"What do you eat?" - Part III - Restaurants in Shanghai City

             I haven’t written much more about food since I’ve been told off for talking too much about food – but what else can you expect from someone that’s normally a food blogger with an interest in foreign cuisines, in a land of such diverse dishes? I’ve also had a few people asking me recently – “Have you eaten any weird things yet?”

I have to say, the honest answer to this is no. Whilst lab people have done their best to give me a whirlwind tour of Asian cuisine, to show off their varied and interesting diet, they are not pushy in making me try anything I’m not comfortable with, and understand that the western diet is very different to theirs. The most I have had to do is eat some prawns, scallops and some other seafood (everyone that knows me knows I can’t stand it) out of politeness, because they had already been ordered. This is because the traditional method of dining in China is that the host orders a range of dishes which all the guests share (this is good for me anyway, because I can’t tell what half these dishes are, and the sharing of many dishes means that even if I don’t like one dish, there are still others to choose from, so I don’t have to go hungry!). You should at least try each dish, otherwise I think it’s considered quite rude. But my guidebook also says don’t finish all the food, because then it looks like the host is too poor to lay on enough of a spread! I have definitely found that a lot of food is left in restaurants, and this twinges on my hatred of waste of food, but hey, when in Rome….

The normal theme from the lab group about choosing a restaurant seems to be “Let’s go have Hong Kong/Taiwanese/Japanese/Thai/Korean food” - I can’t much discern anything between the meals as at the moment they are all variations of meat, weird veg, rice or noodles with or without soup to me. But I imagine it must be like when we’re in the UK saying “Let’s go to that French/Italian/Spanish restaurant”.

This suggestion is closely followed by ones for restaurants focusing on a specific ingredient. Usually these ingredients are not really my cup of tea! One of the funniest suggestions came when they beckoned me over to a computer screen to ask what something was called in English, as they were debating how to pronounce it. I duly came over and saw a picture of a snail, and after telling them how to say it, I naively asked why they were interested to know about snails, and burst out with laughter as the obvious dawned on me that they wanted to go eat it. I thought it was hilarious that they were pushing my boundaries without realising it, but after memories of Sardinia where even my mum couldn’t eat more than one snail from a large bowl she’d ordered, I just knew I couldn’t force myself, so I politely declined. You should have seen how their faces fell when I broke the bad news. They seemed so disappointed and some tried to convince me saying that the way it is prepared is actually surprisingly tasty. I replied saying that I know some people even in Europe really relish snails (I know from Rick Stein that parts of Spain have snail-eating festivals, where thousands gather to feast on them), and that it was just a personal taste issue for me.

The second instance was just this week when Lu meekly came to my desk with a smile on her face saying “do you like to eat intestines and blood?” She’s so cute, it’s hard to say no, but I couldn’t help but laugh and go “what?!” and then she went away saying “Maybe I don’t translate very well” before coming back with “Food like duck intestines and duck gizzard”. I managed to stretch to “I’ll eat blood if it’s cooked” – since I quite like black pudding – “but it’s okay, you guys go get gizzard and I’ll just go to the canteen”. It turned out they were just suggesting it for my benefit so that I can try more types of Chinese food! I managed to politely wriggle out of it after some attempts by others in the lab to convince me, saying that the way the gizzard is prepared you can’t actually tell what kind of meat it is. How reassuring, I thought. Maybe in that case, I’ve already had some without realising it!

Part of me felt a little guilty, because I was partly here to try different foods and push my boundaries a little, and I felt a bit like a chicken (pardon the poultry pun) for not wanting to go. Especially so when duck gizzard is fairly bog-standard food in the country where I’m from. My dad regularly likes to buy packets of chicken hearts from Hungary, and it is also available in Austria, and he puts it in his soup. Like a good Hungarian man, one of his favourite foods is also tripe. So duck gizzard soup wouldn’t really be much different to things found in the traditional Hungarian kitchen. I think soups made from internal organs hark back to nomadic times in both the Hungarian and Chinese history, where people couldn’t really afford to let any part of the animals go to waste. But I think my theories on the links between Chinese and Hungarian origins are a topic for a separate post.....

