Dante and link them here. It's a lot quicker. ... read more
