Shanghai Weekend #2

If you're ever living in China and go to the Shanghai-Pudong airport to fetch someone, you should know that there are completely separate arrivals stations for domestic and international arrivals and only one little sign to indicate this.
I happened to arrive at the airport two hours before the before did, although my life being what it is, he ended up waiting for me for about 45 minutes.
Time is never on my side.
When you factor in his plane's 30 minute premature arrival as well as my stupidity in missing the aforementioned sign, I was not a very welcoming host.
We were finally off and on our way to the Shanghai Hotel Indigo. Hotel Indigo is my favorite brand, not just under IHG, but in the world of hotels. They are distinctly boutique and always well-designed. The service is great without having uptight staff.
It's the kind of brand a girl that bores of working in chain hotels, but doesn't want to lose her travel discount, dreams of.
Anyway.
Our room was designed as if it were a studio apartment: brick walls, day bed serving as a couch, a quarter canopy over the bed, a super fab desk area, and the most awesome view of the Bundt you could possibly get (and did I mention the walk-in shower that has a floor to ceiling window to show it off?).
I could probably use the rest of this post to go on and on about the hotel, but I will let you experience it for yourself sometime or just check out there site here.
The next morning he surprised me with American cereal he had brought from home (heck yes!) and we headed off to have breakfast at a place called A Future Perfect.
Now, I would also love to continue the rest of this post ranting and raving about how fabulous our breakfast was there, except we never made it.
Yeah, we got lost and in the haste of our hunger settled on a random cafe with mediocre food.
This made me particularly sad because I like to go to Shanghai for the food. Shanghai is cool and all, but there really isn't anything more important to me, a girl that lives in a relatively small China town with little access to decent food, than the international food scene.
So, we ate our mediocre food and then got lost some more on our way to try to go to a temple that ended up being too busy and too expensive for us to care to go to anymore. In the end, we spent most of the day on the subway and part of it at People's Park, which is essentially the Central Park of Shanghai.

I told you, the New York of Asia.
Along the way, I made sure he tried a few of my favorite things: Yakult, Green Apple flavored Fanta (or "fen dah" as the Chinese say), Bueno Bars, and the CoCo stand's milk tea.
And he kept on in a game of "Can you smell that?"
I know I've complained about how the water just reeks of pollution, as does the air, and the occasional disgusting smell of weird Chinese food or spoiling, well, whatever.
I'm happy to report that by this point those smells no longer existed.
Well, as long as my nose knew they didn't.
Unfortunately this wasn't the case for Nick who was a constant reminder that I could no longer smell these fumes.
"You can't smell that?"
"There's no way you can't smell that one."
"I can't believe you're practically Chinese now that you nose has turned."
Okay, that last one was a little harsh.
I wonder if I was that obnoxious when I first arrived. It's okay, Nick, I forgive you.
That evening, Nick had his first try of the amazing soup-filled dumplings at Din Tai Fung.

Fortunately for you, you don't have to go all the way to Shanghai to enjoy one of my new favorite restaurants on the planet. They also have a location in Los Angeles and Seattle. 

So, in all probability, you only have to fly across the country instead of around the world. 

And it's worth it. 

I assure you. 

We wrapped up our last night in Shanghai by going to the Apple store so Nick could get his cult fix, but also brag to his co-workers back at his home Apple store and, finally, up the Oriental Pearl Tower. 

Standing at 1,535 feet, the Oriental Pearl Tower is a sight to see among over 3,000 sky scrapers in Shanghai. And because this is China, it is much prettier at night. Just as a refresher: the Chinese love their neon lights in the night sky, plus it makes you forget about all the smog you're breathing into your lungs.
I was deathly afraid of the glass floor and consistently ridiculed with each child that ran by in utter happiness at the thought of running across the city of Shanghai at over 1,500 feet, with no regard of what I was sure was pending doom from running along glass at that height.
I was ready for bed or alcohol.
But a bed actually sounded better since I had already probably sweat out all my water weight that day.
In fact, I'm ready for it now just thinking about it.

