Shanghai

****Spoiler Alert****
This is the nice, candy coated version of my weekend in Shanghai that I wrote for class. In actuality the weekend sucked really badly. The tour guide thoroughly wasted my time and if I had know that I could leave the group and gone off on my own I would have done so in a heartbeat.

Finally! Finally in my five weeks of being in Beijing I was given the opportunity to travel for a weekend, although not on my terms, but I got to travel nonetheless. Although I have been thoroughly enjoying exploring Beijing, before I arrived in China I had planned to spend many of my weekends seeing different areas of the country but had yet to do so. Included in the program fee for the summer in Beijing are two trips- one to Shanghai and one to Xi’an. Much of the organization and implementation of this trip was not to my liking, but I will try to avoid referencing the negative experiences and focus of the things I truly enjoyed because so many of my past writings have dealt with things I have not enjoyed.

Unfortunately, the weekend started out on quite a sour note and set the mood for the weekend. Even though we were provided with railway tickets from Beijing to Shanghai, we had to find our transportation to the train station either by taxicab or subway. This is where we ran into most of our troubles. See, as we needed to leave for the train station there were not any taxicabs driving past our dormitories so someone suggested that we walk out to the main road just outside the gate to try and hail cabs and if there were no cabs we would walk to the subway station in Wudaokou, a twenty to thirty minute walk. Typically this would be a very valid suggestion except for the fact that we happened to be in the middle of a thunderstorm. As to be expected in this sort of a situation, there were no available taxis so we made the “Long March” to the Wudaokou subway station in the thunder and lightning. Just as an aside, I think that me styling my hair (blow drying or straightening) is an indicator that it will rain in Beijing because every time I have done so it has rained.

The rain was so hard that I was soaked through although I had an umbrella and was wearing a rain jacket. Even my weatherproof hiking backpack could not stand up to the conditions and all my belongings for the weekend were drenched. About halfway to Wudaokou we found an empty taxi but he would not take us the rest of the way. I’m not sure that the driver’s reasoning was but it could have been that he did not want to get the inside of his car wet, the trip was too close, or that he was hoping to go in another direction. So we continued in the direction of the subway, discouraged and angry at the person who made the decision to walk and received a text message that they had already boarded the subway without us and was on their way to the train station.

Once on the subway we had a rather uneventful trip aside from the exit we needed to get off on was closed. The rain had subsided by now and bystanders told us that the train station was not far away so we decided to walk the rest of the way. The road leading to the train station forked, and with our great luck we chose to take the wrong side of the fork, making the ten minute walk a forty minute walk. By the time we got to the train station we had eight minutes until the train departed, so we all started sprinting through the station to find our platform and train. Luckily all twenty-six of us made it onto the train without any problems and we were on our way to Shanghai. After all that excitement I was exhausted and crawled into my bunk on the cabin to get a good night’s rest.

Upon departing the train station we were met by our tour guide and bus driver for the weekend. Our first stop was to the Oriental Pearl TV Tower where we went to the 263 meter high viewing platform. Although the Oriental Pearl TV Tower is very much the icon of Shanghai’s skyline and often stunning in photographs, I found the building to be quite an eyesore. We were lucky enough to visit Shanghai on a clear day so being on the observation level provided outstanding bird’s eye views of the Pudong and Puxi districts of Shanghai.

A quick bus ride took us to The Bund on the Puxi side of the river separating the two districts. Here there were great views of the Shanghai skyline from the street level as well as vendors hawking kites, “Rolexes,” and assorted children’s toys at all the tourists. Because we were there during the day we did not get to see all the building lit up, but I have heard that the buildings at night are beautiful. From The Bund we took a short walk to a teahouse and had a viewing of a traditional tea ceremony. At the teahouse we were able to try green, jasmine, ginger, black, and lychee teas. The teahouse was immaculately decorated with elaborate tea sets, jade carvings, and water features, and the tea ceremony presented was very different from the ones I had attended while browsing tea shops in Hong Kong several years ago. Here, the teas were brewed in a glass container with the tea sitting in a strainer on top but at the shops in Hong Kong every shop owner brewed the teas in small clay teapots known as YiXing teapots for the city they come from. They were all very methodical about the process of preparing the tea, cleaning all supplies with plenty of boiling water as well as the teapot once the leaves were inserted to brew. The tea was not considered ready to drink until the water poured on the teapot had evaporated. Visiting this teahouse was the first sign that we would be visiting all the quintessential tourist stops.

From the teahouse we wandered across town to have lunch and then shopping at the Xiang Yang market. The market used to be a sprawling outdoor market peddling every knock off good one could imagine but was shut down in 2006 under pressure from the United States and many of its companies doing business with China. Intellectual-property rights are the single largest irritant in Sino-U.S. ties because 70% of all counterfeit good seized by U.S. Customs were made in China. Although the government pushed the market underground, it recently reopened inside a several story building, similar to that of Silk Street Market in Beijing. I personally had no interest in shopping and haggling with the vendors so instead I took to the streets of Shanghai and explored the surrounding neighborhood. The surroundings of Xiang Yang appeared to be very drab and plain, but after some exploration I found the hidden beauty in the residential neighborhood. Across the street were a local flower market and an outdoor grocery. Individual stalls focused on selling a specific product and very much reminded me of a Farmer’s Market in the United States.

