An Appetite for Adventure

From [09.04.09] Shanghai

After finding heaven in Yangshuo, we fell back to earth among the skyscrapers of Shanghai. Mainland China’s business center, Shanghai has a long history — some parts good, some parts bad — of hosting foreigners. We took advantage of this by staying at the Astor Hotel, the first foreign-owned hotel to open in Shanghai in the 1800s. And what a charmer it is! The hotel never fell victim to “modernization” — or only did so in the right parts. The 17-foot-high ceilings loom over enormous rooms with original wooden floorboards. For $75 a night, it’s in my opinion the best deal in Shanghai.

When I first came to China eight years ago, Shanghai, with it’s futuristic Pudong skyline, chaotic Old City and up-to-the-minute fashion and food struck a resounding chord, and I declared it my favorite city in China. Keep in mind that at the time the only other city in China to which I traveled was Beijing. Now, the tables have turned, and I find myself more enamored with the quiet hutongs, rich cultural heritage and “we have arrived” feeling of Beijing. This about face was perhaps aided by the fact that Shanghai is a mess right now.

Next year, the city host the World Expo 2010, and in the final push up to Shanghai’s answer to Beijing’s Olympic gala, the entire city is being gutted, renovated, done over and polished to a gleam. Next year, I’m sure it will look fab, but that didn’t help us in the present. The Bund, the beautiful Huangpu riverfront promenade of European-built buildings that is romantically lit aglow every evening, hides behind huge dividers futilely trying to mask the major construction on the street that fronts them. The Peace Hotel, a Shanghai landmark and top tourist attraction, is closed for extensive renovations. And all the construction just kicks up more dust — even worse at ground-level — into the city’s already polluted skies. It’s pretty nasty, folks.

That said, we still managed to have a lovely time taking the obligatory Huangpu river cruise, strolling under the neon lights of Nanjing Lu, and exploring the French Quarter. As my mother’s birthday was the day after she returned to the US, I took her for a very special birthday drink atop the highest bar in the world, Cloud 9 at the Jin Mao tower, 89 floors up.

Probably the most hilarious — and often frustrating — portion of our stay in Shanghai revolved around the reopening of the Garden Bridge, a bridge over Suzhou Creek right at where it dumps into the Huangpu. The bridge is nothing special in construction, and the date wasn’t such a special date, but apparently coming to the reopening of the bridge was the thing to do for old Chinese people far and wide. Everyday, the bridge was clogged with “laoren,” some seemingly about to take their last breath. It was strangely cult-like: “If there’s one thing I want do before I die, it is to see the bridge!”

And that, my friends, was the end of Mom and Paula’s adventure in China. Back to Beijing and real life.

[09.04.09] Shanghai