Back to the food. So the previous two are examples of what I haven’t eaten, what follows is a summary of what I have successfully eaten outside of the campus, with varying degrees of stomach upsets after (!)

The meals that arrive for me when I’m out with the lab are pretty much hit and miss. Most restaurants don’t have English versions of menus, or if they do, the Chinglish is pretty bad. My lab mates try their best to translate the foods I ask about, even if it’s via the translating app, and they also warn me if something I like the look of is hot, since they know that I don’t like too spicy food.

So most time I explain to them roughly what I fancy based on the pictures showing what is offered, and they do the ordering. The two don’t always match though, like one time when I said I fancied noodles as a break from all the rice at the canteen, and they asked “with or without soup?” and I said “without” but something must have gotten lost in translation, because I got this really vile soup that was basically just noodles, hot water and bits of beef. Vile.

It seems to be really difficult to get noodles without at least some kind of liquid being in it, and the other British girl I’ve met in the dorms, Miranda, thinks that it’s probably something to do with adding some of the cooking water of the noodles. There was even liquid at the bottom of this tasty Taiwanese take-away we got:

Taiwanese take-away

It was so tasty though, so I’ve decided I now really like Taiwanese food.

 The liquid seems very counter-productive to me though because this just makes the noodles much more slippery and harder to pick up! We went for some noodles made out of potatoes, and even the lab guys struggled to pick up the slippery strips with chopsticks:

Slippery potato-flour noodle soup with pork dumplings and two quail’s eggs

At least this one was a very tastier experience. The dumplings were very nice (despite the need for liquid in them too) and the soup was very hearty, full of different vegetables and even the mushrooms were tasty. Although there was a special mushroom in it which is apparently hard to digest, and for this reason, it is sometimes called “see you tomorrow”. Lol, I don’t think I need to say any more! But this seems to be quite a common ingredient, and I think why is it included if it’s so hard to digest? But hey, extra fibre is always good, I figured.

Not sure what the two quails eggs added to this meal, but I figured since they are a delicacy in some places, I may as well try them. They were a bit of an anticlimax, because they tasted pretty much the same as a boiled chicken’s egg. Boiled eggs seem to be quite a common garnish on dishes, and there is even a version of boiled chicken’s eggs that they like, boiled in tea which comes out brown (why????).

            Another great experience was also when we went to this Japanese restaurant:

             I had some rice, beef and sweet corn come on a hot plate with a knob of butter and you had to mix it up yourself to spread the freshly melted butter round. It also came with a small bowl of miso soup and is probably one of the best meals out I’ve had!

     Another time we went to a Japanese fast-food diner place, and I was recommended to have this other beef and rice dish which came with cheese on top and which also had to be mixed up with the hot rice to melt the cheese:

First bit of cheese I've had since I arrived, on a Japanese beef rice dish

              It tasted pretty much like the plastic-y, waxy, pre-grated cheese you can get in packs at supermarkets back home, but hey, this was my first cheese for three weeks, so I couldn’t complain!

              My incessant photo-taking of all my meals was always found to be hilarious by the guys in the lab, and they now remind me to get my camera out every time we eat a meal out:

“Western people taking photos of our food are so funny!”

               I also went to a slightly more up market place to meet up with Phoebe again (the lady who saved my phone from sinking into the oblivion of taxi land a few weeks ago), a place called Cotton’s that she recommended, which seemed quite western, and even had a Hungarian style beef stew on the menu! I didn’t try it because I didn’t come to China to eat Hungarian food, but it’s good to know it’s there if I ever get cravings for a taste of home!

With Phoebe, the kind lady who helped me track down my phone!

             This place also have buy one get one free happy hour on cocktails while we were there, so I got a little bit merry on some melon and vodka mixes!

            One of the cooler restaurants we’ve been to with the lab is a Korean restaurant where each table is equipped with what is basically like a sunken hob, where a hot plate can be put on top of it for people to fry their own food exactly the way they like it and have it fresh off the plate, or in our case, a large hot pot can be placed on top and your food bubbles away in front of you:

Amazing tasting Korean dish!

