A Weekend on the Town

It is now four days that I have officially been in Shanghai. Time isn’t quite flying yet, but I am pretty sure that it will soon enough. I actually hope it does go slow because there is so much to do and see here that I feel like it would never get dull. It’s a fascinating city.

We were asked to name some adjectives that would describe the city. I think a few good ones would be lively, booming, bustling, full of contrast, polluted, cosmopolitan, international, and smelly. It’s lively because there is always something going on, no matter what time of the day it is. This city never sleeps. It’s obvious how much it is booming and bustling by how much commerce and industry there is here, all of the buildings under construction or demolition, cranes visible no matter where you are, and every street being full of people going about their daily routine. The city is full of contrast because you quite often see someone driving a brand new Lexus or Mercedes down the same street where another person works all day at their little square in the sidewalk selling trinkets for pennies, lucky to go home with $10 at the end of the day. It’s obvious how polluted it is when you can hardly see more than a mile away during the day time, let alone see any blue sky or even the sun. It’s cosmopolitan because people fuss over brands, images, and lifestyles of conspicuous consumption. It’s a trend setting city for China. It’s not uncommon for people here to save for many months to buy a cell phone that would make many Americans envious. It’s obvious how international the city is when you step foot into Lujiazui, the financial district that is booming so quickly that it is catching all of the world’s attention. Multinational companies are racing to set up offices in this city, especially in this particularly prestigious area. The city is smelly because every five feet I walk down the sidewalk, the odor of the air changes. As I venture out into the markets in the morning in search for some breakfast, it’s not uncommon for the smell of cooking meat to be followed by that of dirt, clay, and pollution as a sidewalk is being torn up, then to be followed by warm cake, then live fish. Truly there is never a dull moment here.

Since I last wrote, we have had the chance to venture out into a few parts of town, such as a large park, Lujiazui, a truly massive 8+ story mall, the historic French quarters along the Bund, and Nanjing road.

Despite all we’ve done and seen so far, we have barely even scratched the surface of all there is in this city. My feet ache from all of the walking we have done, but I yearn to continue on. Even as a sit here, with my feet completely lifted up, no weight bearing down upon them, they throb with pain as a constant reminder of the many miles of walking we have done, not to mention the bit of running I did in the morning. If only these shoes could talk, the stories they could tell would be amazing. But alas, my select words will have to suffice.

One of my most important goals with this blog, aside from keeping people informed about how things are going, is to expose China for what it truly is and not dress it up or down. I can already cut to several stereotypes. First off, Americans generally think that Chinese people are short. Yes there are short people, especially amongst those over 50 years old. But as I walk along and look around, they are quite close to the average height in America, particularly amongst those my age and under. I have already met several students that are well over 6 feet tall. I even saw one who easily topped 6 feet and 6 inches. So, the rumor that Chinese people are short is false. They are definitely taller than the French. That is something I can personally attest to. Congratulations France, you now have yet another reason to be made fun of. Oh, and the Chinese are much nicer to people than you are too. Strike two. But I highly doubt you are reading this blog anyway. I figure you are too busy preparing all of those terribly arduous but amazingly tasty hors d’oeuvres that make your 35 hour work week seem too demanding. Or perhaps you are crippling your cities by allowing all of the public transportation employees to go on strike for 3 weeks straight. But I digress.

Speaking of French, I have had a surprising amount of opportunities to use it here. There are several students here that are studying French because they will be doing an exchange program with a university in Nice. I admit that I am almost envious. Nice is, in my opinion, in one of the most beautiful areas and climates in the world. Words don’t quite do it any justice. See, there is redemption for France after all. And besides, I lived there for two years and consider it to be a home away from home, so I am allowed to make fun of it. I may end up helping some of these students practice their French, especially the accent, because it would be quite fun.

We also just happened to get a bit disoriented today while taking the metro and ended up in the completely wrong place. While we were there though, a really nice Chinese man started talking with us. He threw in a few French words, which we noticed, and so I told him that I also speak French. We talked for a few minutes as we waited for our train to arrive, and it was a lot of fun. He had pretty good pronunciation, and his French was definitely better than his English. As I have already said, people are incredibly kind, friendly, and curious here. He and his wife excitedly waived goodbye to us as we boarded the train and got back on track (no pun intended, so stop rolling your eyes!).

The metro system here is surprisingly good. The city has 20 million people, but only 5 lines. That’s pittance compared to how many lines there are in New York or Paris. But these 5 lines get used quite well. The metro trains are very long too. Of all the metros I had been on back in Europe or the US, they were no longer than 4 cars long. This one is so long that I can get on board, look to both ends and not see either one. It’s good because the trains get really packed. There are so many people here!

