Shanghai Romance

After two and a half years in Asia, I guess I finally owe you guys an account of my exotic Oriental travels.  First on the list: Shanghai, China.

Down the Chinese rabbit hole we go!!!

 

Travel account from April 2011

My husband is not quite as adventurous as me, so I thought I would ease him into Chinese culture by way of Shanghai, which is abundant in European flavors woven delicately but overtly into local Chinese tradition.  After having comfortably settled into life in Korea, Hottie and I planned our trip to Shanghai and booked a room at the fantabulous Yangtze Langham Hotel after having stalked it on Jetsetter.com. A few weeks after nervously applying for travel visas (which for a military family equate to signing away all privacy to secret communist "minders" while in country), we boarded a plane to Mao Tze Dong's home land.

Five minutes after landing, the Chinese were already trying to rob us blind.

The hotel was downtown and about a 45 minute drive from the hotel, which supposedly had a kiosk at the airport. We landed, grabbed our bags and headed out through the crowds to the meeting area, where a hawk-eyed man in a suit asked us what hotel we were staying at and ushered us to a row of kiosks where he would arrange our shuttle ride.  Apparently, we could wait over an hour for the shuttle or pay for a cab ride sooner, which sounded great to us. Unfortunately, in our groggy post airborne haze, Hottie miscalculated the exchange rate and we paid -- get this -- $200 for a slow laborious ride through the industrial wasteland suburbs in a crotchety old mini van with no A/C whose paint job had been corroded by smog.

 "Welcome to China, Round Eye."

To our joy, however, downtown Shanghai was gorgeous -- manicured, brightly lit and wearing all of the old world charm it is renown for.  I was entranced.

British Banking District

Nanjing Road at night

Russian Embassy

An advertisement about mayonnaise...made of babies?  Ummm....

Adorable elderly couples in a street dance.

Aaaaand smog.  Yummy.

street art

The Yangtze Langham Hotel was a 5-star art deco beauty of a place in opulent 1920s vintage style complete with traditional Chinese-Western jazz fusion singers (the popular style of the roaring 20s heyday). And a fancy wine bar happy hour.  Cha-ching!

Our friend (the Chinese mascot) lovingly dubbed "Blue Gumby" chillin' in the room. He must be enjoying the gazillion-threadcount sheets.

The next day proceeded as another procession of people trying rob us blind, which turned Hottie into the country's angriest (and tallest) man, while I made a game of seeing how many seconds it took to shake each street sales con(wo)man as we walked by trying to ignore them as obviously as possible. First stop: The People's Park.

The Big Cheese: Chairman Mao

Worker's Party memorial.  Because all Chinese workers are huge and ripped like that

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 The People's park off of Nanjing Road is mostly comprised of celebratory statues, though the grounds are  gorgeous as well.  Determined to make my man fall in love with the beauty of the city, however, I suggested that we also go to one of the more fantastic parks enjoyed by locals and by which many Chinese cities are decorated for the enjoyment (and pacification) of the people.  The next park we went to was absolutely mind blowing in its beauty, with highly manicured shrubs balance by the more natural grace of billowing willows over massive koi ponds.  Thin elderly Chinese men and women defied their appearance through the strong, slow, controlled dancing movements of t'ai chi, and children bounded between smooth, majestic boulders.  We were not disappointed by the place.

Until...

I entered the park's public restroom.  Having seen the impressive effort put into the park's development and maintenance by the local government, I stepped into that restroom expecting nothing less than a functioning restroom with all basic requirements for sanitation met.  Boy, was I wrong.  I found the squat ("Turkish") toilets overflowing with piles of human feces.  Literally.  Mountains of it.  In shock that a country able to provide illustrious parks did not fulfill fundamental rules of public hygiene and sanitation for the health of its citizens, I immediately turned o the sink to wash off the grime I imagined to be on myself, having simply been in the space.  No soap.  I turned the faucet handle.  No water.

Really, China?  Really?  I was so impressed with the show up until now.   

To cleanse the palette, we followed up the park with an amazing dinner of Hunan cuisine and a visit to a popular jazz club, which was so awesomely smoky and dark in all the right ways that I insisted we return almost every night we were there. Nothing beats heavy draperies, smooth yet husky voices, mellow jazz and a good drink with a cigar. Mmmmmmmm.....

Hottie the Great

Inside the hotel with the beloved jazz club.

Oh sweet, dark jazz....

Old Town Shanghai gave us a taste of the historic Chinese culture unadulterated by western colonialism. The old gardens were impressive on their quiet grandeur and lack of fecal mountains. Apparently you CAN get a good toilet if you are a tourist paying an entry fee. :-)

Trashcan photo bomb.

 

That cup of tea with quail eggs cost of $50.  Don't ask.

Before leaving we made sure to hit up the local drinkeries, as is our style. An Aussie bar in the French Concession (makes perfect sense, right?), the adorable1929 bistro and a nameless pub with a skinny long-haired Chinese bartender named Miller who charmed us with a performance of every Michael Jackson dance ever which he "practiced every day with VHS tape." Priceless.

The French Concession

1929

It seems that Blue Gumby also refused to stay back in the hotel and followed us everywhere we went. 

So in the end, Shanghai won my heart with the way it clung to its romantic yet complex history. And with the kids squatting to pee in the street gutters. And with the old men trying to shine Hottie's shoes while he walked that elicited hilarious fits of awkward and confused rage from him. Needless to say, I wanted to go back to China, but he refused. Maybe I could get him to Myanmar next to readjust his expectations....

More adventures to be unveiled soon!