Here you can see a big pile of those long, thin, white “see you tomorrow” mushroom just above the green stuff here. The basic premise of the hot-pot is that you eat whatever you can fish out. Chinese eating occasions are very social, and whilst sharing food for Western people seems a little unhygienic, it is a sign of trust and friendliness here.

            They also had an unlimited free supply of pumpkin goo as a starter:

It tasted pretty much like pureed baby food to me, but the boys, loving food and anything that’s free ordered plates and plates of this stuff and guzzled it away like there was no tomorrow.

            I’ve also been out with the people from the dorms, like this time for Miranda’s birthday:

Dorm dinner out for a birthday

            Her roommate had organized a trip to a nearby Thai restaurant, and we walked through the heavy rain during when the typhoon was passing Shanghai in order to get to this place.

 It was one of the weirdest food experiences I've ever had! You can see from the photo that at this point only I and two other people actually had any food. (people were bored waiting for the food, so they started taking photos). I somehow got lucky and got served almost first, while others had to wait two hours to get their food! And the joke of it was that the restaurant was almost completely empty apart from us, on account of the rain, so it’s not like they were run off their feet. The guy on the extreme right was particularly pissed off, because he’d already got his dish, but had to send it back because the staff didn't understand the meaning of vegetarian and had served it with two prawns on top. In the end, he had to send his food back no less than three times, as each time there were bits of meat in it despite very clear requests to the contrary. One of the girls had to literally spell it out to them in Chinese “chicken is meat!”. I think they didn't cook his food from scratch, just picked out the chicken more successfully each time. Even on the menu, an appetiser labelled as “vegetarian spring rolls” after further probing had turned out to have “a little meat” in it. This just made me think of Hungary even more, where most people are perplexed by the notion of not eating meat, and it’s only recently that vegetarian options are expanding beyond fried cheese in restaurants. (again, this harks back to the traditional nomadic diet, where you simply would not survive as a vegetarian).

  Ironically, I got a perfectly acceptable vegetarian dish, as I just ordered fried rice with vegetables (I decided to play it safe, as I know Thai food isn't really to my taste and can be quite spicy).

             With regards to the waiting, the others also told me that they had similar experiences about waiting times for the food, and said that there had been occasions when some people were just getting their food as others were finishing theirs. This happened here also. The people that ordered various forms of Thai curry also got their rice about two hours after the curry! It made me think of this photo which went viral a few months back:

I’m sure if there had been condiments at this Thai restaurant some people would have been driven to do this!

            The food I got was quite good, and this guy Matthias had even managed to get a cake for Miranda:

It was a really nice cake, quite similar to the Hungarian style cakes, with layers of very light sponge and whipped cream. Lovely.

            So generally, eating out is fine, and although I’ve not tried anything really crazy yet, there are plenty of choices for people playing things safe, and I’m getting a bit braver, so hopefully in future posts there will be some actual crazy stuff.

Skyscraper City!

It’s no secret that Shanghai is a very modern city where skyscrapers have sprung up in rapid succession, each one taller than the previous, as if they were flower shoots vying ardently with each other to reach higher for the attention and the light. It’s even commemorated in this charming fan sold at tourist shops:

Shanghai Bund skyline fan

            The newly-built and constantly expanding metro so modern it puts London’s aged, lumbering 150 year-old system to shame, with every station having specific passenger doors that the train is programmed to stop at, and each carriage on every line boasting several TV screens showing their very own Metro channel with news, information and even cartoons. The metro is also very fast, taking only about 2 minutes between most stops. As mentioned in a previous post, work is now under way for a line 12, which is due to be finished at the end of this year, and no doubt there will be more to come.

For in Shanghai, there is constant building works, and they work long hours to get these flashy new buildings and metro lines popping up in a short time. Even in my campus, I can hear the hammering and electric sawing from 7 am, and my time in the lab is peppered with the rhythmic tones of pneumatic drills gutting and rebuilding a structure just next to us. Pretty much everywhere you go there is a building site round the corner (another brilliant way to keep the masses employed. There must be tens of thousands of builders working every day to keep up with the never ending developments in Shanghai).

