Traveling Diary: November 2007 Archives
I finally got myself to Shanghai this weekend, and now that I'm back I just keep thinking "Why the heck am I living in Suzhou when I could be living in Shanghai!?". Holy smokes Shanghai is awesome! I will certainly be going back a few times a month. I left Saturday on the fast train that tops 250km/hr and takes 40 minutes to get to Shanghai. It costs 50RMB return so a weekend in Shanghai to get there and back and stay a night or two in a hostel and eat and drink for two days won't even cost $100CDN....even with the 3 Starbucks coffees I had per day!
I arrived to a cold and rainy state which only made it remind me even more like Vancouver. I headed on the metro from the train station straight to a downtown area called The Bund. This required that I walk about 3km along Nanjing Rd. - plastered with advertisements, name brand stores, and funky cafes.
If I had to describe Beijing with one word it would be 'mystique'.
If I had to describe Shanghai with one word, it would be 'wealth'.
From the moment I stepped off the train, the people just looked better dressed, held themselves higher, and had a purpose. The buildings (inside and out) are also much nicer and newer.
These pictures have reminded me to tell you a bit about the weather lately. It is officially way colder than it should ever be on the 30th parallel. Damned Pacific ocean currents! It has been in the teens for the last few weeks and the trees have suddenly changed colour and are losing their leaves. Apparently it will only get cooler for the next month or so before it starts warming up again. Can I really complain though? After all, I know what the rest of you are living with right now, so I should just be thankful it is above 0! The main bummer about the weather was the lack of visibility for pictures. It kinda looks cool though with the mist over the Pudong skyline.
With all the wealth in Shanghai also comes a huge disparity of income. Shanghai has the highest average salary in China (2700USD), but there is an obvious gap between the rich and poor. And in a communist country, this is evidence that making money here is all about connections. In a sea of wealth, there are many trying to acquire it...illegitimately. Enter: the scammers. In the span of 6 hours, 7 people came up to me trying the same scam. I must have looked like a tourist! The scam goes like this: a young pretty girl approaches you telling you she is going to University and looking for someone to practice English with. She is so happy to meet you and wonders what your name is and where you are from. I have never personally gotten further than this with any of them, but the story goes that the scam follows with the 'English student' walking around with you for a bit and helping you buy some stuff maybe or trying to help you get somewhere. To a point where she finally starts getting tired and thirsty and recommends you stop somewhere for some tea...she just happens to know the best place. A few cups of team and maybe a sandwich later, you are slapped with a huge bill (a couple thousand yuan) and a big bouncer standing in the door way forcing you to pay it. After the first few times of them approaching me, I just started telling them "Je ne parle pas Englais".
To the East of The Bund is Pudong. This area of Shanghai is very new and I can't begin to describe how intensely 'big city' it is. This is the area that you always see on tv. Construction in this area began in 1999. I don't imagine one of these buildings can be built quickly, although they are certainly trying. If you look closely, three of these buildings in the picture on not yet finished.
I was pleasantly surprised to see a golfing range in the middle of this architectural paradise. At least the Chinese propose to have some sort of work/life balance.
I think the tallest building in the world is currently in Malaysia; however, this tower on the right is currently under construction to be the tallest building in China and it is trumping that tower to the left of it, which used to be China's tallest building. I started counting the amount of floors but then I got dizzy. About 400 I'd say.
Besides the great energy and architecture, Shanghai also has a killer art district.
Wait, did I mention I forgot my passport and so was not allowed to stay in any hotel and then only realized this later in the evening when I went to check into a hostel? Good thing Gina has a friend in Shanghai and I was able to stay with her for the night. Although it ended up being a good experience, I sure won't do that again! The next morning, she (Jessica) was able to take me to this farmers market for artists and gorgeous maze of back alleys. This was my view at breakfast.
And here are some pics of the cool alleys we explored. Reminded me a lot of the alleys in Victoria!
I arrived to a cold and rainy state which only made it remind me even more like Vancouver. I headed on the metro from the train station straight to a downtown area called The Bund. This required that I walk about 3km along Nanjing Rd. - plastered with advertisements, name brand stores, and funky cafes.
