A Week of Luxury in Shanghai: Susan and David come to Shanghai!

so mom and dad came a week ago (and left today, so sad!). Since they don't really understand how much things cost/don't care, we had a wonderful expensive, luxurious time together! :)

I went to their hotel, the Peninsula on the Bund (the river) to meet them, and then had a shanghainese meal in Xintiandi at Ye Shanghai, so yummy. It was a nice introduction to chinese food for them. Then we walked around Xintiandi a bit, then went back.

Wednesday after class, I met them downtown for lunch at LaoZhengXing Restaurant, a really old shanghainese restaurant, where we had (what I thought was) delicious food. The parents were a little freaked out when I just ate the whole shrimp, shell and head included. But it's small, so you can just pretend the crunchy part is fried. haha. Then our first trip to the fabric market, where I bought a blue cashmere coat (that I got back today and it's beautiful. so soft and warm and fits great!), dad got a dark grey cashmere coat (looks great!) , and mom got a bunch of silk dresses and knit dresses (which turned out part good, part not to good). Then we went back to the hotel and had massages and enjoyed the spa facilities at the peninsula. Met Magnolia for dinner at 100 century avenue restaurant in the World Financial Center (the tallest building in shanghai)- yummy! It also happened to be ladies night at the 100 century ave bar upstairs so we went (all 4 of us) for a bit and danced.

Thursday afternoon, mom and dad met me at my dorm and then we had lunch with my roomies at the local Hunan restaurant. the parents loved it. nice and spicy and flavorful. then we walked to cocos and got bubble tea. Unforunately they didn't share my love/addiction for bubble tea. Dad was of course freaked out by the "bubbles" and mom got sick of it after awhile. We walked through campus and took some pictures. Tried to go to the bookstore but it was closed. sad. then we walked to walmart and bought some christmas decorations. Dad napped while mom helped me decorate my room/apt with some xmas lights, ornaments, and garland. of course I have christmas decorations. it makes me pretty happy, although at home I'd obviously have more (remember our tree in the middle of our freshman yr room zanzibar? haha). Then (since this thursday was thanksgiving) we had our program thanksgiving dinner. Turns out it was a huge deal, people from different IES (our program) offices were there, all our teachers, our language partners, friends and family visiting, etc were there. They had turkey, some weird thing that might have been pretending to be gravy? no stuffing. (VERY sad). and the mash potatoes were a bit weird and they kept running out but they made me happy nonetheless. My chinese class was stupposed to do a skit but then we decided not to. Then our teacher said if we sang the thanksgiving song (which we convinced her existed), we wouldn't have class on friday. so we made up a song in chinese that roughly translates as "This is Thanksgiving!..." to the tune of Twelve Days of Christmas. It was a bit of a mess, but everyone loved it of course. and no friday class. yes. Then we went to helens to celebrate thanksgiving some more, then windows.

Friday morning I met mom and dad for breakfast at their hotel- by far the best bfast I've had in china. breakfast potatoes, scrambled eggs, croissants, fruit, quiche, bagels, etc. yum! Then we went back to the fabric market and I got some dresses (which mostly turned out well, the bad ones they're fixing for me), mom got a beautiful purple cashmere coat, and dad got two cashmere sport jackets. so nice! Then we went to Yu Yuan (Yu Garden) and walked around. Mom loved the architecture and the gardens and such. Then we shopped: a bunch of paintings from the Beijing Art School show visiting in shanghai (funny story: the guy who brought us to the painting shop told me I was very beautiful- i get that a lot here btw- and asked if I had a boyfriend. When I said no, he asked if he had a chance. I laughed and let it go but then he kept asking so I said I was leaving next month- cuz I am- and he said, oh well, in the next life. hahaha. I ended up buying his paintings too cuz they were the best- zan, natalie, and greg these are going in our house somewhere, hehe), a brass buddha that I've been trying to buy forever, a lotus flower incense holder, some prosperity fish, my chinese name in calligraphy, and a few other gifts. Lots of good traditional stuff. We also ate some shengjian and the big soup dumplings that you drink with a straw. Then we went back to the hotel, worked out, and enjoyed the spa some more. A few of my friends met us at the hotel for drinks, then ERA (an acrobat show). This one was way better than the one we did at the beginning of the program. I saw this show last summer too when I was in shanghai for the week. It's sooo awesome. There are the traditional contortionists and people who spin/balance stuff, but also some amazingness that I can't even say cuz I don't want to ruin it for anyone. but omg it was so cool. then dinner at din tai feng=best dumpling restaurant in the world! there's one in LA so go if you're there. anyways, then we got cold stone ice cream and went to a new bar with 100 rmb (that's like $15usd) open bar. good music. but we were all tired and went home early.

