The Bund and Downtown Shanghai

I was not able to sleep. I kept freaking out, thinking that I could not do this. Was it impossible? No, but it was impossibly lonely. Even with Traci by my side I felt alone in this large country. I was just very overwhelmed. I woke up every two hours Thursday night. I ended up getting up around 4am because I could not take it anymore. I wasn't tired, so it wasn't a big deal. It may have been jet lag.

We planned on going into downtown Shanghai. After my quick (and sorta pointless) meeting with my boss, we took the metro with Amia to E. Nanjing Rd. We got off the subway, past some small knickknack stands on the sides of the path of the walkway, and onto a gorgeous pedestrian-only shopping street. We took a left, and walked past giant hotels and souvenir shops (stopping at one or two to see what they offered… we were tourists afterall) and continued down to the Bund.

Ok, I have to admit, I didn’t exactly know what the Bund was. If you hear of something called the Bund, what would you think? It was a huge tourist attraction with great views. Is it a bridge? A building? No, it’s a wall that spans a good portion of the Huangpu River. So after walking next to it for a little bit, we decided to grab some dumplings and look at the guidebook to find out. (PS. Good dumplings near the Bund. For those non-vegetarians, I would suggest the chasha bao or sweet & sour pork dumplings. I tried some of the dough with the sauce and it was amazing.)

So after our lunch, we ventured on top of the Bund. And boy were they right! We got a great view of the Shanghai financial district. We made it a mental note to come back at night to see it all up in lights. (haha, that story is to follow)

What a gorgeous city this city is. I have a good feeling that I’m really going to like it here... if only I could sleep.

Welcome to Planet China

The plane took forever. I did not realize how long 14 ½ hours of airtravel felt like. I, normally an avid sleeper on planes, could not muster up the tired feelings and I was annoyingly awake for about 13 of those 14 ½ hours. I watched a few movies using our convenient personalized TVs on the back of the seats; Online (about a “mermaid” found by a fishing boat in Ireland) and The Joneses (think “keeping up with the Jones’” which could have been much better than it was with a few key directing choices.) After three meals and two snacks of vegan cuisine (minus the Hagën das ice cream that I stole from the non-restricted dieters of the plane), we finally descended onto the land they call China.

I thought that I would be more at awe with everything that is China. The Shanghai PuDong Airport looked like any other airport. All signs were in both Mandarin as well as English. There is English everywhere! I did get a little excited when I saw Americans in the Airport, but I didn’t even mind that everyone around me was Asian. They could have easily been Asian-American!

We followed the crowds to customs, and after a they checked our passports, immigration cards, and they took a snazzy picture, we proceeded on to the baggage terminal, where we waited a normally extraordinary time for our bags to come out. And guess what! Nothing was lost! We easily loaded our tremendous suitcases onto our (free!) cart and pressed on towards the exit!

I was told that Amia Han would be waiting for us to pick us up. I had no idea who Amia was or what Amia looked like... I just knew (s)he would be holding a sign with my name on it. And who would have thought – Amia was there waving at us before I could even read her sign. Of course the small Chinese woman would be able to pick out the two white girls traveling alone with way too much luggage.

I believe we arrived in Terminal 2. She wanted to get the money in the airport that I would pay for my apartment. I really didn’t want to pay with cash, but not seeing any other way, I decided to say ok. This woman was about my age and even jetlagged and tired, I was obviously twice her size and strength. I thought I would be ok. I asked for a HSBC, which I conveniently started to save all my money in years before, knowing that one day I wanted to go to China. I could have picked any bank, but I decided on HSBC. After passing 2 Citibanks and having her not recognize HSBC bank at all, I decided I may have made a mistake. So we walked to Terminal 3, where I used a Bank of China ATM. I don’t even want to know what type of fees I got. The next day I decided to see where HSBC banks were, and surprisingly enough, there were 2 ATMS in PuDong Terminal 2. Figures.

We ended up taking the Airbus and then opted for a cab to take us to my apartment. I was tired, I was not going to be walking with 200 lbs of luggage 20 minutes from the train stop to my door. I will pay the $2 for the cab (though Amia paid). When we got to the apartment building, we were told the elevator was broken and currently being prepared. We were told to take the stairs, but after some protest from Amia on our behalf, the man who worked there reconsidered. We walked into an exhibit of some kind to wait to see what will be done next. We were told to sit down on finished wooden logs that were set around a beautiful wooden Chinese table, but as soon as we removed our bags from our backs, we were on the move again. They were allowing us to take the service elevator from the building next door that was in construction. We moved to the side allowing the carts of broken sheetrock and stone to pass, and we continued thankfully were able to safely travel up the 5 flights of stairs to the reception area of the apartments.

There, Amia negotiated my initial payment to be one month plus a month’s rent for deposit, and they asked me to sign a paper. The entire letter was in Chinese characters. Upon asking what I was signing, Amia told me to sign my name. Ok, simple translation error. I asked what the paper said, she said it was a “common contract, like we discussed.” We did not discuss anything but price; I could see that the price was written in the first two bullets. This was a two page document. Amia seemed confused for me asking her to translate the document. Did normally people just sign papers they did not know how to read? After a rough translation, I agreed to sign. I am pretty sure that the contract would not hold up in international court anyway… but this is China. Maybe normal rules do not apply.

We had to take a flight of stairs up to my apartment, which looked fine. We then got changed and headed to Police Station. We decided to walk because it was not far, and we stopped into a store to get a cell phone because the one I brought did not work. We then realized that I did not have my housing contract in order to register (Amia did not inform me I needed it… told me to keep it in a safe place… why would I bring it with me?!) and so we went back to the apartment, and walked up the 6 flights of stairs. Mind you, we had not eaten since 12:00 on the train, had hardly slept in 2 days, and it was around 6pm. We were tired. That may have been one of the worst staircases I’ve ever had to travel up. Once we descended full of bug spray (no bites = no milaria!) and contract in hand, we opted for a taxi.

Once registered, we decided to do some shopping. I had almost nothing in my room. I didn’t even bring a towel because my suitcase was originally 30 lbs overweight. So tired and exhausted as we were, we decided to shop. We said fairwell to Amia for the night (she would meet me the following morning to introduce me to my new boss) and decided we needed food. Looking at the signs, everything was in characters. I wished we ate before Amia left. Not wishing to be introduced to cow liver on our first meal in China, we decided to forgo food momentarily and grab something recognizable in the supermarket.

Oh my! The supermarket really was super. It was a mixture of a mall and a Walmart in one. We headed into the Walmart and picked up things we could recognize. Pots, pans, hot plate, plates, silverware, and a few food… and 2 hours later we left confused. Almost nothing was in English! I was way too tired for it. So finally we left with two large bags and a hot plate/pan combo box… and there was a crowd by the exit. It seemed that the skies opened up and decided to downpour exactly when we intended on leaving with all our good stuff. We decided to brave the storm because we had seen a dominos next to our apartment that was calling our names. We thankfully found a cab and somehow was able to mutter the address of the road (guoshun dong lu) and we were on our way – and then we were past – our intended destination. We somehow got the cabby to turn around and stop infront of Dominos. Thankfully, we paid and got out and basked in our western delight.

By the time we got our pizza it was around 8:00 pm and we headed to the apartment between deafening thunder booms. Intimidated and wet, I trotted into the building, and thank God the elevator was fixed. Safe back in the room, we showered and ate.

Welcome to Planet China.