I tried to take a photo to try to illustrate this, but it was awkward as many sites are covered up and I feel as much of an ogler as those people that try to take photos of me when they think I’m not looking. Anyway, this is the best I could do:

When I took this photo, several passing Chinese people burst into laughter, as they were probably thinking “Look at this stupid western tourist! Taking pictures of builders! Maybe they don’t have building sites in the west?” I guess stupid annoying tourists work both ways?!

I actually got this great view from some outdoor steps at an overpass across one of their many quadruple lane dual carriageways (that makes eight lanes in total!). Needless to say, some of these roads are difficult to cross even at the best of times, so the particularly busy ones have had overpasses built, complete with outdoor escalators!

The best one is just behind the Oriental Pearl:

          It leads up to a spectacular, circular overpass to help negotiate a very complicated intersection, and presumably also to help relieve the traffic from the interruption of a sea of tourists going to the Pearl.

Circular roundabout overpass to help pedestrians negotiate Lujiazui

These pictures don’t really give it justice though – it’s so huge, it really needs a panoramic shot!

              It’s also the only instance of a real-life, genuine roundabout that I’ve seen in China, which goes some way of explaining the complete chaos seen in all the roads, as people try to change lanes at the last minute.

       The nearest overpass to the uni is just a short walk away. This particular one is just next to a mall and a metro entrance:

Popular spot for photography is the overpass above a quadruple lane road in Xujiahui

            But it is also very popular as a photographic hot spot, where you get great shots of the bustling city. I took this photo from there:

            It’s hard to believe that this is only a five minute walk from campus. When you’re on the university grounds, the quiet and the old buildings laced with broken, pot-holed roads lulls you into a false sense of calmness and almost banality. But a quick step into almost any direction and you’re reminded that the campus is actually an oasis of quiet and peace!

            Although on this occasion, the pink and blue glow was from the fortuitously catching of some dusk light, I think it’s fair to say that the sky actually never really gets properly dark at night. There’s always an ominous pinky-orange glow, coming from the enormous light pollution fuelled by the Chinese love of bright lights, especially the ones showing off their skyscrapers. Yingzhou laments his inability to take any photos of stars, and I have to say, it’s pretty hard to spot even Orion’s belt sometimes, on nights when the sky isn’t blocked by a thick blanket of smog, that is.

            This overpass is also a great spot for long-exposure shots:

Long-exposure shot at Xujiahui

   But everywhere you go, the ever present “gleaming glass and steel” as described in the eyewitness DK guide to Shanghai, is over bearing, and nowhere more so than on the Pudong side near the Bund, where buildings come in all shapes and sizes, trying to outdo each other, in a way that makes the Gherkin, Walkie Talkie and the Shard look tame.

This one looks like it could be a dormant transformer, like the building toy from “Big” the movie:

But some of them do look quite elegant, and I particularly like this 20s-inspired building on the Puxi side:

 

Also, the communist monument on the left can also be seen in the above photo

The Pudong side boasts what was the second tallest building in the world, which can be seen peeking behind the others with its trapezoid hole through the top, which has earned it the affectionate nickname of “The Bottle Opener”. It was originally designed to have a circular hole at the top (a hole of some kind was required to to help such a tall building cope with the wind stresses experienced at that height), but apparently people thought a circle would remind them too much of the Japanese flag. Then they realized that a trapeze shape would be much easier and cheaper to make, so viola! The bottle opener was born, and actual bottle openers in that shape are now being sold there. It was originally designed to be the second highest building in the world, but as you can see a taller one next to it – the Shanghai Tower – is in progress, hoping to get a new record. They are both beaten by a skyscraper in Dubai.

Buildings in Shanghai come in all shapes and sizes, like this upside down cone:

            This one below I think is supposed to be two cups:

but it just reminds me of one of Lady Gaga’s bras:

         Occasionally, they try to balance this out by installing a little bit of greenery ion the pavement for pedestrians.

Rare bit of greenery in the city

                But this only happens if there is a big event about to be put on which would attract a lot of foreigners (like the World Expo in 2010), so they have to suddenly plant some greenery to make it look good.

