Shànghǎi Part I

First night out in Shanghai after Joanna landed

The Bund, taken with Joanna's sweet new panoramic capabilities camera

Playing a Chinese dice drinking game in the "I [heart] Shanghai" Bar

Pudong View

Panoramic view of Pudong

Shanghai Subway

“Come on now! How could you be me and want to be someone else?”-KW

Today is going to be my blog writing day... but I am am kind of dreading writing all these entries considering I have been traveling for more than three weeks and I don't even know where to begin. Let's begin with day 1 of mine and Joanna's adventure: Shanghai

Actually my adventure began when I first went to buy train tickets with Lily. We went to a travel agency by where I live, seven days in advance. Turns out the train I wanted had already been sold out and there were only seating tickets left for another train which took 23 hours instead of 17 like my first choice. To be honest I didn't even ask about the bed tickets because I wanted to experience sitting and I figured they were sold out anyway. So I got a ticket next to the window. To my surprise there were also STANDING tickets available. Who the hell would want standing tickets? I thought to myself. No one in their right mind would want to stand for 23 hours (ironically this bit me in the ass at the conclusion of my adventure). The fact that there even ARE standing seats is something I thought was stupid and a fault in planning of the government, more specifically the transportation sector of the government. Why not make more trains or more compartments so that everyone at least has a seat?! Because there are SO MANY people in China that there is no way to make that many trains. "There are six BILLION people in the world. More or less. And it makes me feel quite small" China makes you REALLY understand how many people there are in the world because everything and everywhere is crowded (Credit to Lukasz for pointing this out while listening to this song).

I got to the train station pretty early and boarded the train. I still don't fully understand why Chinese people rush so much or wait in line for so long considering most people have seats or beds which are given a seat number, so it's not like someone will steal your spot. The only reason I can think of rushing is to place your baggage in the overhead spots instead on somewhere under your seat where there might not be enough room. Thus my journey began. I sat next to some guy who gave me space and across from another guy my age who spoke English, but barely talked to me and had a huge suitcase that took up MY space (hahahah on trains you have to fight for every inch!). He was a computer nerd who loved World of Warcraft (that's at least what I got out of him) and he was visiting people he met online a few years ago, for the first time. I ate a lot on the train (I brought my own food), slept, played iPod games, listened to music, looked at magazines, people watched... and eventually the 23 hours passed by. Towards the end of the journey I was already in a daze and I felt like I was on some drug or something because I was going in and out of sleep. Aha and I need to mention something equally as important... the fact that Chinese people rarely are quiet. I mean damn, I'm loud myself but not at all compared to these people (on the train at least). They were playing card games, talking loudly, making noise, singing... I was SO GLAD I brought my number one NECESSITY when traveling (and necessity in China in general): EAR PLUGS. I kept those babies in for a majority of the time and only then could I tune out those loud mouths. (I mean honestly, who the hell talks that loud at 3AM, or better yet at 5AM?) To them the train ride is somewhat like a meeting ground and a place to make new friends... Too bad I don't speak Chinese, maybe I could have joined in with their obnoxious screaming and loud games. Probably NOT though.

Albeit, I made it to Shanghai in one piece (groggy and bladder-filled [I didn't use the restroom since I left my place which was about 25hours before I reached Shanghai] Those that really know me are mist likely wondering how this is possible...but even my bladder knew it DID NOT want to go into those nasty, to say the least, train toilets). Charlie (a Chinese guy whom I met in Shenzhen and our new travel companion for a part of this trip) met me and we went to a travel agency to buy tickets for Huangshan and Xi'an. In China you can wait in long lines and buy tickets SEVEN days ahead in a railway station, or you can go to a travel agency, pay 5 Yuan more and wait in line to buy tickets, TEN days before hand (NOTE TO SELF: Talk about what happened with Xi'an at the train station to demonstrate Chinese incapability to plan and organize... at least Charlie's incapacity... ) We were only able to get seating tickets to Xi'an because beds were sold out, and beds back from Huangshan (Yellow Mountain). Tickets for these places were about 200Yuan one way... so as you can see, it is not expensive to travel in China by train at all (although in Europe you can buy airplane tickets to certain places for pennies...)