Even late into the night, it’s surprising how many people there are everywhere. We were out on Nanjing road, which is famous world-wide for its many upscale boutiques that would be found in the most upscale parts of London, Los Angeles, Paris, Hong Kong, Tokyo, or Dubai, and it was completely packed with people at 10:00pm. In fact, this was just the beginning as most of the clubs, occupying the floors that rose up in the buildings and overlooked the street, don’t really get crowded until midnight. It was just four of us exploring the area. We were actually a very interesting group. There was a huge, well-built and tone black American guy that drew everyone’s attention, a guy who is all-around cool, easy-going, and instantly likeable, myself – the lost-in-thought and always observing type that was also described as being the “Spiderman of the group”, and our Chinese colleague Benjamin (his English name). Here are a few pictures from our stroll along the street.

Yes, we were quite the group. On this very road we met an English girl who had been in China for a month, spoke no Chinese at all, and had been longing to meet some English speaking people. She joined us as we wandered down the road, taking in all of the bright neon lights that would rival Vegas, and trying to avoid all of the people who ran up to us asking us to buy things ranging from flowers to DVDs to wheels that clip onto the heels of your shoes to “massages”. Some were extremely difficult to get to leave us alone. I snapped a picture of a couple who had been pestering us for a while. Here it is:

The picture is kina blurry, but I actually like it that way. It reflects the crazy environment the street has. One of the people nagging us was the lady in orange trying to get us to follow her off of the street but “only a minute away” (according to her). Another was a the guy with his hand on his hip trying to sell us “massages,” but based on the pictures of the girls that were on the cards that would be performing the massages, I certainly had the impression that they were offering other services as well. And by no means do I mean manicures or haircuts. The guy on the right in the purplish shirt is Benjamin. He has been studying English for over 10 years and still hasn’t been to an English speaking country (such a luxury is quite rare for the Chinese), but his English is quite good. We ended our adventure up by People’s Square where we hailed a cab (the metro stops running around 9:30 or 10:00pm). Things are incredibly inexpensive here, even cab rides. Three of us took a 15 minute cab ride back to the school and it was only $3.80. That’s not bad considering back in Fort Collins, a cab ride starts at $3.50.

I’m pretty much adjusted to the time schedule here. I admit that I would rather keep things as they are right now, because I am getting tired at about 10:00pm and wake up between 5:30 and 6:30am. Unfortunately, I doubt that will last more than a week. But who knows? I have giant windows in this room and it’s bright by 6:30am, so maybe I will be okay. Being a morning person would definitely be better for my studying routine, not to mention the fact that I have to wait an hour after turning on the water heater to be able to shower.

Classes start tomorrow morning. It feels like it has definitely been a while since I’ve been in class, but I’ve actually been quite diligent in studying and practicing my Chinese over the summer. I’m obviously making much more progress and at a much quicker rate here. I suppose that would be a given considering that hardly anyone really speaks English here (despite the rumors that everyone speaks English, which is not true.) This is pretty obvious when you try to buy something. When I step up to tell them what I want to buy, my Chinese magically flies out my ears and I botch it all up. I did much better today though when we went to the… umm… *cough cough*… “heavily discounted but posh brands” market… *cough cough* and I got to put my price bartering skills to work. Actually, it was easier than I thought it would be. First off, I have no problem just walking away if something is too expensive or a transaction is too complicated or if it’s something I don’t fully understand. I got a pair of sunglasses that I actually like (I’m really picky about sunglasses) and a really cool, rugged-looking Diesel shoulder bag (the only acceptable form of man purse) for about $15. Not bad, I say. My offer for a watch was shot down and they didn’t even chase after me after I had walked away. Apparently my offer was too low even for them. And I’m okay with that. I definitely need to go back though because I really need a watch and some clothes. We haven’t even been here a week and I’m practically out of clothes already. It’s laundry time!

And to wrap things up, here are a few more pictures. These first ones are some really awesome pictures I took from our residence hall. The first one is from my own balcony in my room! The second one was from the balcony at the end of our wing, and it shows the Pearl Tower in it. The lights are coming from a huge stadium a few blocks away. It had just rained, so the air was really clear and clean and the clouds were visible but the rays of light still lit up in the sky. This place is amazing.

These next couple of pictures are some that I took and offer a slightly more artistic perspective of Shanghai.