                You can also escape to Century Park, a large park with lakes and entertainment (and a 10 RMB entry fee!), for a spot of kite flying:

Kite flying at Century Avenue, Shanghai

         At the end of the day, these structures are so huge and imposing and will be around for years to come no doubt. I sometimes wonder what will happen if or when the US defaults, either in this recession or the next, and when the whole world implodes, what future cultures would make of all these structures? It makes such a contrast to the traditional architecture of the Yu gardens, which are so admired and revered now. Will they still be standing in their full glory for future generations to marvel at them, wondering what drove these people to build into a seemingly never-ending competition for height? And what will replace them? Or will China just step into the spotlight left empty by the USA and keep on developing?

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     I’ve been wanting to add an addendum to this post for a few weeks, ever since I discovered how these skyscrapers are built so quickly! In actual fact, its that the builders live on the building site! They sleep in little carboard-box-type mobile homes, probably with many bunk beds in like the university dorms. I should not have been surprised that the economic boom was literally built on the toil and sweat of the poor, but the initial shock on finding this out astounded me so much I could only respond with “but what about their wives, children and families?!”. Living away from home is very common in China, where it’s difficult to make ends meet and find a job with so many people in the market. Many people have to move for jobs and the primary carer of many children are grandparents, while the parents strive to earn money for the family. I was told that these builders were probably people from the countryside, who come to the city for work, and send the money back to their families who are often people running farms or other agriculture. They even have a special phrase to describe these kind of “migrant workers” as Nóngmín gōng (农民工).

The Builders accommodation just behind the building site

         At first I thought it is very sad, but in some cases people have to move to a whole new country to earn enough to send back to their families. And since they live on site, no time is wasted on a daily commute, and it also explains why I can hear hammering from 7 am every day, so the system must be very efficient. And the workers seem to have a good camaraderie, and in the evenings we can hear them playing music or shouting excitedly about a card game or some such activity.

   It does seem unfair that the government is benefitting from people’s poverty which pushes them to work like this, but with the huge numbers of people, it can be difficult to compete for jobs, so there is no shortage of people willing to volunteer for early, late or holiday shifts, even for what seems like very little pay for us. So in a way, yes, some money is going back to the poorer people out in the countryside, but I doubt many of these workers would ever go into one of these skyscrapers when they’re finished. Many of the skyscrapers charge a fair amount for the entry to the viewing levels, I doubt many of the poorer people could afford such a luxury. The lower levels of skyscrapers are usually devoted to office spaces and hotels, so again, out of reach for poorer people.

   The conflicting socialism/capitalism is an odd issue here, as due to the huge competition, sometimes the only way to get ahead is to be friendly with the right people. There is no way a government could truly provide equally for 1 billion people. There are many features of Chinese culture that don’t seem very socialist – for example all healthcare is private as in America, and can be very expensive – so it seems funny to call “Obamacare” socialist! Things could not be further from the truth here, as everybody is striving and competing, and there is no welfare state to provide for those in need.

   China today is very in awe of the Western world and curious to learn and replicate the successes there. I can’t help but feel that their recent strides in development could only have happened by taking on capitalist attitudes, and business and trade pretty much run in the country the same as in capitalist places. The Chinese people are very practical, so they are willing to do whatever it takes to get things done. The end result is the most important for them. So overall, I would say that since the backlash against the Cultural Revolution in the 80s (people often talk here of the “post-80s generation”), China’s socialist reins have loosened, and increasingly the communist rule is in name only.

Shanghai Exit-Entry Bureau

This week I had another fun trip out to the Shanghai Exit-Entry bureau! My wallet is now 457 RMB lighter, but I’ve got my passport back with a brand new visa in that now means that I can leave the country! South Korea, here I come!

The bureau is a bit tricky to find and navigate, and most foreigners in the South East of China will inevitably end up having to go to this office at one point or another, I thought I’d write a post about this weird and crazy place at the end of subway line 9, to help people.

