Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Shanghai Trip!



This past weekend we got to spend time in Shanghai! Shanghai is so close and so big that we will visit there several times, so this trip was dedicated to shopping at the huge underground shopping mall where you can barter like crazy!
We got our train tickets for 7:30 so we could have enough time after our classes to get to the station. Unfortunately we forgot that China runs in military time so our tickets were for 7:30 am instead of pm. Even though we had to pay more for a bullet train last minute, I did get to go on a bullet train where as I wouldn't ever have paid the money for it by choice. Oh, the train got us there in 1.5 hours instead of 4 and it was moving at 282 km/hr.

We finally found our little hostel at like 11 pm and they had this cute little weather chart. That night,  my roommate and I had reserved a room with 8 other people... yes, 8 beds of strangers in one room. When we opened the door to go to bed, a cat ran into the room to be amongst all the sleeping people. Lucky for us another pair in our group had gotten a 3 bed-room so my roommate and I shared the 3rd bed in with them.

Saturday morning we went to President Mao's childhood home (which has been converted into a mini museum in his honor.) He is like the George Washington of China. He is the one that basically made communism happen... He improved the lives of the people by doing a lot of bad things. Very fascinating.

After President Mao's, we went shopping for the rest of the day. We only came up from the underground mall twice and the weather was absolutely gorgeous! Our whole group is in this picture except our head teachers, the married couple, me the photographer, and 2 girls (Canadians.)

That night we walked from our hostel to the Pearl Tower! Holy cow Shanghai is gorgeous at night. All the buildings were lit up with gorgeous lights and even the trees were lit up in green! At 10pm, though, all the lights shut off. For the city that never sleeps they sure do go to bed early!
I always have to add food pictures! This was a dang good curry dish near the Pearl Tower. It's rice with a potato and carrot curry sauce with a chunk of baked chicken on top. A little tidbit of info: Plastic chopsticks are useless! No wonder Americans think chopstick are dumb; we only have plastic ones! Wood is the only way to go because then you can actually get a grip on things.

I found a 7 Eleven in China. Enough said. Also, some other tidbits of information is that surprisingly, there are bakeries EVERYWHERE in China. There are bakeries at almost every subway station, ever street corner, etc. If you're hungry you can count on a bakery being nearby. Lastly, I've noticed that wherever we go, we make people happy... because of our entertaining looks and 'loads' of money. You're welcome China :D

This is a picture of The Bund at night. Excuse my language here, mom, but our new favorite phrase quoted from a guide book is, "This is a butt clenching view."

The next morning we took a ferry across the bund! We were debating between this or taking a taxi in the tunnel under the bund but then we found out that the ferry is only 2 yen!

And this is the other side of the bund in the day light. The buildings in China aren't just buildings; tons of them have fancy architect that make them look so cool! The tallest building in the picture is almost in a pyramid shape all the way up and the tip of the triangle rotates just slightly. The line down it isn't just a reflection, the building actually twists like that. Then the one next to it looks like there is a handle at the very top. Others have big platforms or crowns at the top of them. So impressive!
On the other side of the Bund we went to the Yu Yuan (Yu Garden). This is one of the oldest kept-up gardens in China and many emperors have walked through them. They were absolutely gorgeous!

This darling little boy tripped, then as he was about to get up he spotted us Americans and just laid there staring 'til his dad pull him up. 

Nothing says China quite like a suuuuper old person in front of a rice terrace building.
Baby Asian :D

These key chains were for sale everywhere and they are just plastic moldings of all the different kinds of food here in China. So awesome, I was temped to buy tons just because they were funny but no worries, I just snuck a picture instead.
This guy was putting on a play or something that he was narrating in Chinese, I don't know what it was but it was very entertaining to watch. They had these look holes so that you had to pay to actually watch the performance.
Last but not least: food! This dinner consists of spinach in eggs (they put eggs in TONS of their dishes), rice (always), a half eaten meatball of... I'm not sure what meat, and a mixture of potato and bamboo. Pretty delicious dinner I would say. It's funny how many things I would never eat in the states like green beans, lima beans and eggs, mystery meat, soggy veggies, tofu, etc. that I just down at mealtime here.

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