| It has been a couple of days since I last posted, so there is so much to write about! I also have some pictures that I will attempt to upload. On Thursday morning, we took our bus tour of the city and walked around the Bund for a little while. On the bus tour, we saw how massive Shanghai truly is and several areas that we might want to check out were pointed out to us. We then walked around Fudan, which has quite a beautiful campus. We were shown the building that our class is in, which is somewhat difficult to find. I'll definitely need to bring a map! For lunch on Thursday we ate Sichuanese food, which is known to be very spicy. The dishes were pretty good, although it is definitely not my favorite. Since I did not have to take the language exam, I got to come back early and relax for a while. For dinner, I went with my Chinese roommate and had xianglangbao, which is a type of dumpling that is very famous in Shanghai. They are filled with soup and pork, and can be somewhat messy to eat until you get the hang of it. On Friday, we had orientation meetings all morning (nothing exciting to report there) and then went to lunch with our roommates. We again ate at a Sichuanese restaurant, although the food was quite different from the other one. A few dishes that I particularly enjoyed were some type of fried taro balls, a patty made of sweet corn and peas with a mayonnaise like sauce on top, and a beef soup. We then went to Wal Mart to buy essentials for our apartments. Purchases included toilet paper, plastic bowl, spoon, plastic cup, face lotion, frosted flakes, bananas, yogurt, and laundry detergent all for less than $20! The Wal Mart covers three floors and there are moving ramps to transport your cart to the next level. In the evening, we saw the Shanghai Acrobats show which was really amazing. I also saw the first westerners besides those in our group since arriving in Shanghai. Today was the best day so far. We finished our meetings at around 11:30 and then had more xianglangbao for lunch. We decided to be adventurous and four of us ventured into the city on the subway to see the Shanghai Museum at People's Square. Surprisingly, the subway was very user friendly for English speakers and also very clean. On our ride over, we met a Chinese English teacher who studied in California. He gave us some advice as well as his business card if we ever had questions. The museum was very neat and had collections of jade, ceramics, bronze, paintings, calligraphy, and coins. There were items from 2000 B.C. which is just amazing. We then decided to explore some more and went to Nanjing Road. We found a French style bakery and enjoyed a cheap pastry and then ventured into a shopping building. We soon found out that it was mostly a counterfeit market with items like fake ipods, purses, sunglasses, and clothing. We walked around and even did some bargaining, although I'm sure we weren't very successful by Chinese bargaining standards. After shopping, we got lost trying to find a metro and wandered around for a while. The signs for the metro are pretty hidden in some areas. Eventually, we found it and made our way back. I then gave into homesickness and had some pizza at a cafe close to our apartment building. Overall some very busy days! Classes start on Monday, so I'm sure that will be interesting as well.View of Oriental Pearl Tower and Pudong from the bund |
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