All you can eat

Sorry for the delayed updates, I’ve been busy with weekend trips and school that I haven’t had time to compile all my trips into words.

Here is a little recap of the past couple weeks…

For 85kuai (another word for money like we have “dollars” and “bucks”) all your dreams can come true. And no I’m not referring to a happy ending, I’m talking about all you can eat buffets. Around the city there exist uncountable buffets that range from 50kuai all the way to 300kuia for all you can eat and drink free flowing champagne. The other night we found an 85kuai buffet that offers all you can eat Indian food and drink free flow beer. Talk about a safe haven in a city of small portions. I believe the reason behind the Chinese’s thinness is their small portions. At many restaurants, on the street and off, the amount of food you receive is minimal, especially for a growing (hopefully still) boy like me. Maybe that’s why the Chinese eat their rice and noodles ravenously, they are starving! Although I eat many times throughout the day, I never feel full. After the other nights gorge my insatiable hungry was cured. I piled my plate high as if it was my last meal and ate happily for a few hours. For all the food we ate and all the beer we drank the poor restaurant had to lose money on us. After dinner our group traveled to a club called Phebe’s. If you have epilepsy this place is not for you. I’ve never seen so many flashing lights, shooting lasers, and disco balls. Needless to say it was a great night.

When I’m not in class, or sleeping, I’m exploring the city. Like Anthony Bourdain says, “you can spend years in China and still never scratch the surface of what it has to offer.” I’m only in Shanghai and I feel like I’ll never see everything. I’m generally really good with maps and finding my way, but Shanghai has so many streets, nooks, and crannies, I constantly have to check the map to get anywhere. Navigating the subways is a piece of cake and because they just finished constructing new lines it’s possible to get anywhere in the city. I’ve been here for about a month and still haven’t checked out all the districts. My favorite district thus far is the French Concession. I consider it the Soho of Shanghai. I love it there. It’s literately an urban jungle. The streets are lined with trees so dense you cannot see the sky. A place I have explored a few times over is Taikang Lu. It reminds me of parts of Spain with its small alleyways, unique boutiques, and friendly cafes. I like to go there and drink coffee while I do my homework.

one of the streets in the french concession, birds for sale 

Taikang St, an interweb of alleyways

 The other weekend the USAC group traveled to a city called SuZhou. It was about an hour bus ride from the city. As much as I like the city atmosphere it was nice to get out for the day. We stopped by a place called Tiger Hill. After civil wars thousands of years ago an important emperor lost the battle and proceeded to commit suicide. 3 days later a rare white tiger appeared and “guarded” his grave…hence tiger hill. I was a little disappointed that while I was there I didn’t see any tigers, just thousands of tourists taking photos. Other than the crowds, this place was breathtakingly beautiful. Surrounded by a river, filled with old stones, a rainforest’s worth of shrubbery, and of course the leaning pagoda. Although all these types of areas are significant for their respective reasons, they kind of all look the same: old architecture surrounded by trees. But this particular pagoda is the second most leaning tower in the world (following behind Italy’s leaning tower of Pisa). Unfortunately, I couldn’t see much lean, and therefore couldn’t take the much-needed picture of me “holding up the tower”. Moving on to what SuZhou is really known for, the silk production. Making silk is a long and arduous process that involves cultivating silk worms and then using their cocoons to mix with water...zzzzz. If I explained the whole process you might fall asleep while reading this. Just know we got to see the whole process and walk around all the machines, which was cool to see. The best part was the gift shop that showcased everything they can make with silk. My favorite pieces of work, other than the softer than God’s butt comforters, were the silk paintings. They looked like they were painted with a brush, but upon closer examination you can see the strands of silk colored and strategically placed to create the image.

Tiger Hill, me in front of the "leaning" pagoda

Getting lost in Tiger Hill looking for the bus

Silk Worms!