Suzhou Week 10/26 (Shanghai)

My manager was having a particularly moody day on Friday and when these come along, she often takes it out on me by following me around for the day and criticizing the stupidest things.
"Why are you standing there? Go polish plates."
"You can't polish plates right now, we have a guest." (Mind you there are four people working the floor that could attend to this solitary guest's needs)
"Why don't you ever polish plates correctly."
Usually, when she gets upset with me she acts like many of you mothers do: "go play in your room I'm too frustrated to see you right now." Or, if you're a particularly fun parent, "why don't you go play in the street?"
For me, it's, "just go polish the plates." This is basically, "I'm going to banish you to the back to be by yourself and think about what you did while you polish plates alone for an hour."
The punishment isn't all that effective since, well, now they force me to wear heels, so I get to sit down when I do this.
I also get to message back and forth with people at home in between dishes.
Most importantly, she doesn't usually come back there.
Oh, well. I didn't care. As soon as 3:30 came, I was out of there.
The room mate and I were headed to Shanghai for a fun weekend out of Suzhou and in an international city.
Better yet, karma came to bite her when she was so stricken with lady cramps that she went home early (score!).
I couldn't change out of my uniform fast enough. I grab my bag out of my locker, we hailed a taxi and we were gone to the Suzhou train station.
We were taking the bullet train into Shanghai which meant only 20 minutes instead of 45 minutes of travel time.
This also meant we were going to be going 300 kilometers an hour and every time a train passed a station, you could hear the roar as if you were standing next to a roller coaster track.
It was awesome.
I was unbelievable stoked.
Also, I imagine real estate near these lines is ridiculously cheap.
For my trip in a few weeks I much prefer the trains for travel instead of planes. More eco-friendly, the same price or cheaper than flying, and less security and safety issues - you only go through a metal detector looking for real weapons (as in not finger nail clippers or liquid containers larger than three ounces) before you wait in the lobby for your train to be called.
When your train is called, everyone forms a crowd in front of the ticket machines (very similar to a subway ticket machine). When the machines go green to allow people to go through, people press on and head downstairs outside to the platform. Within a minute or so, the train arrive, people get off, and you get on.
Even in second class, the seats were comfortable (like airline ones except way more leg room and more comfortable in general).
The whole experience was like using the subway, except instead of going across town, we went to a whole different city in just twenty minutes. It's just crazy!
We arrived and went through another subway ticket machine that cleared our tickets before lining up to sweat for 15 minutes in the taxi line. As we drove through the city in 5:00 traffic, I was grateful I lived in a small town like Suzhou, but also happy that I lived so close to what seriously appears as the China New York City.
The number of high rises are crazy. The availability of not only foreigners, but awesome foreign food is comforting.
While I quickly gained a sense of direction, I was still thankful to live in a smaller town like Suzhou that is easy to see a lot of especially on my bike. I will probably never see all of Shanghai.
We stayed with a family friend of the room mate's and went  to dinner with her at an Indonesian place. She and Grace are both native Malaysians so this food is familiar for them. I had a blast trying new food that, despite what it looked like, tasted awesome. I had a great sauteed chicken dish, Indonesian salad, soup that I didn't want to know what was in it, not-so-awesome tofu (but when is tofu ever good?), and an interesting coconut milk dessert which was great even though I don't usually like coconut milk.
We went to the supermarket to pick up a few things for the weekend and it was then that I envied her living in Shanghai. The availability of more western items is so nice, granted it is more expensive just like in Suzhou. But still, just knowing they are there to splurge on sometimes is nice. Before the weekend ended I successfully avoided buying Cinnamon Toast Crunch and Doritos, but opted for Honey Com, Nutella, Raisinets, and Reese's Pieces (I couldn't help myself).
We spent most of Saturday walking.
If you've got the time, it's always the best way to really soak in the city. Get a glimpse of a day in the life, get lost, stumble on cool things.
First we had breakfast at this little cafe near the French Concession called Cafe Vienna. It was a super awesome little place that served a set international breakfast, as in, I got to enjoy bottomless awesome coffee, some eggs, and wheat toast with an amazing mixed berry jam.
From there we roamed a while before we reached a park that feature a huge lawn (a China rarity) as well as a small rose garden.

