Hangin' Out in Shanghai

After Hong Kong we flew back from Shen Zhen to Shanghai.

Now I want to say this first and foremost. I'm Shanghainese, so I love Shanghai. However I am happy to report that Sarah and I love Shanghai together!

For example we spent an entire day in the Shanghai museum - yes we got in at 11:00am in the morning, left for a 30 mins lunch break and went back in to hang out till it closed at 5:00pm in the afternoon. No we're not crazy - it's an awesome museum.

We went shopping in Qi Pu Road for super cheap clothes and bought a whole bunch of skirts, socks and tops for less than $100AUD between us - CRAZY!

We also went to do some 'cultural' walks down Duo Lun Road (with its nifty bronze sculptures of intellectual type revolutionaries - think Montmarte without the prostitutes), Jing An Temple (which we didn't go into because we couldn't figure out if it was old enough to be worth seeing :p) as well as around the old French Concession area and the Bund.

We lined up for Nanxiang Dumplings (which are well worth the 40 minute wait) and bargained for chopsticks at the Yu Gardens. Not that the chopsticks really required much bargaining on our part, that basically involved a lady chasing us down the street gradually lowering the price from 220yuan to 40yuan :p

We went fake shopping near the old Xiangyang market which only hardened my resolve never to buy fakes again - Xin's poor thighs were not made to withstand going up and down dilapitated stairs whose steepness is a challenge to the will of the weary fake hunter... You can take me back to Hong Kong and the boutiques for those goods thank you very much...

We also spent the last night going to Zapatas (the crazy Mexican style RnB club with the free margaritas for ladies :p), Beni's Bar (Johnny's favourite bar in all of Shanghai) and Windows (with the RnB and the 10yuan shooters)... mmm...

Oh and we also went to Zhou Zhuan which is like a 'Chinese Venice' - or as the ad put is 'the No. 1 Water Town in China'. Whatever. There's a photo of Sarah there in my Trip Photos gallery (look to your left). It's decidedly pretty and all the old architecture from the ye China of old is absolutely fascinating but the vendors and hawkers on every street and corner definitely detract from the experience. Especially when you go with a tour group and they dump you in some stupid silk factory making overpriced goods for 30 mins when you just want to go home...

Okay I'm tired and going to sleep now, just running through the list of what we did in 10 days is making me exhausted. In the meantime, cause I know you miss me so much you can peruse the photos that I uploaded to the web - and no complaints about the quality, do you know how HARD it is to upload photos here on dial up, especially when there has been an earthquake in Taiwan stuffing up all the internet connections?!?