And now, as promised...

I'll try to keep this recap of Shanghai as brief and enjoyable as possible.

On Saturday we arrived bright and early via the hard sleeper train. Note to Chinese smokers: smoking in-between cars still makes the entire car smell! Also, if the train does not arrive at the station until 8am, why does everyone still get up at 6am? Not necessary.

Our first item on the agenda was to go on field trips for our classes, so our media class went to the Youth News Group (which publishes several youth newspapers and a magazine) and then jetted over to Shanghai TV where we wandered around their news set. Both were pretty predictable: the newspaper offices were poorly decorated and employees dressed casually, though this being China and the newspaper having once been founded/supported by Mao himself, the journalists were all pretty conservative in their viewpoints. We didn't get to talk to any people at the TV station so I'm not sure on their views, but it was clear that working in TV is much more glamorous and higher paid (obviously). There was nothing exciting to report except that STV recently launched a new channel called SC1 that basically only shows foreign TV shows because they are much more exciting than any Chinese programs. (This is sadly true. Chinese TV consists of "news", period dramas, bad variety shows, and music concerts).

After that we had dinner and then were free until Monday morning. Naturally we went down to the Bund and took many many photographs while we were harassed by many many salespeople. Then we walked up Nanjing Road, which is like the Wangfujin area of Shanghai so it has lots of fancy shops (but not too high end). We got to the endish, had a beer, and called it a night.

Sunday we had lots of plans. First stop: Shanghai Museum at the People's Square. It was very well done, kinda small, but free so it was worth it. All Chinese ancient artwork and basically I wanted to steal the entire ceramic exhibit. The hall of minorities was pretty cool too, especially the map that showed all 50 of the minorities and which part of China they live in. Yes, I am a nerd. Yes, I really want to go to Yunnan.

Anyway then we walked down Huaihai Road which is the 5th Ave of Shanghai. We found a little French deli in a nice mall and I had a tuna panini for lunch. Amazing! So we continued our pursuit of French things in Shanghai by heading south to the old French concession. On our way we stopped at Fuxing Park and ended up staying there for a couple hours because it was just so beautiful. The best/strangest part was when we sat on the grass playing spoons and all these Chinese people started gathering around us, just leaning over and staring at our game. I guess they were trying to figure out what we were doing bc when we started playing Egyptian ratscrew they left for more interesting sights, saying they already knew that game. Weirdddd!

The bestest bestest part of the day was stumbling upon a little area called Tianzifang in the French Concession. It's a slice of old Shanghai with all these cool boutiques, coffee shops, and bars. I bought a journal that I bargained down two whole kuai and got some extra cards thrown in. My skills are astounding, I know. Well unfortunately although this was undoutbedly the coolest place ever, we had plans to meet up with Cathy (my studying-in-Shanghai pengyou) for dinner near the Pearl Tower, so we had to get back to the subway.

May I just warn anyone needing to take the subway from People's Square at 5.30pm that this is probably going to be the most ridiculous too-many-people-in-one-underground-area experience of your life. But we made it, and we made it on time, and then we had a delicious lunch at the high class shopping mall opposite the Pearl Tower. After dinner we wanted to go up the tower but it turned out to be a 150 yuan fee, so that didn't happen. And we wanted to find another building to go up but they were all on the other side of the river, so alas we called it a night.

Monday we had class in the morning, wherein several Shanghai university journalism students stopped by and told us how great and propaganda-full the Chinese media is. And by tell us I mean they showed us with their blatant acknowledgement that journalists are the mouthpieces of the government... and no one cares. Awesome for the future of Chinese media, right?

Basically the entire class I was thinking: can we please leave so I can go shopping now? K thanks. So once we were let out we headed over to the most famous tourist area in Shanghai: the Yu Gardens. It's a really old maze of gardens surrounded by a huge bazaar full of people, overpriced shops, stinky tofu, and more people. Needless to say after all the hype I was not overly impressed, and though the gardens themselves were cool, the hoardes of tourist groups clogging up the paths kinda ruined the mood. Also I am sad to report that the American tourists were terribly easy to spot because they were both poorly dressed and overweight. Sigh.

We accidentally walked down Old Shanghai Road on our way out in search of a taxi, and it was pretty cool. The shops were much more Chinese and it seemed like normal (Shanghai?) people actually shopped there, instead of other Chinese people on holiday. Skipping forward in time... we headed back out later to meet Cathy for dinner near Nanjing East Rd and had some yummy Singaporean food. Then we had some drinks at a couple bars, went in search of a dance club and failed miserably, and went back home. After all the hype about Shanghai bars and the clubbing scene, either we really struck out or the scene actually isn't all that it's cracked up to be.

Quickly, I will get to the end of this too-long recap: Next day took the D bullet train to Nanjing. Had 7ish hours to kill there so went into the city center and walked around the giant shopping area. Bought two Chinese books: Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Harry Potter. Actually Charlie is a pretty easy read... good to know I have the Chinese reading level equivalent to an elementary school child. Then took the soft sleeper back to Beijing where we arrived Wednesday morning to witness the throngs of Chinese tour groups descending upon Tiananmen for the National Holiday. You can't get away from the tourists, you really can't.

Final note: Internet is down momentarily so further posting will commence once it has been fixed. Hopefully within a day but I can't make any promises.