And then we walked some more until we reach a little street with lots of vendors selling old stuff. Grace was really into these neat vintage cameras and I was just perusing, really. Although, like with many countries, in these little shopping districts, you can't look long before someone is upon you trying to haggle out a deal. Generally, I was told to cut off 80%.
Yep, 80%.
They will haggle, rationalize the price, make you feel like you are trying to cheat them, but, in the end, if you standing firm between the passing of the calculator, or even walk away, they give in.
It's all in the fun, I guess.
We roamed through another larger, more modern and Chinese-looking shopping district (stopping for some dairy queen and then watermelon from a street vendor) before a promenade on The Bundt.
Essentially a large walkway on the river that divides the city, the view The Bundt offers is one that you would imagine looking at NYC. I'm telling you, this is the Asia New York.

We took the tourist tunnel across which is basically like taking a little subway train car as slow as Spaceship Earth that makes about as much sense as the Figment Ride at EPCOT.

Essentially, transportation with entertainment that was designed by people on acid, surely.
Think lots of electric lights and weird videos.
Kind of expensive, too, at 50 RMB a person. It was quirky, but I'm glad we did it, although I wouldn't say it's a must-do.
We stopped for a snack at this giant 7-story mall that feature this restaurant with soup dumplings. I wasn't sure how to eat them, but if you ever get the chance, I don't recommend taking a bite of about half of it.

I essentially snorted all the soup as it shot into my nasal cavity.
At least it made for a good laugh.
We were a 20 minute walk from Grace's Aunt's place, so walk we did. And in the midst of those 20 minutes while walking on a not-very populated street, is how we ended up at the Shanghai-Pudong Police station with a complimentary ride in the cop car.
I reached in my backpack pocket to change the song on my iPhone. I listen to music in the background all day so I know if someone has taken my phone (the music will cut off).
I went to put it back and the music stopped, I looked down and my cord was hanging. As I often do, I had missed the pocket.
And it was in those 5 seconds before I turned around that some lucky and horrible person walking behind me took off with my phone.
And that makes 2 phones stolen in 3 months in China.
Fortunately, Nick was coming in the next week, but no more new phones for China-Madison. I'm inheriting an old 3G.
A local was nice enough to help us check around just in case, but it was no where to be found so he called the police for us who came, looked around, and told us to get in the car.
I was anxious since no one was giving me a translation break, but I got in after Grace, who told me we were going to the station to file a report.
I wondered why since there was no way we were going to find it, but when we crossed a room full of TV screens of cameras around the city, I wished I had reported the first one.
Their translator was out for the evening, fortunately I had Grace. Neither of us had a copy of our visas and she didn't have a copy of her passport, which worried me with all the new strict immigration laws they're passing, alas, I am writing this from my apartment in Suzhou, so I haven't been deported yet.
They were very apologetic and filed a detailed report, down to a description of my clothing in which they had to ask how to say what I was wearing on my head. Of course, I didn't realize what they were talking about until she laughed and pronounced "bandana."
They asked for a description of the phone, its case, and the serial number.
Since I didn't have the last one, I was practically SOL. By this point, the case was trash as well as my SIM card, but the serial number never leaves.
So if you're ever in China, or abroad, really, always carry a copy of your passport, visa, and the serial number for your phone on you.
Now you know.
Fortunately the police station put us a few blocks closer to the apartment building, so we hurried home before her aunt got too upset at us for taking so long (she had made us an awesome dinner with Apple pie).
She could tell I was upset and was quick to say, "Well, hey, there's nothing you can do about it. This is Asia after all."
Of course, for the most part, in the states someone would have picked that phone up for me or just left it. But not here. And apparently not in China or the rest of Asia.
Except Japan.
She told me that the number one thing at the police station is lost umbrella's. Yeah, people actually take people's lost umbrellas to the police station to report. They also told me the story of a woman that left her purse in a cab there. Late that night, the cabbie arrived after his shift to her doorstep to personally return her bag.
Why didn't I end up in Japan?
We took advantage of being in Shanghai the next day by eating Mexican for lunch. I felt so at home in that place it was crazy. Mostly because it is near an expatriate living complex and didn't have a single Chinese person in there other than the staff, but also because of the decoration, the music and just the general feel of it all.
Grace made this amazing Malaysian cake that I really want to beg her to make for me when we are both back in the states and just ship to me from Vermont for Christmas or something.
As I was looking out at the amazing view of the sunset on The Bundt, 50 floors up, eating this delicious cake, I realized what a perfect weekend I had, despite the phone, and how gorgeous China can be sometimes.

You just have to look past the smog and the stealing, sometimes.