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Published: August 13th 2008
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Hong Mei Jie
A nice little pedestrian street filled with restaurants and cafes. Breakfast is the meal that is supposed to start your day off right. But I have to admit that we were all getting a bit tired of the leftovers from Ying Chen’s dinner, delicious though they were. This morning we started our day off with leftover salad and scrambled eggs with toast. (Later in the day we invented our own oddball expat cuisine - bow-tie pasta with canned peas, salty Chinese pickles, tomato sauce, and brie. It wasn’t bad, actually, though might have been better with some bits of salami.)
We headed to Hong Mei Jie, a pedestrian street about 5 minutes away by taxi. It proclaims itself a pedestrian street, but I’m not sure I would call it that. True, there are no cars, but bicycles and mopeds make their presence known. In fact, I saw a man drive his moped out the front door of a bar!!
We ate lunch at the Blue Frog, which has several restaurants in Shanghai. MT and I shared a yummy, but huge, steak fajita salad and delicious almond chicken wrap. We were there so MT could meet with Lucy, an Australian OT who worked in Shanghai until the birth of her
tiny son. She was very nice and had a lot of information for MT who is looking into her options regarding working here. With her new OT degree, a specialty not licensed here in China, MT is not sure whether she wants to work with an organization, start her own clinic (J’s idea), or just study Chinese and work on some OT projects on the side.
Leaving MT and Lucy to talk some more, I gathered E and T’s hands and we bravely headed out into the hot summer day. We wandered back down the pedestrian lane until we reached a real street, which would have to be crossed to reach our destination. This was the first time I was solely responsible for the safe crossing and I was intimidated for sure!
Crossing the street here, with its obvious dangers (cars refusing to stop!), on my own is one thing. I am perfectly willing to risk my own safety. But crossing with two little kids is much, much scarier! So I waited until I was almost completely sure it was safe, and we hurriedly crossed the street and walked into the Hongqiao Pearl and Craft Market.
I
Blue Frog, Shanghai
Yummy American styled food that the kids will happily eat. I had a happy tadpole kids' drink with coconut milk, grenadine and cranberry juice. let the kids direct our meanderings throughout the store. On the first floor were crafts, silks, watches, shoes and bags. The second floor heralded the pearl and jewelry stalls. We walked through tables filled with pearls, crystals, and other gems. People called out to us from every direction, but we just kept walking -- I wanted to see it all! I watched vendors making necklaces and stringing pearls. It was fascinating, for me, at least: the kids weren’t too impressed.
On the third floor, we found tailors with fabric draped attractively over their walls and mannequins displaying some finished products. There was one wool coat that I would have liked to inquire about….if I hadn’t been so hot that the thought of wearing a coat almost made me sick! There was a nice Persian carpet shop and some toy stalls as well. Then down we went again.
MT joined us and we all made a trip to the bathroom. Thank goodness for Purell. Actually, these bathrooms were not too bad, compared to others we’ve seen.
E and T showed MT around. We found a stall selling jade jewelry and MT spied a lovely flower necklace. The seller
took a piece of her hair, wrapped it over the jade and took a lighter to it. It did not catch fire, so she explained that this meant it was high quality jade. MT and I had no clue whether or not this was true, but we each bought one. We got a pair of earrings thrown in with the deal.
Down a few blocks, near City Shop (an organic market frequented by expats), we found our way to a Coldstone Creamery that we’d spotted a few days earlier. They had a special going: different mixes representing different Olympic Sports. E, T and I all ordered the Swimmer: a blue cotton candy ice cream mixed with blueberries, sprinkles and cake. It was nice and refreshing. A server came around offering cups of water on a tray, which was a nice gesture although it turned out to be Shanghai tap water (which tastes exactly like dirt). And, above all, they have a first class bathroom!
We crossed the street back to the City Shop building and went upstairs where we found an upscale kids shop called Lollipop. It had high chairs shaped like eggs, bunk beds with storage, Pottery
Barn Kids’ rugs, books, Crocodile Kids placemats and much, much more. But from the kids’ point of view, it was awesome because it had a little play area complete with automated Japanese style parking garage!
Then we quickly came home, ate dinner and got ready for bed before turning on the TV. It took a moment or two, but MT found the Chinese coverage of the Olympic opening ceremonies. The kids excitedly looked for J among the crowd before giving up and pretending to see him. MT and I watched in awe as the drummers beat in harmony and later as the boxes started popping up. MT declared there was just enough discord that there had to be people inside. I couldn’t believe it…they’d have to be all the same height. But there were! We all fell asleep somewhere in the middle, and we later learned that we missed the most amazing parts! Oh, well. We’d had a busy day.
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