Shanghai

3 days to discover Shanghai, that’s what we had and I made sure we had a busy schedule to see it all. Let’s face it after this vacation I feel I could use one week of rest. We’ve run all over the country to visit but did not really get some rest. I guess I’ll rest when I’m back in Belgium and for the moment try to make the best out of China.
So here is what we've seen / done while in Shanghai.

Shanghai – Yu garden
Located in the center of the Old city, the Yu garden is considered as one of the most beautiful garden in China (some even say one of the top 3 gardens in China).
And guess what? It is indeed a beautiful garden. It’s one of those places in China once you enter you feel peaceful and relaxed. I don’t know how they achieve this but they do. PS: would have been better without the other tourists :), so many French and German people around us…

Of course I took zillions of pictures, especially of the statues on the roofs (my new passion). I’ve put them together in a small video for you to enjoy a walk in the Yu garden.

Shanghai – Old city
Around the Yu garden is the Old Chinese city. It’s a big contrast between this part of the city which is old, messy, and dirty vs. the modern skyscrapers and westernized areas. This part of the city has never been part of any of the foreigner concessions so it was left aside from the development. I read that the walls that were surrounding the old city were taken down in 1912 and replaced by a circular avenue.
One of the fascinating things in China is that they still use bamboo for their construction. I have to say it feels like middle-age when you see all those bamboo sticks around but at the same time it still works. So why move to metallic bars when bamboo can do the job?
Have a look here.


Shanghai – The Bund
The Bund is a long avenue that runs along the river. On that side of the river you can see a collection of old buildings from the 1920s.
It’s a pity that with Shanghai getting ready for Expo 2010, they’re having huge works on the Bund so we didn’t really enjoy the full view on it. I guess we’ll have to come back after the big expo.









Shanghai – The skyline
The new city of Pudong is the Manhattan of Shanghai. Located on the other side of the river, facing the Bund, you can find Pudong and its skyscrapers.
As you can see I got to play around with the zoom lens. Sometimes I’m impressed by how far I can see with it. Ok not to the point I could see what was happening behind the windows of the skyscrapers, but I could clearly see the windows :)
Pudong by day





Pudong by night






Shanghai – Barbie megastore
While walking through the French concession we found the world’s first Barbie flagship store! Yes girls, a megastore all about Barbie. “Barbie Shanghai is the ultimate destination for girls of all ages to shop”, dine, enjoy a day at the spa, and become a fashion designer or runway supermodel”
That’s the largest and most comprehensive Barbie store in the world! And that’s a dream for all girls and women. It’s absolutely fantastic to see so many Barbies, across time and generations. Makes you want all of them of course. Since that was not possible (sadly it seems I’m too old for Barbies now) the back-up plan was to get a Sundae with Barbie ice cream (a pink berries ice cream) and Ken ice cream (chocolate and peanut). As you can see millions of calories a scoop but surprisingly very good.






Shanghai – Nanjing street and People’s square
Nanjing street is THE shopping street of Shanghai. Tons of shops and department stores, millions of shoppers walking down the street. They even have a little train that goes from one end of the street to the other one. At night the street turns like Time Square with all the lights on.
At one end of it you can find People’s square, one of the key connection center of the city. On People square you can find the Opera (design by a French architect, so I have to mention it), the main history museum as well as several others.
Take a walk down the street with us here.

Shanghai – Expo 2010
In 2010 Shanghai will host the next world Expo. We’re still about 1 year to go before the opening and Shanghai is one giant construction field. The city is going through a massive make over. As a consequence a lot of the sites, building and streets we visited were busy with workers and machines.



The mascot of the Expo is called Haibao and is a little blue character. There is no way you can miss it as it’s all around the city. On our 1st day in the city when the weather turned to rain and I was getting cold I bought myself a T-shirt with the little guy. Wolfram however grew some passion for this mascot and I got him one (not to mention that blue color will match perfectly with the color of his coach).




Shanghai – Bird market
Fancy buying a bird, a cat, a fish, a turtle or insects? This market is the place to come. As much as the birds were quite beautiful, the kittens and rabits cute, the insect part made me feel uncomforatble.
Check out here the animals from the market.
Hangzhou

Hangzhou
On the 2nd day in Shanghai we actually left the city by train to Hangzhou. Hangzhou is described as the paradise on earth so how could we miss that chance to go to paradise?
Hangzhou is famous for its lake around which there are pagodas and also the 3 pools mirroring the moon. In other words 3 small constructions popping out of the water, getting all Chinese people very excited about it; leaving us quite perplex I would say.
It was absolutely beautiful and very peaceful after the hassle and the pollution of Shanghai. I do understand why people from Shanghai massively come to Hangzhou over the sunny week-ends. Enjoy the “paradise on earth” here.