Week 4: Stayin’ Round Shanghai

This week was my birthday week, so I decided to stay in Shanghai to celebrate with coworkers and newfound friends from my Yellow Mountain adventure the previous weekend. Unfortunately I seem to have caught a bug, so the stories are not quite as crazy as one may have hoped, but I can honestly say the foreigner’s wing of the Chinese hospital I went to was quite pleasant and I’m on the mend.

For my actual birthday day two of my coworkers took me out for a noodle lunch: in Chinese culture it is good luck to eat noodles on your birthday, as long noodles symbolically represent long life. Personally, I think they chose it because people who live to be old can only eat soft foods, but that’s neither here nor there. They also brought me a cake and sang Happy Birthday in my native tongue, so I could follow along. One interesting aspect of living here that you would not find in the States is that they marched on into a restaurant with a full cake, set of plates, forks, etc. and no-one batted an eyelash! It is much too taboo to do that in any restaurant I know back home. Following this meal, we proceeded to get foot massages and relax the afternoon away. In the evening I got “Mexican” food with a friend from my hike. I say Mexican in quotes because it was the most Asian-Mexican food I’ve ever eaten: not a fusion I’ve heard of before or would ever really want to try again, though it tasted pretty good. Among the novelties were carrot and cucumber tacos, Peking duck quesadillas, and churros that tasted like they had been cooked in the dumpling oil. Although the meal did not meet all expectations, the birthday surprise dessert of lava chocolate cake far exceeded them.


Sunday proved to be weather too glorious to stay inside and rest up, so I decided to take a walking adventure and see some of the local sights. My first stop was the famous Fuxing park, about 35 minutes walking from my apartment. You could literally hear the park before you could see it: every 50 feet or so another group of musicians (mostly amateur it would seem) would be seated playing a tune or someone would be singing or there would be a group dancing, or just plain children screaming. Being in this park made me finally understand why people say China feels so crowded: there were people in every space possible, making all the noise in the world, but they were extraordinarily good at ignoring each other. Even the individuals doing Tai Chi in the shade of the tree seemed to be able to block out the sound no problem. Growing up with 3 siblings could be loud sometimes, but nothing compared to the raucous of a popular Chinese park on a beautiful Sunday morning.

Once I had seen (heard) enough I continued on to the People’s Park, near the People’s Square in the middle of the city. I chose to go here both for the convenient location as well as for a local social activity I had been told about. On the weekends, parents worried about their daughters and sons getting married will bring an umbrella to this park along with a description (and occasionally a picture) of their child. They line these up along the walkways and allow people to just peruse through the eligible bachelors and bachelorettes. This is no small thing either: a good number of the information sheets have been laminated for re-use and some umbrellas are exceptionally attractive. Mind you, none of the children are actually there-most are embarrassed by this practice. I asked my coworker if this method of finding a mate actually worked for anyone and she said she had never heard a success story from it. That’s not to say it couldn’t happen, but I’m a bit skeptical myself.

My last stop was to the Bund to take a look at the iconic buildings on the other side. I’ve included a few pictures as well as some from my apartment, which has some pretty spectacular views. Nothing too exciting to report though, and this post is getting awfully long, so if you have any questions leave me a comment!

Week 3: Yellow Mountain

This week I decided to get out of Shanghai and go see some of the famous natural sights in China. To this end I joined a trip to Yellow Mountain in Huangshan. It was advertised as a 2-day challenging trek which included a night at a hotel in the mountains and some fantastic views of one of UNESCO’s world sites.

It was challenging indeed. Apparently in China, hiking consists of a whole lot of stairs. Climbing Yellow Mountain was like walking up to the 10,000 floor of a building. While the official stair counts varied, the lowest I have recorded was over 17,000 steps during the day, over 80% of which were of the vertical nature. Needless to say, my legs were a bit worn out by the end of the day.

Luckily, we got some amazing views out of the steep climb. While it rained the entirety of the second day in the mountains, the first included some breathtaking vistas of geological formations that you will not find anywhere else I have been. The natural beauty was breathtaking (or maybe that was just the stairs!) and it was a great get-away from the smog of Shanghai. The second day it was raining hard and it was impossible to see much through the fog-there’s something very disconcerting about walking along a stone staircase and looking over the railing into a void of mist. However, if the wind picked up and you glanced down at just the right time, you could see some of the shapes of the mountainside below, peaking up at you.

One of the most interesting things about hiking in China is that you can actually get carried up the mountain, if you’re in a touristy enough area. Never mind the numerous cable cars and funiculars that are available for the ascent: you can hire living, breathing, human Sherpas. Unfortunately with the bad weather the second day I didn’t have the pleasure of seeing one of these teams in action, but due to the low cost of labor in China it looked like a pretty good deal! I was also amazed by the regular trash areas created for all the tourists: in my naïve experience of “carry in, carry out” it was astonishing to think that every 100 meters or so you could just dump your trash and someone would come by to clean it up later. However, for the number of people who were on the mountain while we were hiking, it was incredibly clean, so the Chinese must be doing something right!