If I had to describe Beijing with one word it would be 'mystique'. If I had to describe Shanghai with one word, it would be 'wealth'.
From the moment I stepped off the train, the people just looked better dressed, held themselves higher, and had a purpose. The buildings (inside and out) are also much nicer and newer.
These pictures have reminded me to tell you a bit about the weather lately. It is officially way colder than it should ever be on the 30th parallel. Damned Pacific ocean currents! It has been in the teens for the last few weeks and the trees have suddenly changed colour and are losing their leaves. Apparently it will only get cooler for the next month or so before it starts warming up again. Can I really complain though? After all, I know what the rest of you are living with right now, so I should just be thankful it is above 0! The main bummer about the weather was the lack of visibility for pictures. It kinda looks cool though with the mist over the Pudong skyline.With all the wealth in Shanghai also comes a huge disparity of income. Shanghai has the highest average salary in China (2700USD), but there is an obvious gap between the rich and poor. And in a communist country, this is evidence that making money here is all about connections. In a sea of wealth, there are many trying to acquire it...illegitimately. Enter: the scammers. In the span of 6 hours, 7 people came up to me trying the same scam. I must have looked like a tourist! The scam goes like this: a young pretty girl approaches you telling you she is going to University and looking for someone to practice English with. She is so happy to meet you and wonders what your name is and where you are from. I have never personally gotten further than this with any of them, but the story goes that the scam follows with the 'English student' walking around with you for a bit and helping you buy some stuff maybe or trying to help you get somewhere. To a point where she finally starts getting tired and thirsty and recommends you stop somewhere for some tea...she just happens to know the best place. A few cups of team and maybe a sandwich later, you are slapped with a huge bill (a couple thousand yuan) and a big bouncer standing in the door way forcing you to pay it. After the first few times of them approaching me, I just started telling them "Je ne parle pas Englais". To the East of The Bund is Pudong. This area of Shanghai is very new and I can't begin to describe how intensely 'big city' it is. This is the area that you always see on tv. Construction in this area began in 1999. I don't imagine one of these buildings can be built quickly, although they are certainly trying. If you look closely, three of these buildings in the picture on not yet finished.
I was pleasantly surprised to see a golfing range in the middle of this architectural paradise. At least the Chinese propose to have some sort of work/life balance.I think the tallest building in the world is currently in Malaysia; however, this tower on the right is currently under construction to be the tallest building in China and it is trumping that tower to the left of it, which used to be China's tallest building. I started counting the amount of floors but then I got dizzy. About 400 I'd say.Besides the great energy and architecture, Shanghai also has a killer art district.Wait, did I mention I forgot my passport and so was not allowed to stay in any hotel and then only realized this later in the evening when I went to check into a hostel? Good thing Gina has a friend in Shanghai and I was able to stay with her for the night. Although it ended up being a good experience, I sure won't do that again! The next morning, she (Jessica) was able to take me to this farmers market for artists and gorgeous maze of back alleys. This was my view at breakfast.
And here are some pics of the cool alleys we explored. Reminded me a lot of the alleys in Victoria!Some other great things about Shanghai on first impressions were: there was less smoking, and less spitting, and it was cleaner. The only downer was it was very, very crowded.
There is so much else I want to tell you about Shanghai. The history of this city is crazy, there are some amazing stats about it, and I got some good Chinglish pics. But I will wait for another day to fill your brain with lessons and facts.
There is so much else I want to tell you about Shanghai. The history of this city is crazy, there are some amazing stats about it, and I got some good Chinglish pics. But I will wait for another day to fill your brain with lessons and facts.
Is it just me, or whenever something crappy happens, something equally great happens within minutes (ok maybe hours or days, but time is relative). The last few days have been a bit of a roller coaster, as my life certainly tends to be. Just like the ancient Buddhists say: life is but 1,000 joys, and 1,000 sorrows.
Jason was fired/quit on Thursday. So my play mate was uprooted from my life and I had about 45 minutes to react and say goodbye. He will likely either head back to Canada or go up and work in the Northern part of China. It's a long story and all stems from a combination of his motorbike being seized a month ago and then typical Chinese business and cultural practices. So I am bummed to lose my only 'good' friend in China. He was on of those people I just connected with right away. You know when you think about how long you've known them you think 'holy crap I feel like I've known this person for years, not just two months!' So it is a real drag to see him go.
