Gone to Thailand! Be back on Apr. 5th.
Ciao
Friday, March 27, 2009
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Great emptiness
Every morning I wake up not realizing where I am. For some reason I keep forgetting about the fact that I am in CHINA. I am in a foreign country, I am studying abroad, I am doing the thing that most people would say is the experience of a life time. And yet...I don't feel that it's any different than waking up in my little bedroom in the states. Every morning I wake up to a gray haze or a bright penetrating sun~the same as if I were to wake up in Boston or Los Angeles. I get a little taste of New York as I listen to the morning songs of honking car horns from a distance. My view consists of the miniature landscape design of the SUFE quad and the freeway across the way. Never fails, it's always bumper to bumper traffic and every Chinese driver is angrily honking the horn, no matter what time of the day it is. I would say China's most defining characteristic is....the constant risk of getting hit by a man driving a tricycle bike whilst carrying a huge load of bamboo, cardboard, and other miscellaneous things. This may not hold true for some of the other students in my program or I could very well just be ignorant. I guess I was expecting more of a culture-shock - I think I wanted to be somewhere that would blow my mind away into cultural smithereens. Perhaps the only wall that stands between me being Chinese and a foreigner is the language barrier. It seems that this is a very thin frail wall (Made in China) and I am actually more Chinese than I thought I was. I did grow up around a huge Chinese family.
My question(s) of the day....what makes a city great? Is it having the most famous landmark? The best nightlife culture? The best set of people? The scale of aesthetic beauty in the surrounding environment? What is the #1 reason that a person would want to see your city?
I ask these questions because I have been in Shanghai for two months~and I can't answer these questions. I can't find the music scene, nobody cares about the Shanghai sports teams, I can't recall any landmarks except for the huge strip of buildings on the Bund that doesn't seem have any historical backing except for the price tag, etc. etc. So far the only reasons that people would specifically come to Shanghai is for business. Come here and be smothered by the concrete metropolis of a Sim City game gone bad.
Last night I went to a jazz gig in a hidden art gallery in the hidden art district in Shanghai. To further my research on my capstone project, I spoke to one of the women who worked at the gallery. I asked her what is Shanghai's most defining characteristic? No words came to mind except "very empty." This notion is stuck to me now. Despite every street & sidewalk being amassed with sprawling Shanghai citizens, there is no soul or flair that every booming metropolitan city should have.
What makes a city great?
My question(s) of the day....what makes a city great? Is it having the most famous landmark? The best nightlife culture? The best set of people? The scale of aesthetic beauty in the surrounding environment? What is the #1 reason that a person would want to see your city?
I ask these questions because I have been in Shanghai for two months~and I can't answer these questions. I can't find the music scene, nobody cares about the Shanghai sports teams, I can't recall any landmarks except for the huge strip of buildings on the Bund that doesn't seem have any historical backing except for the price tag, etc. etc. So far the only reasons that people would specifically come to Shanghai is for business. Come here and be smothered by the concrete metropolis of a Sim City game gone bad.
Last night I went to a jazz gig in a hidden art gallery in the hidden art district in Shanghai. To further my research on my capstone project, I spoke to one of the women who worked at the gallery. I asked her what is Shanghai's most defining characteristic? No words came to mind except "very empty." This notion is stuck to me now. Despite every street & sidewalk being amassed with sprawling Shanghai citizens, there is no soul or flair that every booming metropolitan city should have.
What makes a city great?
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Art, Sharks, St. Patrick's...
Last weekend we went to the art district in Shanghai! Tucked away in Putao district, we went to one of many art galleries. One we went to was a glass lacquer gallery called "Two Cities." Their concept was based on the fact that every city has two sides: the good & bad. Their goal was to beautify the bad part of the city and make it culturally enriching. We also went up to Image Tunnel's headquarters, where we met the woman who was the driving force behind the art community in Shanghai. Every week she has film screenings in her little studio of all sorts of documentaries concerning Shanghai. Her goal was to bring more culture to the Shanghai scene - because despite the fact that Shanghai is China's biggest city - it still lacks that creative individualistic flair that most metropolitan cities have. I find this very true - I can't even find any music venues to see good live music! It makes me miss T.T. & the Bears in Boston...
