Shanghai - part 4

Back in Shanghai for a final couple of days involved some relaxed sight seeing around the city and a maddingly annoying trip to the fake markets. You cannot believe how much these people hassle you when all you really want to do is buy a watch. In the end we were weighed down with fake rolexes and gucci watches, but it kept us amused.

Some highlights of the last couple of days included a trip to the Shanghai Aquarium, much better than expected. The penguins were a little sad, but the overall experience wasn't actually too bad. They showed us how pearls are harvested from oysters and we all got a free pearl extra fresh.

We then visited the highest hotel in the world. Well supposedly anyway, where the hotel begins on the 57th floor of one of the extremely large towers in Pudong side of Shanghai and rises to approximately the 97th floor or something. Its only 1 of 5 hyatt's n Shanghai and this picture looks bizarrely like some sci-fi meeting room for thousands of crazy dudes. It was pretty cool, and the bad at the top has the same view as the observation deck and you don't have to pay $20 to get in, you just have to have a $20 cocktail instead!

So in summary, Shanghai is a city of contrasts, filled on one hand with 5 star hotels and towering office buildings, it is also a scene of abject poverty and terrible living conditions for many of the local people. The pollution can just be mind boggling but on a clear day with a few dollars in your pocket you can have a great time, 10c beers, $2 lunches, and $100 custom made suits are just some of the joys to be found. On the other hand the constant spitting on the streets and blatant rip off attempts can get you down. Its not an unsafe place by any stretch but you need to keep your wits about you! And look at this pollution, its just insane, people who say that global warming is a myth and that humans aren't interfering with the planet need to visit Shanghai!

Shanghai - part 3

Of course the real reason we were in Shanghai was not just for our own amusement. There was a wedding to attend, Kathleen to be a beautiful maid of honour and me to attempt to record some videography. Casey and Ben's ceremony was wonderful, and the photos afterwards on the streets of Shanghai were exciting and interesting. The reception was held at the fabulous Yong Foo elite, where the 6 or 7 courses were all delicious. The Australian wine went down pretty easily too!

Afterwards we were off to 'Not Me' for the after wedding party. Now we'd been to not me a couple of times in the lead up to the wedding and had negotiated a special price deal for the wedding party guests. This included wearing dodgy not me party badges, cheap beers, super cheap cocktails and pretty much our run of the music. Not me's music selection certainly proved bizzare with a selection of new dance music, R&B (everyone's favourite) and chinese pop songs. I wonder if they've put all the millions of photos they took of the party crowd up on their website yet. Of course at the end of the night there were only a few of us left and after the best man decided to argue with the bar staff about the costs of the last four shots he'd had we were on our way off.

Post wedding day was relaxed with an afternoon trip to the pearl markets. Don't ask me exactly where we went, but the main pearl markets in town were being renovated (and are a rip-off anyway) so it was off to the 'burbs to find some cheap pearls. Of course they weren't for me, but with a hung-over sister and a wife on a mission I had to come along and check out the range of fake merchandise on offer. A point to note is that the initial price of things in most markets in china has risen considerably. A lot of places I was able to easily bargain them down to below 1/10th of the price. So start low, because they are well used to ripping tourists off.

Shanghai - part 2

A trip to the founding place of Communism in china proved an interesting diversion to another exciting day filled with adventures in Shanghai. I think that there is still a huge amount of 'education' that goes on against the local people in China. The press is definitely not free, as an example the local chinese channel made some very interesting comments about Tibet and that the french have always believed that Tibet should be part of China. So as a word of warning, don't believe Chinese TV and news, well in fact don't believe any mass produced news, its all a conspiracy and the only way to know anything about anything is to find out about if yourself. But on the other hand they do show a large amount of football on the tv along with plenty of snooker so you can forgive them a bit for their devotion to high quality tv. Non-chinese satellite tv is only available illegally and lonely planet China guidebooks can't be bought in China as they have said some negative things about the place in the past.

A day of wandering around the city proved interesting, we invested in some custom tailored suits and clothes in the clothing markets which take a few days to put together. The evening involved a very large amount of beer and shots and an argument with bar staff about a fake note that they had just given to us in change. The groom to be proved slightly the worse for wear but heroically backed up again the next night.

The days in Shanghai were proving to fly by, we were almost killed repeatedly by taxi drivers who seem to make a living from avoiding crashes by the narrowest possible margin and charging you $3 to go across the whole city. The subway system was so jammed packed a peak hour that you couldn't see for the walls of people. The french concession is highly recommended for just wandering around. There are plenty of cool bars, restaurants, and of course the Shanghai TV university. I dropped in to pick up an honorary degree in simpsons watching, and was also awarded a doctorate in advanced world cup broadcasts.

Don't believe all you read about this fine institution though because it does appear to be run out of a shack on some back street and across the road there are plenty of dodgy dvd dealers but I personally believe that its all legit.

Shanghai - part 1

Shanghai is an amazing place, risen from a small town only a couple of hundred years ago to being a teeming metropolis of somewhere between 15 - 25 million people depending upon who you believe. Filled with high rises and designer stores, you only need to walk a few streets away to find poverty and traditional chinese living. Street food is common place, but 5 star restaurants and hotels also dot the city like pimples on a acne ridden 15 year old. First night involved the view from the bund, and then a beer at captain hostel bar. Highly recommended for the view, not highly recommended for the pizza. Then it was off past East nanjing st, (filled with desinger stores, touts, fake watches and the subway) to Southern Barbarian for dinner. Thanks Case and Ben for organising, the yunnan food was super awesome and cheap and the extensive beer list was well received.

Day 2 - We didn't really know where to begin, our guidebook despite being brand new proved hideously out of date. The city changes so much that unless you are printing a guidebook a day you'd never be able to keep up with pace of chance around the city. So we headed south, it was towards the equator so that gave us some hope that it would be warmer.

Soon we entered some markets in the old area of town. Do not buy anything here except maybe street food. Everything else is a tourist trap and you will pay through the nose, ears, eyes and throat (thank you scottish man on the train for the quote) for anything else. Still its kind of exciting and entertaining to wander around. These streets have been rebuilt as some kind of new 'old' chinese buildings are filled with shops, food, street performers and touts. We continued our adventures and walked about 20kms through the teeming metropolis that is Shanghai. The architecture of the modern buildings in the city is amazing, with dizzying skyscrapers meeting traditional chinese buildings, french colonial architecture with slums, terrible roads and extreme pollution thrown into the mix.



Night two involved a visit to southern beauty for szechuan food. I was sweating chilli through my eyeballs but man it was good. They made these great little eggplants topped with fresh chilli and tomato, a standout. The prawns were so hot that you could've cooked an egg on them and everything else was a dream as my mind was so fuzzled by the extreme amounts of spice.