The night it all went down I was heading to my third badminton practice ever. I was learning the rules because I had agreed to play in a tournament this weekend. Why? Because the thought of it scared the crap out of me. When I got home from that practice, bummed about Jason and annoyed that I had agreed to make a fool of myself, I saw that I had an email in my inbox. It informed me I had just won a pretty big contract to develop and administer a management training program to an entire Real Estate company here in Suzhou. Yipes! It will kinda be like classroom-based consulting. I know the issues upper management is having with it's middle managers, and I am creating this 8 week course to train them all on leadership, conflict resolution, marketing, sales, etc to help alleviate the issues. I am very excited and it will be awesome experience and fun, too! The money is going to pay for my Indonesia trip, woohooo! So three nights a week I will be working on that for the next few months. Which will be good also to keep me from feeling lonely. Yes, typical me, filling the voids with work...but a true workaholic wouldn't know they were doing it, would they?;)
Friday night a friend from badminton (David, on the left) took May and I to a wine tasting. Put on by him! We had some amazing wines that David had to specially have imported. A merlot from France and a Cab-Sauv from Italy... so good! These wines are not available anywhere in China so it was especially cool because of that. That is Henry, the owner of the restaurant, on the right.
It got a little saucy, as any wine tasting would. And David started to sing some really cool traditional Taiwanese songs. He is great fun and I have taken to calling him IGGY (I.G. actually, which stands for Italian Guy). He is unlike 99.99% of Chinese guys and reminds me a lot of the crazy, womanizing, "La Dolche Vita" Italian men in my life. My theory is, so long as you are not married to Italian men, they are great!
The next afternoon, it was my first badminton tournament. I got a bit of a case of the nerves, but had fun too. I played in three mixed doubles games with this cool guy, Denny, who lives in Vancouver half the year and then works here the other half (we called ourselves 'team Canada'), and we only won one game but I really started getting it by the end. May and David are a team and are very good. They won the mixed doubles and this is a pic below of them during one of their games. We are a team of about 20 (3 girls) and there was another team from Shanghai that came over for the weekend to play against us. Apparently this is the highest level of league in China besides the Olympic team (why in the hell am I on the team then?!? I guess they DESPERATELY need girls.) and Denny said to me the thing he misses the most about China when he is in Canada is the quality of badminton.
There was a good mens doubles final match where I got to see what 'real' badminton was supposed to look like at the end of our day. The Shanghai team won.
However,
I was a bad teammate and struggled to watch the game and cheer my
teammates on because there were three of the women from China's
National Team practicing on the other court. I am not one to get start
struck (remember the Owen Wilson and Paris Hilton stories from Maui?) . In fact, most of
the time I don't even know when someone is famous. But I have always
been in awe of professional athletes. I get really nervous around them
and really feel like a five year old watching their hero. These women
where unbelievable athletes. They made it look so easy and are so dedicated. I was in awe.
Of course, after a long hard day of playing, any true athlete would go out drinking.... I could get used to being on this badminton team! David and I posed here, after several bevvies, as sweaty, tired Zoolander characters.
Jason was fired/quit on Thursday. So my play mate was uprooted from my life and I had about 45 minutes to react and say goodbye. He will likely either head back to Canada or go up and work in the Northern part of China. It's a long story and all stems from a combination of his motorbike being seized a month ago and then typical Chinese business and cultural practices. So I am bummed to lose my only 'good' friend in China. He was on of those people I just connected with right away. You know when you think about how long you've known them you think 'holy crap I feel like I've known this person for years, not just two months!' So it is a real drag to see him go.