I also got to see the Shanghai Sharks basketball team play! Yao Ming used to play for them. Shanghai was up against Xinjiang, which is a province located northwest in China. The Sharks are ranked second to last in the CBA (Chinese Basketball Association) and they were playing against #4 in the league. The stadium was so tiny! I felt like I was at a high school basketball game, and the cheerleaders looked like they were 12 years old. The Shark mascots were also strangely puny and acted somewhat dorky. After awhile I started yelling random obscenities in English just to amuse myself. The Sharks only lost by 7 pts., surprisingly. Good job! 很好！
ST. PATRICK'S DAY. I realized that America always steals other countries' holidays as an excuse to drink. We tried to maintain this mentality in Shanghai. On Saturday night, the weekend before St. Patty's we went to Bull Dog's Pub. I was ready to party 100% but was met with failure after realizing that this was a legit pub, and we were surrounded by a very much older crowd. We were the only ones wearing green, whilst everyone else wore knitted sweater vests and had salt n' pepper hair. I tried to look older by playing a little pool and hanging out with one of the guys that was smoking a cigar. FAIL. The second chance to celebrate came around on the actual day of St. Pat and we went to O'Malley's. The crowd was much more our scene, sprawling with Wai guo ren (foreigners) and it was only 25RMB for each Irish Car bomb. Not too shabby. There was a giant Guinness mascot walking around, Celtic bands, and I met some Irish people. I had two Irish car bombs and stuck around for maybe 20 minutes and bounced back home. I think the highlight of the night was going to the street vendor to get a bowl of noodles.
I also got to see the Shanghai Sharks basketball team play! Yao Ming used to play for them. Shanghai was up against Xinjiang, which is a province located northwest in China. The Sharks are ranked second to last in the CBA (Chinese Basketball Association) and they were playing against #4 in the league. The stadium was so tiny! I felt like I was at a high school basketball game, and the cheerleaders looked like they were 12 years old. The Shark mascots were also strangely puny and acted somewhat dorky. After awhile I started yelling random obscenities in English just to amuse myself. The Sharks only lost by 7 pts., surprisingly. Good job! 很好！
ST. PATRICK'S DAY. I realized that America always steals other countries' holidays as an excuse to drink. We tried to maintain this mentality in Shanghai. On Saturday night, the weekend before St. Patty's we went to Bull Dog's Pub. I was ready to party 100% but was met with failure after realizing that this was a legit pub, and we were surrounded by a very much older crowd. We were the only ones wearing green, whilst everyone else wore knitted sweater vests and had salt n' pepper hair. I tried to look older by playing a little pool and hanging out with one of the guys that was smoking a cigar. FAIL. The second chance to celebrate came around on the actual day of St. Pat and we went to O'Malley's. The crowd was much more our scene, sprawling with Wai guo ren (foreigners) and it was only 25RMB for each Irish Car bomb. Not too shabby. There was a giant Guinness mascot walking around, Celtic bands, and I met some Irish people. I had two Irish car bombs and stuck around for maybe 20 minutes and bounced back home. I think the highlight of the night was going to the street vendor to get a bowl of noodles.
Weekend Excursion Outside Shanghai
About a month ago, on the weekend of Feb 27-3/1 the Global Alliance planned a trip outside of Shanghai to Shao Xing, Ningbo, Xinchang Valley & Xikou. I can't believe that trip was a month ago! I wanted to take some time and write about it before I forgot all the details - and I've already forgotten so many!
Anyway, Shao Xing is a smaller city about 3hrs outside of Shanghai. We stayed in a very nice hotel and rode in rickshaws around the city. We also took a black-awning boat ride which would have been very lovely if it hadn't been pouring rain out. It's basically China's version of riding in gondolas through Venice. We sat in this little wooden boat while a man rowed for us. We rode through the waterways which was also the backyards of many local residents. I saw a woman wash her underwear in the murky water.
We also visited Lu Xun's childhood living quarters. Lu Xun was China's most famous philospher, writer, and business man. We drank Shao Xing's famous huang jiu, also known as yellow wine. It tasted sweet and tart at the same time. We got to see a Shao Xing opera, which was very interesting. Usually only women perform in the operas, but this one had male actors as well. The singing was very high-pitched and strange at times - I had no clue what they were saying. The best thing was that they performed outside in the courtyard of Shen Garden (depicted on the right).