Saturday we walked down E Nanjing Rd to People's Square, where we happened upon the singles market- parents go there to talk to other parents about what their children are like and what their children want in other people. It's really funny/interesting. Then we went to the Jade Buddha Temple, pretty cool. Great temple. better than a lot that I've seen in china (which means a lot cuz I've seen a lot of temples). ate lunch at the temple's famous vegetarian restuarant. so good. then we went to M50, a modern art gallery district. Mom and I bought some really cool photographs of shanghai. Then back to the hotel for some spa treatments. Went to the pearl tower before dinner and saw the sites of shanghai from the top. Dad and I went on the glass floor part and looked down and freaked mom out by jumping on it. She refused to walk on the glass. Then an amazing chinese dinner at the hyatt on the bund. The waiter was really nice. we had peking duck. for dessert, I had a chocolate fondant. you don't realize how much you miss something like that until you have it again. omg I died and went to heaven. X100. then we went to the Vue Bar on the top where they have a hot tub you can put your feet in (or whatever I guess) and big beds- probably really nice in the summer, but too cold now. Dad loved the view though. Mom and I had yummy lychee martinis. We went back to the hotel and I had another drink. Then I met some friends at a new bar in the french concession for Jeff's 21st bday. fun times.

Sunday morning we went to Soong Qing-Ling's residency. She was the wife of Sun Yat-sen (I sincerely hope you know who that is, but just in case- the founder of the Republic of China (which is now taiwan, but at the time was the precursor to the people's republic of china) who led the overthrowing of the Qing dynasty in 1911). She did a lot of cool women's rights and humanitarian stuff. It was fun to hear about her (I had an audio guide, which actually used good english, haha). Then we went to Tianzifang, where we had a minor crisis when we realized we had almost no cash and then the ATM didn't work. but luckily that was solved. had lunch at taithai and sat on the floor on big cushions, always fun. I got a really cool vintage flower ring. so me. and a cool necklace. Then we went back to the hotel and bought another suitcase to put all the things we bought in plus some of the stuff I had already bought/don't need anymore. Throughout the week, my parents had been giving me little presents here and there for my bday (which is this saturday, duh)- dresses, tights, new bras, etc. They gave me the rest sunday night. so unexpected and fun! Then We went to a spicy food restaurant for dinner. super yummy. dad and I got in a bit over our heads with the spice. still fun though. Then I went home to study. blah.

Monday, I had three classes and some urgent stuff to catch up on so mom and dad went to hangzhou (nearby town on a lake, very pretty, i went there already two months ago). They liked it. I'm glad they got to see somewhere other than shanghai. Then they met me at my dorm and we went to hotpot. Hotpot is basically a boiling broth (of various flavors) and you put stuff in it and it cooks (kind of similar to fondue). I always forget how hard it is to order food there cuz you don't really know what the different things are, especially when there are no pics and little english. We accidentally got duck blood. congealed. but it was pretty good. tasted like tofu or liver. we ordered way too much food. but the waiters/waitresses were really cute and kept giving us gifts and stuff. so cute. Then we took a rickshaw back to campus for the experience, which was pretty funny cuz they're only made for two chinese sized people. and we put three big foreigners in them. haha. the guy tried to rip me off cuz I guess he thought we were stupid. but I showed him. went back to mom and dad's hotel for a final night, tried on our clothes that were delivered from the fabric market and watched singing in the rain (aka dad was sleep talking, mom snoring/trying to stay awake and watch, and me missing the ending cuz I was also asleep). It was a fun movie anyways though. haha.