I took a trip to Old City the other day with a couple friends to explore the shops, people watch, and of course eat. Let me start by saying that this past week  (September 22-24 the annual Moon Festival took place). When ever there is a holiday it means the city is packed (more than usual) and places get so crowded that walking becomes impossible. The only movement that takes place is the shuffling of feet and the swinging of elbows. Old City is known for the Yuyuan Gardens, famous, essentially identical to all the other gardens I’ve seen thus far, nonetheless beautiful. But more importantly, there is a place called Nanxiang Steamed Bun Restaurant. This is the world renowned place to get the xiaolongbao 小龙包 ß those are the Chinese characters if you couldn’t figure that out. These delicately crafted, skillfully cooked, and quickly (kind of) served SOUP dumplings are the reason I came to China, other than to learn Mandarin and the art of the crouching tiger (which by the way I’m getting pretty good). The thing I like about this place is that it’s not only for tourists, the locals love this place as well. It is a double window operation, overlooking the central lake, where five or six chefs work vigorously to dish out thousands of little dumplings. The line stretches foreeeevvverrrrrrrr. Naturally, I had to hop in line to try these little treats. After an hour of watching people walk by with their dumplings unknowingly taunting people in the queue, I got my fix. For 20kuai I received 16 dumplings (that’s the standard order), and I stuffed my face with them ahh nom nom. On the inside of these thin doughed dumplings from god sits a pork/crab meat mix surrounded by soup that you have to skillfully suck out; otherwise you’ll burn your mouth/face (I’ve seen it happen…amateurs.)  I was in heaven.

*Quick side note, since I’ve been here I’ve noticed a few things about the Chinese culture. The one that is most noticeable is the Chinese peoples’ favorite hobby: waiting in line. I swear if you go anywhere and line up 4 or 5 people the Chinese will queue up so quickly the line will stretch down the road.  We all like free things, but the Chinese people LOVE free things. This was most noticeable at the Shanghai World EXPO, where they would rush towards the counter at the end of a pavilion and grab a handful worth of freebies.

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I was kidding when I said it was crowded

The best dumplings in the world

The World Expo. WOW. All the posters reiterate the Expo’s slogan: Better City Better Life. The world expo is suppose to provide information about each country’s infrastructe, what they’re known for, and what they plan on doing in the future to “go green”; I guess not all the countries got that memo because some pavilions included nothing about their infrastructure and future goals where as others nailed it. The pavilions I visited include: Pakistan, Cambodia, Indonesia, Singapore, Australia, Sweden, Iceland, and Spain. I plan to go back in the next week or so to visit a few more including Germany, UAE, and the UK. The pavilions are huge and the architecture is like nothing I’ve ever seen before. I spent the whole day looking up with my camera glued to my eye. My favorite pavilion was Singapore’s. I think they captured the idea of the expo perfectly. On the first floor there was a food section, a clothes section, a video game racing section, and a music section. All these sections were exhibits exemplifying the best of what the country has to offer. On the next floor there was a huge video room where they played a 6-minute music, video, montage of Singapore showing their future plans and their current landmarks. On top of three skyscrapers in Singapore there exists a park called Sky Park, which is essentially a glorified roof top garden. To emulate that, the top floor of the Singapore Pavilion was a roof top garden that overlooked the expo. The expo is one of the main reasons for tourism to Shanghai right now. On an average day the expo endures about 260,000 people. On a holiday, upwards of 400,000, and on the day we went there were roughly 170,000 people. I’m not just making these up! The TVs on the subway provide an expo count daily and report it to the city. Even going on a day that had under the average number of people, we still had to wait in line for an hour for the better pavilions… like I said, the Chinese love waiting in line. Despite the heat and crowds rivaling Disneyland on the weekend, the expo was a great experience. I can’t wait to go back this week.

Inside the Australian Pavilion

The outside of the Singapore Pavilion

As September finishes up and October starts I’m hoping for a temperature change. I’m from California; I love the sun and the heat. But in Shanghai, the sun and heat also means humidity. I’m not a big fan on the rain, some would go as far to say that I melt in the rain, but when it rains here I love it. Rain means I can wear a shirt, shorts, and sandals and not be sweating. I’m also looking forward to familiar faces. Mom and Dena will be arriving on the 4^th of October. I’m excited to show them around the city, eat great food, and take a real hotel shower.

Chinese phrase of the week

Hao jiu bu jian 好就不见 (pronounced how-jio-boo-gee-an)

Translation: long time no see