The next day we went to Xinchang valley, a famous spot for lots of kung fu movies! We hiked through a really long tunnel through the mountain and hiked up to a secluded restaurant that hid between rolling fields of tea leaves. It was so nice to get outside of the city and see the beautiful, clean side of China. The restaurant looked like a little hut and one of the dishes consisted of snails. I didn't eat any.
After the hike we went to a factory that manufactured parts for machines that built car parts. It was also a textile factory. I was surprised at how manual the labor was - they needed a person to monitor each machine and maintain each part that was being built. It was extremely cold and empty, as they had just let go a large amount of migrant workers. The machines were very old and rusty. Upstairs was the textile part - also very manual - they would lay out each piece of cloth to do silk screening on.
After the factory we went to Xikou - we didn't do much there since the museum was closed and everyone was grumpy from the rain. I can't remember when or where but we also visited a museum where Mah jong was first created!
We finally came back to Shanghai and I had never been so exhausted from a weekend trip! I think the weather had really impacted everyone's moods and we weren't able to enjoy it as much~however I'm really happy I got to see Xinchang Valley!
Anyway, Shao Xing is a smaller city about 3hrs outside of Shanghai. We stayed in a very nice hotel and rode in rickshaws around the city. We also took a black-awning boat ride which would have been very lovely if it hadn't been pouring rain out. It's basically China's version of riding in gondolas through Venice. We sat in this little wooden boat while a man rowed for us. We rode through the waterways which was also the backyards of many local residents. I saw a woman wash her underwear in the murky water.
We also visited Lu Xun's childhood living quarters. Lu Xun was China's most famous philospher, writer, and business man. We drank Shao Xing's famous huang jiu, also known as yellow wine. It tasted sweet and tart at the same time. We got to see a Shao Xing opera, which was very interesting. Usually only women perform in the operas, but this one had male actors as well. The singing was very high-pitched and strange at times - I had no clue what they were saying. The best thing was that they performed outside in the courtyard of Shen Garden (depicted on the right).
The next day we went to Xinchang valley, a famous spot for lots of kung fu movies! We hiked through a really long tunnel through the mountain and hiked up to a secluded restaurant that hid between rolling fields of tea leaves. It was so nice to get outside of the city and see the beautiful, clean side of China. The restaurant looked like a little hut and one of the dishes consisted of snails. I didn't eat any.
After the hike we went to a factory that manufactured parts for machines that built car parts. It was also a textile factory. I was surprised at how manual the labor was - they needed a person to monitor each machine and maintain each part that was being built. It was extremely cold and empty, as they had just let go a large amount of migrant workers. The machines were very old and rusty. Upstairs was the textile part - also very manual - they would lay out each piece of cloth to do silk screening on.
After the factory we went to Xikou - we didn't do much there since the museum was closed and everyone was grumpy from the rain. I can't remember when or where but we also visited a museum where Mah jong was first created!
We finally came back to Shanghai and I had never been so exhausted from a weekend trip! I think the weather had really impacted everyone's moods and we weren't able to enjoy it as much~however I'm really happy I got to see Xinchang Valley!
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Orange Skies, Black Lungs
So the sun finally decided to peak its head out of the smoggy clouds and blessed us with a day of fun outdoor activities. It has been cloudy, gloomy and cold for the last two weeks. On Monday Ben & I decided to go for a run at the track nearby....I only lasted 10 minutes. At first I thought I was supremely out of shape because my lungs felt like they were going to explode. Looking back now, it was definitely the pollution because I kicked the treadmill's butt yesterday and ran 7.5mi at the gym on campus.
A friend mentioned to me that I am actually inhaling 3 cigarettes worth of pollution a day living in Shanghai. Apparently in Nanjing it's worse - about a pack a day. It's not hard to believe....only once was I able to see the Pearl Tower from a distance, and that's when I was right on the Bund river. It doesn't help that Shanghai is concrete central - my view consists of blocks and blocks of tall buildings. I rarely ever see the sun even though on good days it will be bright outside. At night however, the sky never turns completely black - it just remains an orange-ish hue.