Finally it was time to meet with Lukasz (he is Ewa's husband and both are Polish and awesome people. I won't get too much into our gracious and amazing host because it would take up too much of this entry!) I met Lukasz with Charlie, went to eat (Lukasz pointed out Shanghai's ranking system with restaurants: Smiley face for a clean and sanitized place, a sad face for a dirty place... or not up to certain standards of Shanghai officials. The faces come with colors, but I have already forgotten them). After lunch (I arrived in Shanghai around 10AM) Charlie and I went back to Lukasz's apartment which was AWESOMEEEEEE and I took a nap, showered and then got ready to pick up Joanna at the airport! We got there about 20 minutes after her plane was supposed to land (by subway), but she was already waiting for us! Of course I started crying and getting emotional that my little sister was with me in China, but got over it! Joanna and I went back to Lukasz's place and went to eat. This was Joanna's first Chinese meal and so of course I chose a Sichuan restaurant! We both love spicy food. We walked around after dinner for a little bit and went to sleep (not too eventful of a night).

Day two of Shanghai Joanna and I walked around the Bund and looked at Pudong across the Hangpu river. Pudong includes the Oriental Pearl Tower, Lujiazui Finance and Trade Zones, and other cool newer looking buildings. The weather wasn't too amazing, a little cloudy, but the pictures came out great nevertheless. After the Bund we went to Yuyuan Garden but did not go in. It was way too crowded so we went around the shops and circled the area. Joanna and I bought some random things like postcards, bags, and fans. An old lady told me I was beautiful and I am very proud of myself for understanding and being able to reply to her comment (conversely when she proceeded to have a conversation with me in Chinese I had to tell her that I didn't understand anymore. Too bad.) Later we met up with Marc (Joanna's best friend's cousin who is studying Chinese in Shanghai) and David (Swedish guy) and ate dinner after searching for a place to go (don't be offended that the descriptions of people in these upcoming blog posts are vague BUT don't worry... I remember you clearly in my head). Dinner was followed by drinks where it was Ladies Night (on Tuesday NOT Wednesday at this bar). The bar was called I [heart] Shanghai.

The following day Joanna and I explored some museums, The Urban Planning Museum (which shows what Shanghai is predicted to look like in 50 years) and went to the People's Park. It was a busy, but fun day. Equally important was night time when we went to drink at David's (or someone's place) and then went to Zapata's (another bar for foreigners in Shanghai) which was having Ladies Night (TWO Ladies Nights in a row... YES!) At Zapata's we drank watered down margaritas for 15 minutes (Ladies Night was over at 12AM), but at least we danced on the bar and had a good time. I can't remember if this was the night we made a taxi driver take us to a local noodle place and the young boy who was supposed to be working was sleeping on a folding chair outside the "restaurant" (AKA hole in the wall in American English). He was pretty mad when we, including the taxi driver, woke him to make us some noodles bitch! (hahaha had to add that in). The noodles were delicious. Joanna was obsessed with them actually... (it was a Chinese Muslim place so they really know how to make noodles, all hand tossed and stretched). I hadn't eaten drunk food in a while, but this food was good. For Joanna and I, I ordered fat noodles with spicy cabbage and peppers. YUM. I can't get enough of spicy Chinese food... which is probably really doing a number on my digestive system this year (oh well, I guess in the US I can eat bland food). Side note: Marc speaks Chinese because he took six weeks of intensive Chinese in the US and is still learning it in Shanghai.

By this point I still had NOT learned how to say the street Lukasz lived on. It wasn't hard, but a simple mistake would lead to the taxi driver not understanding... thank God for the Shanghai Help Line which really helped us out when it came to taxis. All we had to do was call the "magic number", tell them where we wanted to go, and they'd tell the driver. These people were trained and required to understand over 50 different English accents. Nice.

That's all for this post... next one will be ALL about the EXPO and my first impressions of Shanghai.