The night it all went down I was heading to my third badminton practice ever. I was learning the rules because I had agreed to play in a tournament this weekend. Why? Because the thought of it scared the crap out of me. When I got home from that practice, bummed about Jason and annoyed that I had agreed to make a fool of myself, I saw that I had an email in my inbox. It informed me I had just won a pretty big contract to develop and administer a management training program to an entire Real Estate company here in Suzhou. Yipes! It will kinda be like classroom-based consulting. I know the issues upper management is having with it's middle managers, and I am creating this 8 week course to train them all on leadership, conflict resolution, marketing, sales, etc to help alleviate the issues. I am very excited and it will be awesome experience and fun, too! The money is going to pay for my Indonesia trip, woohooo! So three nights a week I will be working on that for the next few months. Which will be good also to keep me from feeling lonely. Yes, typical me, filling the voids with work...but a true workaholic wouldn't know they were doing it, would they?;)
Friday night a friend from badminton (David, on the left) took May and I to a wine tasting. Put on by him! We had some amazing wines that David had to specially have imported. A merlot from France and a Cab-Sauv from Italy... so good! These wines are not available anywhere in China so it was especially cool because of that. That is Henry, the owner of the restaurant, on the right.
It got a little saucy, as any wine tasting would. And David started to sing some really cool traditional Taiwanese songs. He is great fun and I have taken to calling him IGGY (I.G. actually, which stands for Italian Guy). He is unlike 99.99% of Chinese guys and reminds me a lot of the crazy, womanizing, "La Dolche Vita" Italian men in my life. My theory is, so long as you are not married to Italian men, they are great!The next afternoon, it was my first badminton tournament. I got a bit of a case of the nerves, but had fun too. I played in three mixed doubles games with this cool guy, Denny, who lives in Vancouver half the year and then works here the other half (we called ourselves 'team Canada'), and we only won one game but I really started getting it by the end. May and David are a team and are very good. They won the mixed doubles and this is a pic below of them during one of their games. We are a team of about 20 (3 girls) and there was another team from Shanghai that came over for the weekend to play against us. Apparently this is the highest level of league in China besides the Olympic team (why in the hell am I on the team then?!? I guess they DESPERATELY need girls.) and Denny said to me the thing he misses the most about China when he is in Canada is the quality of badminton.
There was a good mens doubles final match where I got to see what 'real' badminton was supposed to look like at the end of our day. The Shanghai team won.However,
I was a bad teammate and struggled to watch the game and cheer my
teammates on because there were three of the women from China's
National Team practicing on the other court. I am not one to get start
struck (remember the Owen Wilson and Paris Hilton stories from Maui?) . In fact, most of
the time I don't even know when someone is famous. But I have always
been in awe of professional athletes. I get really nervous around them
and really feel like a five year old watching their hero. These women
where unbelievable athletes. They made it look so easy and are so dedicated. I was in awe.Of course, after a long hard day of playing, any true athlete would go out drinking.... I could get used to being on this badminton team! David and I posed here, after several bevvies, as sweaty, tired Zoolander characters.
I spent the last two weeks with some of my classes organizing Halloween parties, and the day finally came this week! Chinese people do not know about Halloween. In fact, it is mostly an American thing as I also learned when I was in New Zealand two years ago at this time. So as a 'cultural expert' (weird that I am considered this) it is my job to teach my kids about North American culture; and Halloween is certainly a great excuse to have some fun with them! I failed to tell anyone here that as a child I never celebrated Halloween, really. But that didn't stop us from getting dressed up, eating lots of candy, and carving pumpkins.
On Halloween, Jason also had a party in his class. He teaches all the grade 1's in the school, and before heading to his party, I wrapped him up in toilet paper. Sadly, half of it came off before he even got to class....but it had me laughing so hard!
What was more, within about thirty seconds of him arriving to class, his kids had completely ripped it all off. But they are so cute...how do you get mad at these faces?
My grade 7 overseas class did such an amazing job of their party! We'd been decorating the class for weeks and when we organized the party, I put all the tasks for the party up on the board and each student got to decide what they were going to do. We had two DJ's and about eight kids who brought food. I was expecting cookies, chips, etc, but these kids had their moms drop off huge pans of spaghetti, 20 KFC chicken burgers, these weird Taiwanese blood pudding squares, (which I made the mistake of putting into my mouth and then asking what they were) etc.
Also, six kids volunteered to be part of the pumpkin carving contest. The issue being, they don't seem to have pumpkins for carving here; hence the small size of them.
