China #2 - Wandering the streets & tastes of Shanghai

October 2nd, 2011 - Happy Day After China's 62nd National Day!!!!!

Hi there folks...sorry it has been a while....but the beginning of this school year has been super crazy....i am not sure if i ever will feel in the groove here...the technology just keeps working against me....but the kids are great and we have been having fun playing in the lab.....i am just about to head out to bali, indonesia for my october break and when i return 8th graders and i will be embarking on a exploration in chemistry and 6th graders and i will be playing with things that fly....should be fun....

life here in shanghai is going quite well...i have started taking mandarin lessons, we have them twice a week....should be interesting...just from one lesson i can tell the hard selling chinese folks i am just looking and am not really interested in buying something (bu yao or kankan)....a great thing to know for the markets.....in the past few weeks i have wandered down along the Bund, had some amazing dishes from lots of different types of foods, danced the night away to a band composed of fellow teachers, taken a bamboo raft down a river & had a massive water fight the whole way, celebrated the moon festival, celebrated my birthday and yesterday was China's national day - 62nd year of celebration....which means fireworks were everywhere and all of the chinese people who normally live in this town have left to go to hometowns, and all of the chinese people that don't live here are here as tourists....its really mellow out where i live...but pretty busy in the downtown area, museums and tourist attractions....hence why i am getting out of town....so to bali i go....woot!!!

this round of pictures has some of the shots i took from some of the adventures i have been on since you last read....and i have more coming.....on with the pictures....the first one below is from my walk along the bund....the bund is the main waterway through town and it separates puxi (pronounced pushheeeeee) from pudong (sounds like its spelled)....i live on the puxi side....one day i hopped the metro and went to visit the bund and take some pictures and i was so lucky because it was rather clear that day....not much pollution, as you can see from the shots....i love this first shot, because it is taken through the monument to People's Heroes and is focused on the pearl tv tower...one of the most recognizable buildings here in shanghai....last time i was in china i was up in that tower and i will get there one of these days again....  

this next shot is of the pudong side of the bund....so you get to see many of the sky scrapers here in shanghai...but that's only on one side of the river...there are plenty from the side i am taking the shot from....also, behind me on the puxi side are the very art deco buildings...so one day i will get over to the pudong side and take a shot toward puxi so you can see the craziness of the combination of buildings...and then there's the french concession....but that will take an entire update to show photos from that section...old villas, ivy covered and mansion-like....its way cool....
 

along the bund are monuments to everything that is china....and of course chairman mao is there...and here he is with the pearl tower behind him....i wonder what he would say about this building and everything that has come about in china since that day 62 years ago when he declared china its own republic for the people.....i just wonder.....

from the bund i wandered up nanjing road...which is a crazy busy shopping street...and i was there at 5pm on a saturday....it was packed out with tourists and chinese folks....had to push may way through for part of the time....but this shot below can give you an idea of what it looks like....anything and everything you could want...and two enormous malls to boot....just insane...i do like this shot because the lights were all just starting to come on....
 

and here is another one of the many buildings of shanghai....i think i could take a picture of everyone of them and never be able to post all of the pictures i would take...the architecture here is simply incredible and one day i will get to walk around and take them all...i hope....and we have a building down the street that has been being built since we got here, and i can't believe how fast it is going up....they have added so many floors in the 2 months i have been here...its now about 56 floors high....crazy!!!! however, if you heard about the line 10 metro crash this week....things that happen fast (like the building of the metro lines) are starting to be questioned quietly....and not many folks were on the metro this week after wednesday....makes a girl wonder....but i do like the building in the shot below

on the walk i took i finally made it to my favorite building in the entire city....the marriott downtown...and as luck would have it it was way close to 1st quarter of the moon and all was visible for this shot...LOVE IT!!!!  i love the pyramid + the sphere of this building....
 

as promised last time, i said i would send some funny shots....so here i am out with some of my favorite people, in one of my favorite restaurants....an italian place, run by a japanese family....and yes...it rocks and i am eating my penne pasta with chopsticks....they have forks for those who cannot use them, as chopsticks are not used in japan...and many japanese go to this restaurant....but i aim for using the chopsticks whenever given the chance....mangia!!!!!
 

i thought you also might want to see one of my favorite breakfast foods here in shangahi...its a dai bin...i think :)  its a crepe, made on a very hot pan, filled with potato chunks, cilantro, spicy sauce, a type of black bean sauce, an egg scrambled & blended in and this crunchy thing, fried bread sort of....this is the lady who makes me these twice a week....yummy!!!!
 

these are the ingredients that get mixed and and blended with the crepe....at the bottom of the shot you can see the money box....these cost 3 kwai = 50 cents....not bad for a breakfast that fills you up until lunch....if you look closely at the money, there you can see chairman mao again....he isn't everywhere, but yet, he is.....

for the funny sign this update, i promised to show you the saying on my favorite brand of cashews....and here you go....they tease you and capitrate you....whatever that means....they sure capitrated me....i love them :)
 

the shot below is the name of the street where i live and where the school is...it is a major street in puxi leading out of the city....hongqiao - pronounced hong chow....in mandarin it is looking like i will only be speaking this language...i am finding i do not recognize any characters....except for the numbers one, two and three...one horizontal line, 2 horizontal lines and three horizontal lines...but maybe you can figure it out....

another funny shot comes from a stop in the pearl market...where you can find anything for sale...even a lighter that is a huge match and a huge cigarette that is a lighter too...di was making her mom face about me not smoking....love it! but no...i did not buy it....you can see the bugs in plastic behind me...they literally sell everything....even "real looking" NFL football jerseys...might have to pick one of those up though, as they are super cheap...but of course they aren't real-real....
 

the first weekend in september was the moon festival...and in honor of that moon cakes were everywhere....now you can get these filled with sweet or savory things....and some people swear that the meat ones are the best....i say the ice cream ones from haagen daaz are the best, but i didn't have any of the meat ones....i did have this one though, filled with red bean paste....not my favorite...but i felt i needed to try a traditional one to say i had done it...no more in the future though...i put it on my living room table top, just because i have some really cool furniture and this is a way you can see it :)

this is the obama club...i haven't been inside...but i thought it would be cool for you to see this....that's his name in chinese....its a bit too much for me...and i am not sure if it's even open, as i have only gone past it on the way to a breakfast place we go to often...because they have the "big american" breakfast and unlimited coffee....today when i was there i got blueberry pancakes...yummy...the big american has way too much meat and food overall for me...but it is a good breakfast spot none-the-less....
 

the last shot is of me in a convenience store again....this time for your viewing pleasure i have some chicken feet in my possession....yummy....the ones i am holding are barbequed, but the ones to the left of me are plain....i am not sure how one chooses which one they want....eat them up...yum!!!!
 

and there you have it....update #2 from shanghai....yes, i am still really having fun exploring this place...but i am also very glad i am getting out of here tomorrow....i need some time away with a massage or two thrown in...i am hoping to get to the monkey temple and maybe see a celebration or dance of some type....but mostly i am excited to relax...it has been a crazy seven weeks of school and i know things will be better for me when rested and relaxed....it will be good for my kids too...

so happy national day (china style) and fall for everyone too, as we have now had the autumnal equinox....i am on my way tomorrow and i hope you are each happy and healthy....peace out.....