Week 2: Thailand

This week I ventured over to Bangkok, Thailand for a client meeting that lasted the whole week. Like most client meetings, this one was less than thrilling. However, one notable thing was the last day we were on site, they all wore yellow. At first I thought it was some team building thing but it turns out they were celebrating the anniversary of the king’s coronation! Another fun fact I learned from this client is that Thailand tracks their years based on the birth of the Buddha, rather than Jesus. Thus, they are 543 years ahead of us (the current year is 2559).

Friday night Jill and I chose to take a river cruise and see some of the sights at night. Complete with an “international” buffet (they had French fries and ribs so the Americans were happy) and some traditional Thai dancing, it was a nice affair. We were able to see some of the major tourist attractions lit up at night-they even had timers on the lights to conserve electricity and only show the buildings when the boats were passing!

Saturday I decided to act the part of tourist as completely as I could and wandered off to the Grand Palace. They have a strict dress code, and despite the fact that my leggings covered my entire legs, I was required to rent a skirt from the facility. Let me tell you, if Bangkok is anything it’s HOT. The palace was pretty cool though: in Europe you don’t see ornate decorations the same as Thailand, probably because the weather would destroy them. There were outside mosaics and mirrors everywhere, and countless painted carvings that had either withstood the trials of time or were recently renovated. Once I had had enough of swimming through crowds of tourists, I went to the park across the street to sit and rest. In doing so, I was approached by multiple high school kids who wanted to know my favorite Thai foods and what I thought of the weather.

That afternoon I went for a classic Thai massage. Unlike a message in the United States, which tends to be a relaxing experience, this was an odd combination of yoga and pushing on various muscle groups. To end the session, I got my back cracked from both sides, and I can still feel soreness along my spine where the masseuse did her work. Wrapping up my night included a glass of wine on a rooftop bar, with a 360 degree view of the city. It was pretty spectacular, all things considered.

Finally, on Sunday I headed over to the market in the morning to get some good stuff cheap. The place in question is said to have over 15,000 stalls and I can honestly say I got lost in the inner maze of the place a few times. However, I did get some good-priced steals and then headed back to Shanghai, where I took the bullet train. (You can’t come from a family full of engineers and miss the bullet train!) So I am now back in China for the foreseeable future-or at least until my 60 days are up. Stay tuned for future adventures!

Week 1: Facing my fear of food

For those who know me well, I’ve never liked Chinese food. I have successfully avoided eating it in America for over 6 years, and the scariest thing about going to China was having to face the food. So much of a culture is shaped around meal time and what is eaten-I didn’t want to miss out on this, but I also had zero desire to start re-tasting the flavors I had despised for so long.

That being said, the first few days were not great. The thought of getting food made me feel ill (even though the food itself always turned out to be pretty good) and meal times were something to dread. However, I’m happy to report that my perspective has changed, thanks to the constant chiding of my coworkers in Shanghai to be more open-minded and keep trying things.

So far, the most adventurous delicacies I’ve eaten include:

• ·         Chicken feet
• ·         Chicken knuckles
• ·         Eel
• ·         Tendon
• ·         Hundred year egg
• ·         Beef tongue
• ·         Shrimp with the heads on

I can’t say I enjoyed this selection, but I am trying to branch out every day with the help of my friends.

One of the most interesting aspects of eating in China is that it’s like having a selection of tapas. You get a HUGE menu to choose from, and then pick whatever dishes you’d like for the table. A large lunch for 4 one Saturday included 3 kinds of dumplings, 2 dishes with Shrimp, some bread, a meat platter, a vegetable platter, a noodle platter, a porridge, and 2 desserts.  It’s a huge amount of food, but I like the variety and the fact that I’m not stuck with a single dish that I may not like. Going to eat with Chinese people is awesome too, because they order for you, which creates a variety and forces me to try some things I wouldn’t otherwise touch.

Overall, I’m happy to say that Chinese food is growing on me and I don’t feel traumatized when meal time rolls around anymore. I’m still apprehensive, because you never know what unusual morsel will end up on your plate, but it’s been a real adventure these past few days. Even when you think you’ve picked a safe option, you can never be sure: I got a “sunrise cheese bun” at a bakery and it was normal bread, filled with some sort of ezCheese product. Not the nice baked bread I had expected, but an interesting flavor. Something as mundane as tofu can be transformed as well-there’s one kind of fermented tofu that smells like a farts and sweat mixed together. I haven’t been able to get through the smell to try that one yet, but if I could conquer chicken feet, the sky’s the limit!