Part of My Shang Hai Trip

Shang Hai Trip Day 1 – Tuesday August 21, 2011

It only took a 2 hour flight from Hong Kong to Shang Hai. But within that 2 hours, we were provided with a delicious dinner. The part where it was so amazing was that one of my relatives who sat beside me on our flight was vegetarian and didn’t eat dinner. She only eats two meals a day and skips dinner so I was given an extra dinner to solve my stomach problems. When we arrived at Pu Dong Airport (not too clear about the name) it was 9:00PM. We retrieved our luggages and was about to take the subway to our hotel. However it turns out that the airport subway closed at 9:00PM. Our only alternative was to take the bus which we had no clue as to what stop to get off at. We tried our best with our limited resources to get a better picture of how to get as close to our hotel as possible. We used GPS, our cellphones and our labtops to find a general location of where we are. Thankfully our busstop was right next to the our supposed subway stop. We hitched a short ride on the local subway before we got off at our stop but the exit closest to our hotel was closed because it closed at 10:00PM which was exactly the time we just arrived. Forced to take the longer route, we ended up losing our location and had to ask people on the streets for directions. Even with the directions, it took us nearly 20 minutes to walk to our hotel with our luggage beside us. It was nearly nightfall when we made it to the hotel so I took a light shower and went to sleep.

Shang Hai Trip Day 2 – Wednesday August 22, 2011

I am writing this today, Thursday August 23, 2011 and I practically forgot what we have done today. All I remembered was the big misleading dinner that we had. However after giving it some more thought, the events of the past came up one by one. We went to Hang Zhou to visit the water village. Nothing that special except there was water surrounding it and it is a water village that has been around for many many years. We had a tour about some different styles of beds, the simple carved vs complicated carved beds meant different dynasties. We boarded a small boat and toured around for a bit and went out for lunch. It was a very cheap lunch where all of us were practically full to the brim with food. Then we went towards West Lake and took a boat towards an island in the middle of West Lake. We only had 45 minutes before the last boat left the island. Then we went for dinner because it was getting late. When we arrived and sat down on the restaurant tables. We were discussing when my uncle noticed that the waiters took away a menu. We looked at the rest of the menu’s and when we asked for a few more copies since we only had two on hand, they said they had only two menus in the entire restaurant. Bear in mind, the restaurant had over 100 tables and we only took up 2 tables while the rest of the place was very empty. We found it very suspicious and asked for the menu that we looked at before but they would not give it back. Apparently, the prices rose and so the old menu which they had taken away was not suitable. We thought we were being cheated and started asking for a set meals because on the menu, it only showed individual meals. They immediately went to work to create three set menu for us. Though it took less than 5 minutes, we were pretty sure they had typed it out because it was on a plain piece of paper. Sad to say, we had no choice but to order from the set menu because we would be causing a hard time for our tour guide if we just took our stuff and left. To our surprise, they gave us a plentiful dinner and it was very worth the price. In the end, we found out we weren’t being cheated but we had misunderstood.

Shang Hai Trip Day 3 – Thursday August 23, 2011

Today, we went to a big Buddha place where there was four big statues. Each statue meant a different direction, north, east, south and west. However each of the statues were missing something, one was missing a sword sheath, another was missing a snake’s tongue, a third was missing the umbrella skeleton while the last was something that I forgot already. Then we went out for 雷峰塔. It was a five story tower and at the very top, we could see the 西湖and many other areas of Hang Zhou. It took a long time walking up towards the tower as well as getting down. We went out for lunch at some restaurant which had no air conditioning. Although the food was plentiful and totally worth the prices, the a/c part was very disheartening. I was so full after eating several plates full of food. Our tour guide took us to a silk museum where we were given instructions on how to differentiate between real and fake silk. The only method was not to look or feel the silk but to burn it. If we were to burn real silk, it would not catch on fire very easily because their boiling point is high. Also, white smoke came out from burning instead of the usual black from cotton. We would have to ask the sales representative to do the burning because from the guide’s saying, we burn, we pay. If they burn, it’s not our problem and we would know that it is fake. After hearing this, they showed us 100% silk-made blankets and blanket covers. It was at a very cheap price and many of my uncles bought one though my family didn’t. That museum tour ended and we went out for free shopping at near the West Lake before we watched a performance. This performance was spectacular, because people were actually performing on a stage on water. It was just amazing at their style of acting such as using yellow and red fish lights, lighted flying birds, and large feathers. That concluded our day.

Shang Hai Trip Day 4 – Friday August 24, 2011

I just found out today but Hang Zhou is actually a different area that’s outside of Shang Hai. Today, we took our last ride with the tour bus and crossed the borders toward Shang Hai. However it took around three hours and twenty minutes before we arrived in the center of Shang Hai. The tour guide described that Shang Hai has two big highways which cross in the middle. In the middle is Shang Hai’s center and it’s basically their downtown area. Besides the highways, there is a ring around the city which makes Shang Hai look like a Chinese word if you glanced from a helicopter view. First, we went to a pearl museum where they taught a lesson on how to differentiate between fake and real pearls. It’s basically rubbing the two pearls together lightly. If it turns rough then its real, however if it’s still smooth then its fake. After that, we had a look at their pearl store but the prices were way too high. Oh yea, for pearls, there are fresh water and saltwater oysters and apparently, the salt water oysters are more expensive. However it is very hard to determine if it’s salt or fresh water. At the end of the pearl tour, each of my family members took a small pearl (not exactly round and it’s pretty small) from a nearby cracked oyster. That was the end of our Shang Hai tour and we returned to our hotel to change because we had a family banquet at night. It was to celebrate the marriage of one of my cousins and I was finally allowed to drink some alcohol though it was poor quality. After drinking half a bottle of red wine mixed with tons of pepsi and 7up, I felt a little bit tipsy but I was totally fine. I was deeply disappointed with the fact that our banquet had no cake but there was a cake on display only. It was pretty late when we returned home but me and my cousins decided to sleep a little bit later since we wanted to get some more alcohol. We each drank a shot at the hotel’s local bar but it was so expensive, around $80. So we went to a convenience store nearby and bought a whole bottle of Smirnoff plus some fanta to fulfill our alcoholic desires. It totaled $90ish which was pretty decent. One thing that I was glad about this night was that I was finally above 18 and legal to drink in CHINA and HONG KONG!!