Taking the subway was the easy part, since there is a stop on the relevant line near SJTU, and all I had to do was sit until the end station, Middle Yanggao Road. Then, there are two main exits, but I got off at exit 3 and then crossed the huge road towards the corner with a building site, and then set off down Minsheng Road. Or at least, it was a building site the first few times when I arrived there. If you’re reading this blog from maybe a few months or more in the future, you might find that there is now a big skyscraper there! I had been in the bureau only one hour to pick up my passport, and during that time they had already erected some metal barriers equipped with lights to cover up the building site

Large metal sheets installed during the hour it took me to get my passport back, in order to cover up the ugliness of the building site!

            It must look very pretty at night with all the lights on, but what I think this most illustrates is how much Chinese culture places such importance on keeping up nice appearances and covering up negatives. But I digress…..

Here is the view of exit 3 from the opposite corner showing the intersection that you need to cross, regardless of which exit you take.

You need to cross to the corner where the people on the right are going, and then just go straight ahead for two blocks

             From this point on though, I was equipped only with an address and Google maps on my phone.

Weirdly, there are two buildings on Minsheng Road very close to each other that come up as a result for a search of “Shanghai Exit-Entry Bureau”. The first one on your right “Shanghai Entry-Exit Inspection and Quarantine Bureau” was the one my phone initially pointed me to, and it was a very large and imposing building, guarded by two guards at the entrance near the base of the stairs and a further three or four, up at the front door of this official looking building. Since I had no clue where I was going, and thought that this place looked way too over the top for just visas, I asked one of the guards, hopefully they’d be just like policemen in the UK – ie. great to ask for directions. Luckily, they were very nice, and armed with the address written in both English and Chinese, they knew where I needed to get to and gestured that I needed to go a bit further.

So the place I think most people need to actually get to is a good two blocks away from the metro station, where Minsheng road meets Yingchun Road. This is called Bureau of Exit-Entry Administration Shanghai Municipal Public Security on Google maps. You can’t miss it because there is a massive big sign on the front in both English and Chinese:

Front entrance of the Exit-Entry Bureau

When you go in, there are lots of signs, and not many of them are very helpful! I stopped at an information kiosk on the ground floor (1^st floor in China) and asked a young lady where I should go and she directed me to the third floor (2^nd in English), which was a floor of one of the most mental administrative systems I’ve seen. When you arrive, you’re supposed to pick up a ticket from a machine, which shows your position in the queue. A display board shows when you’re next and which desk to go to. So I waited. But occasionally, one of the ticket attendants would shout something in Chinese down a megaphone and hold up a piece of paper with a group of about 20 numbers, when there would be a massive rush of those people going to a desk, any desk. There were maybe 12 desks on this floor, and two extra attendants with the megaphone guy, and they all had police uniforms on. The total number of staff in this building alone must be about 100, and I was thinking what a cushy job this must be if you’re in the police force – it’s a well, respected, easy job, all you have to do is sit behind a desk all day and push papers around! Don’t have to do any of the crime solving or fighting! Like I said before, I think this is the key to the success of the Chinese government - creating all these unnecessary jobs to keep everybody employed!

When my number was among those called out, I duly went in the scrum to get to a desk. When I got one I was asked if I had had my picture taken yet. I said no, but I had a passport photo with me. This was not good enough, so I was sent away again.

Now, I was already lucky to be slightly more prepared than the average person that comes to this crazy office, because this very helpful lady at the international students office at the university had already advised me about what to do and take, and she had even prepared the correct form that I needed to fill in and printed it off and stuck my passport photo to it, and gave me instructions on where to go an even how much it would cost by different methods. I know most people arrive not knowing which of the plethora of forms they need to fill in and have several unsuccessful attempts before they finally get the right one, or they have to leave again to get some passport photos done or get another document. So I felt like I was quite prepared. However, having the correctly filled in form, passport photo, letter of admission and proof address was still not enough, so then I went downstairs and spoke to the same lady who I asked in the first place, and then she directed me to the digital photo booth, which puts a photo they take of you on to their electronic database. A part of me was screaming inside “WHY COULDN’T YOU HAVE JUST TOLD ME THAT I NEEDED TO DO THIS IN THE FIRST PLACE”, which would have saved me at least 45 minutes of waiting upstairs.

Of course, at the photo booth, nobody spoke English, so I was gestured into a seat and then had a photo taken, not knowing whether I needed to pay, but since nobody asked me for any money, I then went back upstairs to get another ticket and wait.