Today we went back to the fabric market to get a few things fixed, which I'll have to get later this week. And then had a leisurely lunch and they left for the airport around 2. I went home, got a mani/pedi, and did some hw. so sad they're gone, but I'll be home in two and a half weeks anyways. It's just hard to go from luxury life in shanghai with some western comforts back to cheap college student life. and we are finally having assignments, presentations, and exams so I actually have to do work. that sucks. big time.

but my 21st is saturday and we're going to nanjing this weekend! should be a nice escape from shanghai! next week is our last week of classes. The final week is for final exams but all of my assignments/exams are monday of that week so that leaves me four full days of free time before I leave! wooh! Hopefully I can get my work done asap and then just enjoy the last two and a half weeks (which is obviously why I'm writing this blog post instead of writing a paper).

See you soon America! Miss you already mom and dad!

Suzhou and life since Taiwan

Last week I mostly caught up on work, papers, etc. cuz mommy and daddy nethero are coming on Tuesday! Yippee!!! Last Monday I went to Tianzifang with Magnolia, Sup, and Diggory and we ate delicious “new york style” pizza. It was real pizza. J

Friday we had an optional field trip for our shanghai metropolis class to the harbor new city. When the Expo came to Shanghai, they moved the ports outside of the city cuz that was prime space. Now they’re like an hr away. We went over the longest bridge in china/world? Not sure how long but it took like 20 minutes to cross at about 60 mph. They had windmills and stuff in the water (for research we later found out) so that was cool. We got there and there was nothing to do but look at the harbor.

the harbor. cool huh?...

Magnolia and I trying to find something to do for an hour and a half at the shipping yard... haha

Then we went to a shanghai electrical plant place where we had a tour but it was poorly translated cuz it was complicated weird words that the girl didn’t know in English. We accidentally left without magnolia, but I realized after about a minute so no big. Haha. It took us almost two hours to get home. Sooo annoying.

Friday night we went out for our friend Linh’s 21^st bday and ate delicious thai food at tianzifang. Yum!

Saturday I just did hw cuz we have a test tomorrow.

Today we went to Suzhou. It took us about 20 minutes on the high speed train. Suzhou is a “Water town” outside of shanghai with lots of gardens and temples and such. We first went to the “Humble Adminstrator’s Garden” (great name huh? so chinese), which was actually really pretty.

The Humble Administrator's Gardens. :) changing leaves!

me at the gardens. notice the random chinese man, starting obviously

Then we had a very Chinese lunch, where we accidentally ordered way too much. (my fault, mommy nethero has definitely instilled the fear of never having enough food in me, even though we always have enough for an army- as she would say) couldn’t find a taxi so we took some bike rickshaws, ended up being a half hr ride. Poor drivers… then we went to the Yanmen Garden, which is on the edge of the old town. It had a big pagoda, which we didn’t feel like climbing. We walked around and took pictures. It was nice, similar to the other gardens. Basically they’re all the same within a region in China. Water, wholly rocks, maybe some lily pads, no flowers really. But it actually looked like fall, so that was nice. Leaves in shanghai aren’t really changing…

me and people at the yanmen garden place

at the yanmen garden- looks pretty similar to the humble administrator's right?

Then we saw the moat around the old city and a piece of the old wall that used to surround the city.

me at the moat

Then we searched for coffe shop for awhile, fail. Looked for a taxi for over a half hour and almost took a (somewhat) random bus, but finally find a taxi. So we went to Tiger Hill, with another pagoda. We didn’t feel like climbing the hill so instead we hung out in the street where there were some carnival games and food and such.

