C & C globetrotting around the world…

We arrived in Shanghai, the most populous city we’ve been to in China so far with its 19 million inhabitants. The city grows at an amazing rate and develops heavily. Just like in Beijing, they are extending the metro network at a fast pace, with 3 new lines in the last 2 years. Currently it is the longest one in the world with more than 400km on 11 lines! Shanghai, meaning “Upper Sea” used to be a fishing and textile town, but grew in importance during the 19^th century due to its favourable port location and was one of the cities opened to foreign trade in 1842. Since then, it has come a long way and is now a multinational hub of finance and business.

Lance, our friend from Amsterdam, and his cousin picked us up at the train station and then took us around the city. It’s was really nice to see him again, and also cool to have a local guide. First we walked through a neighbourhood with small alleys and typical Shanghainese houses (shikoumen). It was cute, with lots of art galleries and shops, but we realized Shanghai was a lot more expensive than the other cities we had been to.

Lance’s cousin Ming-Ming also took Cecilia to a silk shop to show her how to tell the difference between silk qualities. We also walked through the French Concession (old quarter occupied by the French) and saw some nice old European style buildings. In the evening, we went on The Bund, the famous boardwalk of Shanghai. All the beautiful old European buildings nicely restored and lit-up at night on one side and the amazing view of Pudong with its sky-scrapers across the river was really really impressive to see.

Last but not least, in Shanghai we had our first window-less room! That’s not completely true since we had a window overlooking the hallway, but no contact to the outside. It really wasn’t that bad since it’s hot outside, you wouldn’t open the window anyway. Not to mention that at least it was dark enough for Christoph to sleep. Totally unrelated, but Christoph had to check out Chinese hospitals. He conducts a study of hospitals on our trips and so far has visited one in Mexico. Now it was Shanghai’s turn. This is where Christoph had his first severe diarrhea. Of all places, he had it in Shanghai! The good thing was, we had Lance there and so Chris got VIP treatment in one of the best hospitals in China. Thanks again Lance!

Shanghai also has very many museums and since it rained, we went to the Shanghai Museum, which was really interesting. The museum as such is in a nice building and the exhibitions were very well-made. The building looked pretty new, so we asked Lance if it was new. He told us it was old, built in 1996! Yeah, I guess we have a different concept of old and new… In the museum, there were different sections: Bronze figures, pottery, paintings, jade sculptures and the Ming and Qing furniture. Along with the art, we also got a feel for China’s history. The pottery was probably our favourite exhibition, with the famous white and blue china.

Lance’s dad invited us to a restaurant and really spoiled us. He ordered a gazillion dishes for us to try local delicacies such as swamp eel and fish belly. Chris ate fish belly, but did not eat the swamp eel (which is why he had diarrhea, Cecilia jokes). After having drunk a large glass of rice wine, Cecilia got herself to taste the swamp eel. It was delicious! Of course, it was with garlic, hehe. On the second evening with Lance’s dad, Cecilia got to try “elephant-trunk clam” aka geoduck. It’s a very weird animal. It’s a clam, but its body is huge and protrudes. It really does look like an elephant’s trunk. They had it brought in from the kitchen (alive) for us to see. Pretty interesting.

One of the main reasons people come to Shanghai is The Bund. So far we have seen it at night, but Lonely Planet has a little “Walking Tour” explaining the various important and interesting buildings on this famous street. The view of Pudong is very nice during the day as well and the old HSBC building on the Bund is really worth visiting with its beautiful ceiling. We also went into the Waldorf Astoria Hotel and that was elegant as well.

We also visited the Yu Garden and its pedestrian area. The 9 zig-zag bridge was fun to cross with its million fish and turtles underneath. The Yu Garden, which belonged to the Pan family, a rich government official during the Ming dynasty, was interesting. What we realized is that Chinese gardens are nothing like our gardens. There are no flowers, instead just artificial lakes, little hills, plants and odd-shaped stones. There are also a bunch of different pavilions given very exquisite names.

In the evening we went to the Bund, from where we took the Bund Sight-seeing Tunnel to Pudong. It’s such a scam it’s not even funny, but at least we were in Pudong and got to walk around the promenade there and see The Bund from the other side. It is also very nice and the promenade reminded us of Old Montreal and the Vieux Port. We also went closer to the Oriental Pearl Tower which looks pretty cool. We did like the Bund and Pudong very much, so it was nice to see it over and over again, either by day or night.