But by this time, of course, it was coming up to Chinese lunch time (11:30 to you and me). So the number of manned desks was reduced to one, with still roughly the same amount of people waiting (but thankfully the guy with the megaphone was now gone too). So I had to wait another 45 minutes before finally a couple more ladies returned from their lunch break, and at last the queue was starting to move at a reasonable pace. I spoke with one of the ladies for maybe 5 minutes and then was told to come back two weeks later (on account of the upcoming Golden week).

So this week I made my return, and it was slightly more straightforward. Collection of your passport is at a section on the right of the front entrance on the ground floor. There was a huge queue of people for two kiosks where you could pay the fee for your new visa, so much so, that a little snack shop had set up just next to the queue, selling drinks and biscuits, etc. When I saw this I began to imagine that I’d be stood in the queue for an age, but actually it moved along at an acceptable pace. I then went to pick up my passport with my receipt, and they gave me back exactly that – and nothing else! So no more is my acceptance letter from SJTU – be warned, only submit copies of documents unless you don’t want to see them again! But perhaps, they just took the letter to stop me getting another visa, since I’m only allowed to change it once with an F-type.

But the bottom line is, I can now make two extra trips out of China and they will let me back in! So, next stop, Seoul…..

Chinese National “Golden Week” Holiday - a great time to stay at home!

                 “Why so many blog posts?” I hear you ask. “Aren’t you supposed to be doing some research there?”. Lol, I wish I was, and I’m bugging the other students as much as I can for them to show me where everything is and how to use their machines, etc. So far, all I’ve managed to do is order some primers, and I’m waiting for some antibiotics and SYBR green to arrive which won’t come until next week.

                That’s because the first week of October is a national holiday for the Chinese, goes under the guise of celebrating the founding of the People’s Republic of China in 1949, but in reality, the week’s paid holiday was introduced in 1999 to help boost domestic tourism and the economy. There has been some calls for the holiday to be cut back because of too much disruption to the regular services, but it can’t be said that it’s not working to boost tourism. If anyone is doubting whether this week long holiday has boosted tourism, they need to see my pictures.

There are lots of decorations up, mainly of the Chinese flag, and also pop up face-in-hole boards in the street.

Me and Lu, posing as Maoist "comrades"

           People are turning out in their droves, which means that although Shanghai is a pretty busy and crowded city already, the main tourist spots are now at bursting point.

Before I came, when I heard that this would be a week of holiday, I thought that this would be a great time for Sam to come and visit. But now, I'm so glad I heeded the advice of Dexi, the first exchange guy who is on his year-long stay in Leicester at the moment, who told me that under no circumstances should I go and visit any tourist sites then, and that it would be better for Sam to come later. He also told me that sometimes during that week, he just stays in his dorm, relaxing. I couldn't understand how this could possibly be, in a city that seems so exciting and with so much to offer. I told myself that I wouldn't be doing this under any circumstances. But having been on the Bund at dusk yesterday, I am now inclined to agree!

Lady at the bottom right hand corner of this shot trying to get a sneak picture of me

            The sheer number of people clamouring over each other to get a shot of the Bund was stifling, and this was also the moment a charming middle aged lady who can be seen in the bottom right corner of the picture decided to shove a camera in my face to take a photo as if I wouldn't notice, despite being squashed right up against her, and everyone else there.

Because, yes, the holiday has brought all the country people from the areas outside of Shanghai into the city, with their fascination for western people. The past few trips into the city this week is when the infamous “locals ask to have photos taken with westerners” had started. On campus, nobody really bats an eyelid at the presence of a westerner in their midst. Sure, we are quite rare in the canteen, and maybe the odd person stares a little bit longer than usual, but it’s not obtrusive or irritating. I think that most Shanghai people are pretty much used to Westerners, especially at the university, where I’d say 50 % of the students at the international dorms are of Caucasian descent, and the rest are Korean.