Alex trying to shoot balloons

"Oh look, a white blonde person with a gun! Let's stare!"- the crowd of chinese people watching us

We couldn’t find a taxi (Suzhou has a serious shortage of taxis). So we went to the tourist info center and asked them to call one, but they couldn’t. so instead this guy volunteered to drive us. So we put 13 people in a 7 person van. Fun times. Then we trained back. While we were waiting, this crazy fast train flew through the station. America really needs to step up our train game. trains in china rock. And they just built the fastest train in the world, from shanghai to hangzhou (where we went for mid autumn festival break, but we didn't take that train cuz it wasn't finished yet). oh ya, and they build all these trains in like 6 months. I guess that's what you get when you have 1.3 billion people and low labor standards. :)

Note: People say Americans are loud and obnoxious? Those people should come to china first. Chinese people are so loud and talkative, ALL THE TIME. On the flight back from Taiwan last week, the flight attendant actually had to ask the Chinese people to be quiet. And they always sound like they’re mad (yelling), but that’s actually just how they talk. And the women have really high pitched voices, which makes it even better. They also honk excessively, like a “hey what’s up” on the road. I see you. I am not even moving so why are you honking at me? And even if you’re standing still, drivers still want to drive exactly where you are, even though the rest of the road is empty (this applies more with bikes and mopeds). Also the concept of the line hasn’t made it to china yet. (waiting in line I mean) on the subway, they won’t let you off cuz people are so anxious to get on. Getting on the train today and going through the ticket machine thing, this woman in front of me had her probably 8 yr old son in front of her and used him as a pushing device. He stuck his head out so that he was head butting them and then she pushed. A few times people wouldn’t move so the poor kid’s neck got crunched, but no problem, anything it takes to get on first. As if we don’t have assigned seats…silly, silly people.

Anyways, home now. Meeting with a guy from IES Chicago (from the headquarters of the program I’m doing) cuz they picked a few of us to talk with him. I dunno what I’m supposed to talk about with him, just entertaining I guess…that’s it for now!

more taiwan pics...

the national palace museum

me and diggory at the thailand garden at the flora expo

National Palace Museum

the secret garden we found!

Danshui, the northern city by the ocean (sorry, I didn't have any better pics)

oh ya, funny story I forgot about, my friend alex is french and got her visa for china this summer while she was in france. apparently she got the wrong kind and on the way back from taiwan, they stopped her and wouldn't let her in! haha. we were all making jokes like, oh alex the terrorist (not really funny, but it was at the time) , and then they told her she had to go to hong kong to get her visa fixed. haha. so she's there until thursday! hahahahaha.

anyways, miss you all america!!!!

"...cuz Taiwan's a real country."

so just got back from Taiwan last night. We went with the program for the week. Technically we went to as part of our comparative metropolis class, to compare Taibei (Taipei) and Shanghai. It was pretty awesome…

Friday before we left, magnolia and I went to the shanghai art museum cuz we didn’t have Chinese class. It was pretty amazing. Really cool paintings/statues/installations. I highly recommend it.

exhibit at the museum- "Fat"

chinese pop art

Shanghai Art Museum Building

Then we discovered this new really amazing area of shanghai called tianzifang. It’s a whole series of alleyways that are made up of traditional shanghainese homes, called shikumen. Now it’s filled with boutiques and ethnic food (likes thai, Indian, western, etc) We had Indian food, sooo good. Then I got a brownie at a different restaurant and noli had a coffee. Then we went to a third café, that was all organic and natural (zan you would have died). I got a cocktail and noli got gelato.

so we left last Saturday. It’s only a two hour flight so it was pretty easy. We were picked up at the airport by the Taiwanese partner university coordinator people. They had different students every day assigned to hang out with us and help us out with whatever we needed so we got to talk to lots of Taiwanese students about whatever. That was pretty cool. We decided that Chinese students from the ages of 12-25 actually act like they’re 12-15 yrs old. The whole time. As in very low emotional maturity. Example: they’re obsessed with stuffed animals, toys, dolls. Boys and girls still frequently act like the other has cooties. And the idea of “partying” is really bizarre to them. Most of the clubs/bars in china are full of westerners or older Chinese people. Anyways, Taiwanese people are a bit better. They party. And don’t act like children. So after checking into our hotel (which had this awk courtyard in the middle with fake grass mat stuff. And all the floor overlooked it so we’d just lean over the balcony and yell at each other- probs pretty annoying for everyone else at the hotel, invasion of the loud Americans!), we walked around the area a bit. We quickly discovered that people actually obey traffic laws in Taiwan! It was crazy. People stopped at red lights. Bikes stayed on their side of the road and followed the lights. You didn’t feel like you were going to die in the taxis. And taxis were just always available. Whenever you needed one and started to look around, they would just appear. And the drivers were all really nice. And their taxis were too, like brand new looking. Leather seats. Yay. (speaking of scary taxis- today the taxi I was in got pissed off that the light turned red, so he sped up to get through the intersection before the other cars started going cuz they had a green light. We were inches from a giant bus. Sooo scary. Then we stop at a light and the driver starts snorting and then opens the door and spits. Gross.) we decided this must be because taiwan is a real country, with real laws, etc. haha. then we had a dinner with the program at a nice western restaurant (everything is a bit cheaper in Taiwan than it is in shanghai) but it took forever, like 3 hrs. and my steak was barely cooked, which I normally like but you just never know when you’re in china/Taiwan. Then we went to a bar and I had hard cider- yum! We tried to go to this bowling place/club but you needed reservations. At 1 am, seriously? Reservations. We were sad. And then I lost my purse. (more on that later)