Continuing to walk away from Xiang Yang lead me through a series of apartment buildings and local convenience shops that offered some insight into the lives of the local people. I was not surprised by the setup of the apartments, shops, and daily necessities strewn everywhere because the arrangements were similar to what is seen in Beijing, but I fell in love with the contrast of a simplistic life set against a sprawling urban jungle. The further I got from Xiang Yang the more I saw the disparity of modern comforts with bygone treasures. The most striking element of the neighborhood was a massive pagoda at its center surrounded by two rock garden fountains. Surrounding the pagoda and fountains were old buildings with the bottom floors renovated and turned into modern storefronts, hosting a KFC, McDonalds, and many clothes stores. What I had stumbled upon ended up being the Longhua Pagoda and Temple, the largest temple and active Buddhist center in Shanghai. Without my desire to wander off the beaten tourist track, I would have never known that such a unique and sprawling cultural relic was just around the corner.

From Xiang Yang the tour guide took us to Yu Yuan and Old Shanghai Road. Unfortunately because we were allotted so much time to shop at Xiang Yang, we could only view Yu Yuan and not spend any time wandering through Old Shanghai Road and the surrounding markets. I know that surrounding markets are of little historical value and are mostly all new construction but I would have much preferred spending my time exploring this area, taking in the sights and smells and enjoying a cup of tea at the Huxinting Teahouse built on stilts in the middle of a lake.

Regardless of my feelings towards the time schedule set up, I found Yu Yuan to be outstanding. The garden is of a much smaller scale then of those found in Beijing because it was privately owned as opposed to being built for the imperial court, but its small space was used to an advantage, creating many rooms with winding paths, waterways, and lush greenery with bonsai trees. I easily could have spent days wandering through the garden observing the scenery, relaxing, and thinking.

The evening ended with seeing an acrobatics show. The host of the show warned that our mouths would be wide open the entire time and did not think much about the warning. Once the show started, however I was in total awe of the stunts and contortions these people could do. My favorite acts definitely had to be the men leaping through hoops, the women spinning plates, and the motorcycle cage.

The next morning we went to a city on the outskirts of Shanghai that still lived according to old customs and ways. This old town was very quaint and was meant to be something similar to Williamsburg, VA (A city in the United States that reenacts old lifestyles), except that there were people who actually lived in the city and at the gate there was an entrance for city residents and visitors and the visitors must pay to get in. The town is centered on a canal where you could take gondola rides to see the city by water. As you cross the bridge to get to the other, more residential side of the city, sellers we offering fish to release into the water claiming that the wish will grant a wish. I was a little too skeptical to pay someone for a fish that they will turn around a recapture once I release it into the water, but plenty of people were buying them. The city streets were initially lined with tourist merchandise vendors but as you got further into the village you began to see the true way the people lived. Storefronts became fewer while homes grew in number, young children played under the supervision of old men who seemed to not even notice the passing by tourist. Although we could not enter the homes, it reminded me of what a hutong would be like in Beijing with a façade that lead to a courtyard with the homes and rooms all tucked away inside.

From the old town we drove back into Shanghai to visit the Jade Buddha Temple. Before our arrival, we were warned that the monks may be performing ceremonies and praying for the victims of the Sichuan earthquake and if so, we were not to take pictures of it. I am not sure if we witnessed the monks performing a ceremony or just a daily ritual but they were rather enthusiastic, playing drums and singing/chanting. Aside from chanting monks, the temple did offer many statues of Buddha, in jade and bronze. The first chamber we entered offer three adjacent Buddha’s which represent the Buddha in his three potential forms, past, present, and future, as well as the statue of the only female deity. The temple was home to two jade Buddha’s, one standing and one reclining. Both were beautiful jewel covered sculptures in pale green jade encased in rooms where one can donate money to the Temple and receive a small Buddha to be mounted to the wall surrounding the large Buddha in your honor. Maybe the people think that by giving money to the Temple they will looked at favorably in the eyes of Buddha when it came to the afterlife? I am not sure.

Before we had to meet for dinner and depart for the train back to Beijing, we had some free time to walk around. Nanjing Lu, the main shopping road in Shanghai was a quick cab ride away so that was where I headed. The area had several malls full of designer boutiques and merchandise selling the real versions of what was being sold in Xiang Yang. There were also many restaurants, cafes, and bars for nighttime entertainment for the many business travelers staying in the area.

Although we visited many sights of historic and cultural interest, I do think that I enjoy Beijing more as a whole. Beijing has such a great concentration of interesting sights, both new and old, that it would take a lifetime to experience it all. Shanghai is an interesting city with a booming nightlife scene, but I do not believe that I would want to live in a city that is so focused on a 9-5 business culture.