However, when we get to major tourist spots, there must be country people who haven’t ever seen a westerner in their life, because that is where I start getting requests to pose for photos with people. The first one happened in the Yu gardens while we were waiting for the boys to get the tasty Bell cakes, and I must admit, I thought it was hysterically funny that some stranger would want a photo with me, and the girls from my lab were also in fits of giggles. It wasn’t hard to smile those first few times, since I was laughing already. I thought I was getting a taste for what it feels like to be a celebrity! Another expat blogger in China, Sara, writes a very funny blog post about this called "Move to China and Become a Celebrity". This is pretty much how I'd describe it! Although I don't hear the words  外国人 wàiguórén  and 老外 lǎowài so often. Or maybe I just don't hear it when people speak so quickly.

I find it really cute when little kids are curious about me, and some of them try to practice what few English phrases they may know. I found these two little cuties (or maybe they found me?) in the Yu gardens, as they were singing “Hello, hello, hello” behind me, and then I realised they were talking to me.

Cute Chinese kids wanted to pose with me :)

        Their parents told them to say “Nice to meet you” and when I said “Nice to meet you too!” back, everyone fell into fits of giggles. So when their parents suggested a photo, of course I obliged and got one for myself too. Who could refuse such little sweeties, with their inquisitive faces so full of anticipation and curiosity!

One of the things I’m really glad about is that in Chinese culture, there isn’t a cold fear of others that pervades so much in British culture that means you can’t so much as look at another person’s child without some frosty stares that suggest they’re suspecting you of being the next Mark Bridger. Whilst those cases are tragic and horrifying, I’m sure that they are isolated incidences; whereas it sometimes feels like that the British culture acts as though they are commonplace, and that people need to be on their guard. It might just be that the British like to have their personal space and keep the distance more. There is much less of a big deal on personal space in China, and if that is precious to you, then China won't be for you. People in China people seem very at ease with their children, and allow them to explore, and they seem happy for them to interact with me and others. In fact, Chinese people seem to be quite touchy-feely, since some people who posed with me grabbed my arm as they stood next to me, or put their arm round me, like the girls in this photo. It’s nice to see that people are really friendly and open.

                There was also a funny couple at the ferry from the Pudong side that made me laugh, as it was clear that the girl wanted a photo, but she was too shy to ask, so her boyfriend went ahead and asked me while she slapped him, embarrassed. I thought this was hilarious, so of course, I had to pose with them. I don’t mind if people ask politely, but unfortunately it sometimes happen that if people see me posing with others, they want to do it too, and they begin to get into a queue, as if I was a tourist attraction myself, along with the Oriental Pearl and the Bund. This kind of lessens the magic a little, and I start to feel a bit like a commodity rather than a person.

                It was especially bad when I had a nap on a grassy verge in the park and barely had I raised my head to wake up, when some guy was already asking me for a photo, shortly followed by more people queuing. I think some people must have started to sense that it was getting annoying, so they satisfied themselves with taking photos of me by myself from afar, which I found equally, if not more creepy. I was starting to understand how celebrities can get annoyed with the paparazzi.

                But this lady on the Bund was really taking the biscuit as we were all squashed up against each other in a crowd, and without saying a word, not even in Chinese, she tried to surreptitiously take a photo of me when she saw me behind her. When she wasn’t satisfied with the photo, she tried again, not so surreptitiously. I was like “hello lady, I’m right here” (there must have been less than 10 cm between us, so thick was the crowd) and felt like flipping the bird into her photo. However, my politeness prevailed, and I just about managed a sarcastic smile and wave for her photo. I also started to think about the reverse, and the kind of reaction Asian people would have if they received the equivalent treatment in Europe. It would be considered unthinkably racist for British people to stop a Chinese person on the street to pose with them, yet here it seems perfectly normal!

Dear Chinese people, it’s okay to have a photo with me, but please have the courtesy to ask me politely first!

                However, by this time I’d had enough of the crowd and had got my obligatory photo of the Bund, and just decided to head home. It took about 10 – 15 minutes to make the 500 m journey back to Nanjing Road East metro station through the crowd.

The Bund at dusk

         Coming back to the spacious, quiet campus was a welcome relief, and I went to my dorm room and had a well-earned rest, without anybody bothering me, blending into the background again. It was much more comfortable to be at home. Maybe Dexi was right after all.