Last post from Shanghai

My last dinner was at the Whampoa Club at 3 on the Bund. I had this great view from my table.
The food was sort of Chinese nouvelle cuisine.My appetizer was squid stuffed with sweet rice, barbequed pork and mushrooms, and seafood and cheese (!) baked in a hairy crab shell. It was good but I thought the fried vegetable dumpling I had on the street this morning was really great. Some of the street food is amazing. Almost everyday on my way to class I would buy my breakfast from a lady selling fried bread that she smashed into the middle of a ball of rice along with some pickled vegetables. It might not sound that good but combination of the hot rice and the crunchy bread really hit the spot.
If you are seeing my blog for the first time you might want to click on "Archives October 2005" on the right to see the whole blog. Email me at cwoo@svn.net

10/29/05

Above is a welder on Henan Road and early Saturday morning at the fabric market.

Swarovski jeweled dress

10/27/05

Above - street scene in the old city. Below - the famous Bund - the street along the river where so many old buildings from the early 1900's still stand. In the background is Pudong - the new development area.

Today I went to a big yarn expo in Pudong looking for some sources of good knitting yarn. Unfortunately all the exhibits were for textiles. You can't believe how many kinds of distressed denim exist in the world. Anyway, I got this picture instead of yarn.

China Internet

The single light fixture that works in my room uses about a 20 watt bulb. I went to the supermarket and bought a lamp to use by my bed so I could read at night. But the Internet connection is another story. It is incredibly fast - I'll have a hard time adjusting to cable when I get home. I've been able to transfer big photo files to my blog in a second. Here is a picture of the setup in the hallway. The line is split for 2 rooms. The big problem for people here is that several websites are blocked. Blogger is one of them so I haven't been able to view my site although I have heard that the Hotmail blogsite is visible from here. It seems that it would be nearly impossible for the government to keep up with all the new sites that crop up every day on the web.

10/27/05

More food

I thought I'd give the Shanghainese cuisine another try so I went back to Crystal Jade and ordered 3 dishes. The corn soup was just like at home but the poached spinach with 3 kinds of eggs and the fish head and tails were new to me. Well, I'm still not a fan.

Northern Jingan District

I found Yao Ming!

10/26/05

Yesterday I went up to the northern part of the city to see a new complex of artist's studios. It isn't quite finished but it is going to be a great place to see what is going on with the contemporary art scene here. There are already a few artists working there - mainly painters. It looks like they are just getting started because I didn't see anything that looked very accomplished. I was starving and luckily I found a place (a real dive) selling dumplings and buns. So I guess you could say that was my most satisfying meal so far.

Near the Old City

Yesterday I went to the other end of town to the Nanshi district. Some streets still had some small, old houses. Many were really falling apart. It probably is wishful thinking that they would be kept and restored. The bulldozers work night and day tearing down the old. Just on my street in a week some workers took down a beautiful granite storefront and replaced it with some cheap, ugly beige tile. They worked all night. On another corner a brick building was razed and completely removed in a day. There is always someone available to do whatever you want to have done.

!

This attractive pile of junk has been steadily growing. Two weeks ago it barely spilled out the walls of the building. Now it's threatening to block the driveway of the apartment building. I did see an interesting deco-type wood chair at one point but that got hauled away by some lucky guy.

More mall fun

These people were trying to win a flat screen monitor!

10/22/05

I saw a fireworks display from my window just before going to bed. It was a great way to end the day.
These guys are tying up hairy crabs so they don't get away.

Nanjing Lu

Ding Tai Fung

I was craving dumplings so I went to this Taiwanese place. I was surprised to see that
making dumplings is guy work. I had the ones filled with pork and crab roe.





This dessert combines 2 of my favorite things: fruitcake and sticky rice. The black thing in the center is a dried jujube. Among other healthy side effects it produces "qi."

What I saw along yesterday's walk

This was at a tiny museum and shop that sells traditional "Blue Nankeen" indigo cloth.


Maggie Cheung and a guy with weird hair.

Tall dessert

Last night I ate at a Taiwanese restaurant and I just had to try one of these. It's called "bin." It's green and red beans on a mound of delicately shaved ice surrounded by tapioca balls, pineapple, and some other chewy gelatinous things. Cream was poured on top. It's a wonder how all that stuff was molded onto the ice. It all collapsed just as I stuck my spoon into it.

Public library

The library is this big, new building. I think it is the only one in town so if it's serving 18 million people it's actually small. The excellent signage was in both Chinese and English. The browsing collection that I saw was mainly paperbacks and the stacks were really neat and not very full. The books must have all been checked out!

There were several rows of these neat Webpacs next to the main reading room.

I thought I had the green light

Crossing the street can be really stressful. You really have to be alert because you never know what is going to come charging towards you. Sometimes the bicyclists are the most aggressive.

Silk factory

I took a tour to Suzhou and we made a stop at a factory to see how silk is made. First, the cocoons are sorted. Then the strands of silk are delicately pulled form the cocoons and strung up to be spun into thread. The cocoons that are not good enough to be spun are boiled and mashed together.

These ladies are pulling matted
pieces of silk into thin sheets.
Layers of sheets are made into
quilts.

Szechuan lunch

I had lunch today at a Szechuan restaurant just one block from school. The dish on the left is crispy chicken. It seems that the dish is prepared by lining the basket with strips of leeks and the marinated chicken pieces are laid on top. One of the spices was fenugreek (or maybe anise). Then the whole basket is fried and peppers and scallions were piled on top. Everything was wonderfully crunchy. The dish on the right is eggplant. I saw a couple next to me eating fried duck heads. I'll go back to try the fish since the place is known for seafood.

My bed

I took this picture the night I arrived. I'm now going into my second week. So far, I haven't ventured too far out of my neighborhood but I hope to get over to the old part of the city soon. I feel more confident about getting around now that I know how to use the subway and for about $3 you can go across town in a taxi. They aren't too hard to flag down but since my pronunciation is so bad I usually have to point at a map to make myself understood.

Saturday shopping

Street scene

These two guys were really engrossed in their work. The one on the left was repairing something (maybe a cell phone?) and the other was doing embroidery. I'll try to find out what the signs say.

Take a guess

Well, it's not exactly tai chi but I guess it does the trick. This exercise machine sits just outside the front of my apartment. I saw one lady using it the other day. She seemed to be getting a workout pulling those ropes up and down. I' m not sure what the metal disks are for in the enter of the pole. Maybe you do something with your head? Well, I may be joining them soon since getting to the park in the morning means walking through traffic jams and inhaling lots of bad fumes. I'm just practicing in the apartment parking lot for now.