Downtown Shanghai

Ni Hao,

Well another week has gone by. Classes have started to settle in and it seems autumn is upon us in Shanghai. The last few days have been rainy and cold. The weather reminds me of Seattle or London. I have been enjoying my classes. We have progressed from learning tones and pronunciation of the Chinese language to writing characters. I have learned several basic sentences. I have to admit I’m not a fan of early morning classes. Classes have been different from my experience in Wyoming. Normally in Wyoming classes were fifty to ninety minutes. Every class in China is a hundred and twenty minutes with a ten minute break during the middle of the class. I’ve been doing plenty of studying. I’ve probably wrote a thousand characters by now. I’m still struggling with writing characters in their appropriate strokes. The language is very fascinating and challenging at the same time. The language is a lot like singing different tones have different pitches in voice and tone. When putting together sentences the tones change from high to low and move very quickly. The course work in the next few weeks will pick up according to our teachers. However, they say the class should be speaking basic Chinese by the end of the semester. I’m excited to see how far I get in the next few months. However, I must be making progress I was able for the first time to order food properly outside of the west gate of campus! I’ve included pictures from around the campus. I’m going to post a few new pictures from around the campus with each new blog post. The campus is massive so I should have new pictures almost every week. The one on the left is the library on campus and the one on the right is one of the class room buildings.
The university last weekend hosted a trip to downtown Shanghai. We started with a trip to the second tallest building in the city. The tower is called the Jingma Tower, which is located in the center of the city next to the tallest building in the city and the famous T.V. Tower across the way. After going through a long and winding line the group was escorted to an elevator that traveled up 88 floors/340 meters. I can’t say I’ve ever had my ears pop in an elevator until last weekend. At the end of the elevator guests are dropped off at the observation deck. The deck included windows on every side. We walked around in a circle fashion. There were interesting pictures, posters, and a brief history of the tower. The day was very smoggy so we couldn’t see that far out of the city. I can’t imagine what the view must be like on a clear day. It felt like we were in the clouds. My favorite part of this building was located in the very center of the observation deck. There is a glass window that looked straight down into the atrium of the hotel located in the tower. I included a picture of this on the right. It took several seconds for my eyes to catch up with the distance down to the main floor. It still surprises me how many skyscrapers are located in Shanghai. The other pictures I’ve included here are some of the international friends I have made and a picture with me and the T.V. tower in the background. Also, you can see in the background of this picture the Huangpu river. It was fun to see the large cargo ships and small private boats using the river for transportation. Shanghai is a port city, which has a large amount of international trade. Some of us are talking about touring the large shipyard at the end of the city. I think it would be fascinating to check out how much business is done through trade on the open seas. Hopefully, one of my blog posts will include a little more about the impact Shanghai has on worldwide trade.
Next the trip headed out for Yu Garden. The drive was about twenty minutes from the towers. We had several hours to kill so the group decided to get some lunch at a local dumplings restaurant. I can’t say I had many dumplings in my life before this trip, but we messed up the order and had about 40 dumplings between 3 people. It was a ton! We got it done, but can’t remember the last time I was that full. I’m still amazed how little everything costs here. Most meals outside of the university cost between eight and sixteen Yuan (which is equivalent to about two US dollars). But for this price you get enough food to feel full. Most meals include rice or noodles, so on top of meat you get carbohydrates that expand in your stomach. I still don’t know how the Chinese can stay thin on the amount of food that’s available for a low price. After leaving the restaurant the group proceeded to walk through local markets and shops to the gardens. While walking downtown it is common to see crumbling buildings next to American companies like McDonalds, Burger Kings, and Starbucks. Just before entering the gardens we crossed a bridge if crossed should bring good luck (hopefully it works). We paid about twenty Yuan to enter the garden. This garden was unlike the one I posted about before. The Yu Garden was built during Emperor Mao’s time. It hosted only elite members of society. Most the buildings were in good shape. There was water and bridges throughout the gardens. In the water were large gold fish, which people took the time to stop and feed the fish. We spent a few hours touring the buildings and taking pictures. Unfortunately, I don’t have all the pictures from other people’s cameras from this event so I included the few I had. I will include more from this trip in later posts. It was a beautiful place. I look forward to visiting the several other gardens throughout the city and country.

Our final stop for the day was a river tour of the Huangpu River. We traveled on a fairy that took the group up and down the river. Each side included a great view of the skyscrapers located in Shanghai. The tour took about an hour to go down and back. I couldn’t believe the amount of ships passing our tour. There is a huge difference between large shipping companies and the local fisherman. I tried to get the contrast in a few pictures I posted here. I was really shocked to you see huge freights carrying large amounts of cargo pass your little tour ship. The skyline was cool to see from the ship. I got a few videos of passing the large ships and buildings. Architecture in China is very different from the United States. I guess with the large population they have to adopt a build up philosophy. I don’t know if you can tell in the pictures, but days here are very gray. Rarely do you see the sun or blue sky. It’s unfortunate because on a clear day the boat ride would be even more spectacular than it already was. The city is preparing for the World Trade Expo next year so you can see and hear construction operations everywhere you go in the city. Signs are posted with the cities logo “better city, better life” all over the place. The city is torn up now but I have see pictures of the final visions of the planners and it looks amazing. I hope to see the final stage of Shanghai before I leave next year. The picture on the left is a small part of the Shanghai sky line and on the right is the large cargo ships I mentioned above.
After our tour of the city a few of us got ready to go out later that night. We decided to check out a few different clubs located downtown. The first we went to was a very European/American dance club. It had modern dance music and tons of people. The atmosphere was thick and the majority of the people there were from Europe. So due to the amount of people and prices of drinks we went to a different bar located further downtown. This included much better prices and techno music. Night life located throughout the city. The first place was located in a large mall and the second was included in a shopping district. Every Friday night they host different themes and types of drinks. The night life has been very impressive so far. Although, it takes about forty-five minutes in a taxi to get downtown, so it’s a full night event when we go out.

I don’t have anything planned for the upcoming weekend, but I hope to do more touristy type things. I’m going to buy a tourist book about Shanghai and check off different places each weekend. I look forward to posting pictures from our adventures this weekend!

Hope all is well!

Travis