On Halloween, Jason also had a party in his class. He teaches all the grade 1's in the school, and before heading to his party, I wrapped him up in toilet paper. Sadly, half of it came off before he even got to class....but it had me laughing so hard!
What was more, within about thirty seconds of him arriving to class, his kids had completely ripped it all off. But they are so cute...how do you get mad at these faces?My grade 7 overseas class did such an amazing job of their party! We'd been decorating the class for weeks and when we organized the party, I put all the tasks for the party up on the board and each student got to decide what they were going to do. We had two DJ's and about eight kids who brought food. I was expecting cookies, chips, etc, but these kids had their moms drop off huge pans of spaghetti, 20 KFC chicken burgers, these weird Taiwanese blood pudding squares, (which I made the mistake of putting into my mouth and then asking what they were) etc.Also, six kids volunteered to be part of the pumpkin carving contest. The issue being, they don't seem to have pumpkins for carving here; hence the small size of them. One thing that they certainly could work on is dressing up in costumes. I told everyone they needed to dress up, and those that did not would be wrapped up in toilet paper like a mummy. Ironically, one of the kids in class's father owns the toilet paper factory in town so he volunteered himself to be the t.p. guy. They were much better at wrapping one another up than I was for Jason.
This is Charles, one of my little trouble makers. He is such a problem child and I absolutely love him for it. He brought his erhu to play squeaky, scary music on for the party.
It is times like this when I forget I am in China. And then look a little closer, and am reminded....this is what Chinese Halloween candy looks like!
This is Charles, one of my little trouble makers. He is such a problem child and I absolutely love him for it. He brought his erhu to play squeaky, scary music on for the party.
It is times like this when I forget I am in China. And then look a little closer, and am reminded....this is what Chinese Halloween candy looks like!The party was a compete success. A couple foreign teachers came by and helped us to celebrate Halloween, 'A weird and interesting holiday celebrated in America.' (as on of my older students wrote to me).
Want to talk about weird and interesting? I wish you could have come out with Jason and I on Halloween night. Here are our costumes: I was a girl ghost, he was a 'pot' head. I think these costumes are almost as good as mine and Stevens last year; where I put my snowboarding helmet on and went as an epileptic and Steven wrapped a towel around his head and put a button down shirt on and went as an Arabian business man. I know.. what the...!?! I am a big fan of putting as little effort into a Halloween costume as possible. Yes, this was the bed sheet supplied to me by the school.
We went out to a bar that was giving out free drinks all night to anyone dressed up...Heck yeah! On our way there, we got some of the most incredulous looks I had seen in my life. A man finally stopped us and asked us if we were Muslim. Then we started hearing the word Muslim in Chinese the rest of the way there. They thought I was in a Sari!?! Also, someone asked us if we had any drugs. Apparently the Muslims run the drugs here in China. I don't need to tell you how the rest of the night went. Just... holy smokes! I am heading back to that same bar tonight since their free drinks with a costume policy goes until tomorrow. I'm dressing up as a hockey player (I brought my Canadian hockey jersey here) to drink more free booze. Is it just me, or does free beer taste better?
Want to talk about weird and interesting? I wish you could have come out with Jason and I on Halloween night. Here are our costumes: I was a girl ghost, he was a 'pot' head. I think these costumes are almost as good as mine and Stevens last year; where I put my snowboarding helmet on and went as an epileptic and Steven wrapped a towel around his head and put a button down shirt on and went as an Arabian business man. I know.. what the...!?! I am a big fan of putting as little effort into a Halloween costume as possible. Yes, this was the bed sheet supplied to me by the school.
We went out to a bar that was giving out free drinks all night to anyone dressed up...Heck yeah! On our way there, we got some of the most incredulous looks I had seen in my life. A man finally stopped us and asked us if we were Muslim. Then we started hearing the word Muslim in Chinese the rest of the way there. They thought I was in a Sari!?! Also, someone asked us if we had any drugs. Apparently the Muslims run the drugs here in China. I don't need to tell you how the rest of the night went. Just... holy smokes! I am heading back to that same bar tonight since their free drinks with a costume policy goes until tomorrow. I'm dressing up as a hockey player (I brought my Canadian hockey jersey here) to drink more free booze. Is it just me, or does free beer taste better?