I thought LA was bad! Here are a few pictures I took:
A friend mentioned to me that I am actually inhaling 3 cigarettes worth of pollution a day living in Shanghai. Apparently in Nanjing it's worse - about a pack a day. It's not hard to believe....only once was I able to see the Pearl Tower from a distance, and that's when I was right on the Bund river. It doesn't help that Shanghai is concrete central - my view consists of blocks and blocks of tall buildings. I rarely ever see the sun even though on good days it will be bright outside. At night however, the sky never turns completely black - it just remains an orange-ish hue.
I thought LA was bad! Here are a few pictures I took:
Friday, March 6, 2009
FIRST MONTH!
So...I can't believe I've been in Shanghai for a month already! In Chinese I would say, "Shijian zhen quai!" TIME FLIES. I would have started this blog earlier, and I wish I did...but...I've been busy. The first week was spent getting to know everyone in the program and exploring Shanghai, as well as trying our damndest to beautify our abysmal dorm rooms. As a spoiled American, I was appalled to see that our toilet was located inside the shower. Although at least they are not squatters. There are many questionable stains all over my dorm room. Also...there is not dryer and everyone hang-dries their clothes outside! Very interesting - but at least they are conserving energy!
So, it's hard to squish a month of craziness into one post - but here are some highlights: Scavenger hunt with the Chinese roommates, a mini field trip to the Urban Planning Center to see how Shanghai's constructing seems to be traveling at the speed of light, participating in the awesome nightlife at Shanghai, cab rides galore (very cheap), a weekend trip to Shao Xing, Ningbo, and Xinchang Valley, eating Shanghai's famous Xiao Long Bao (soup dumplings), bargain shopping in the underground, and more! That weekend trip to Shao Xing was amazing and it definitely deserves a separate post...
As a Chinese-American that has zero knowledge of the language, I am very excited to announce that I am able to carry very basic conversations. Everytime I get into a cab, I make sure that I strike up a conversation - usually I just learn the driver's name, how many people are in his family, and what he likes to eat or do. Not too shabby for only taking Chinese for a month. Although sometimes I feel like I am in a Chinese boot camp - we take 3 hours of Chinese 4x a week.
My Chinese roommate is AWESOME. She is from Weihai, in city in Shandong province about 12hrs. north of Shanghai by bus. She is definitely more stylish than the norm and is very easy-going. She is always very happy - which is good, despite the consistent gloomy weather we've been having here in Shanghai. I taught her some slang such as "Old School" and "Word." I hope to improve her fluency in ebonics ten-fold by the end of the semester.
Anyhow, I have lots of pictures to display my adventures in Shanghai - I don't have Flickr, but they are on Facebook. Check em' out if you're my friend!
So, it's hard to squish a month of craziness into one post - but here are some highlights: Scavenger hunt with the Chinese roommates, a mini field trip to the Urban Planning Center to see how Shanghai's constructing seems to be traveling at the speed of light, participating in the awesome nightlife at Shanghai, cab rides galore (very cheap), a weekend trip to Shao Xing, Ningbo, and Xinchang Valley, eating Shanghai's famous Xiao Long Bao (soup dumplings), bargain shopping in the underground, and more! That weekend trip to Shao Xing was amazing and it definitely deserves a separate post...
As a Chinese-American that has zero knowledge of the language, I am very excited to announce that I am able to carry very basic conversations. Everytime I get into a cab, I make sure that I strike up a conversation - usually I just learn the driver's name, how many people are in his family, and what he likes to eat or do. Not too shabby for only taking Chinese for a month. Although sometimes I feel like I am in a Chinese boot camp - we take 3 hours of Chinese 4x a week.
My Chinese roommate is AWESOME. She is from Weihai, in city in Shandong province about 12hrs. north of Shanghai by bus. She is definitely more stylish than the norm and is very easy-going. She is always very happy - which is good, despite the consistent gloomy weather we've been having here in Shanghai. I taught her some slang such as "Old School" and "Word." I hope to improve her fluency in ebonics ten-fold by the end of the semester.
Anyhow, I have lots of pictures to display my adventures in Shanghai - I don't have Flickr, but they are on Facebook. Check em' out if you're my friend!
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