Sunday me, ben, alex, and jay went to longshan temple. It’s Buddhist. Really ornate and well preserved. And tons of worshippers burning incense, offering fruit to the gods, chanting, doing calligraphy, bowing, etc. really cool cultural experience. And there were water falls and ponds all around it- sooo pretty.

Long Shan Temple 

details on the ceiling, really well preserved

Me and Alex (and Ben) outside of the temple, there were gardens and such

Then we went to this street that supposedly had traditional stuff to buy, but it was really just tea and Chinese medicine. We did a tea tasting, which is sooo fun. Such a ceremony, they have to clean the leaves, the bowls, everything a million times, and then pour and repour everything a million times. We also randomly saw a van doing a puppet show on the street. Random. 

rando puppet van

funny hats on the street

In Taiwan there are tons of themed restaurants (hospital, toilet, poop, lord of the rings, etc) and we went to the ninja one. It was Japanese, soooo yummy. All the waiters/waitresses were wearing ninja-like clothes and had swords. Apparently on the weekends they have “girl shows”, aka strip shows. We did not see the strip show, haha. Then we walked around and discovered a cool boutique area.

Ninja Restaurant

ninja clothes

Monday we started the pre-planned lecture stuff. We had a lecture at the zoo (so random, no one really knows why we were lectured on zoo management) and then got to see all the animals, mostly special ones who were in non-public cages. I think they were like rescued or something. The orangutan was so creepy looking. When he looked at you, like in the eyes, you could tell that he had stuff going on in his head, not blank stares like other animals give you. And there were these really cute monkeys that were swinging around holding on to each other- they were mom and baby. And we saw pandas!!!!! So cute. Great panda gift store too. J 

creepy orangutan

cute mommy and baby monkey

panda!!!

gift store

then we went to the national science and technology university and had lunch with the students there. We were in groups and our students was so awk, but in a funny way- he asked us if we had boy/girl friends. And one of my friends, ben, was like ya I do. And the Taiwanese student was like, “oh can you teach me how to get girlfriend?” haha. Then we got a tour of the campus and saw their really baller technology lab thing.

science lab thing

our new chinese friend

Then we went to the election headquarters of the democratic people’s party (DPP). (more on politics later) there is an election for the mayors and local positions of the 5 cities in Taiwan in about a week so everybody was geared up for the election. they gave us lots of free stuff. Then we had free time so we went to see the social network- it had just come out in Taiwan. And it’s never coming out in china so we thought we should take the chance to see it. It was good, very interesting. I enjoyed reading all the subtitles in Chinese to see how they translated things. Then we went to the shilin night market- see my last post for the wonder of night markets. But this was even better. Whole streets filled with delicious foods- I tried fried squid, dumpling things, lemon-orange juice (amazing!!!!!!!), bubble tea (a specialty of Taiwan, although you can get it in china too), a curry chicken wrap, fried shrimp with this delicious spicy sauce (oh ya, I forced myself to like spicy food now), a waffle cone filled with shrimp and pineapple, and tons of really fresh exotic fruit. Noli and I stayed and shopped some. I bought a leopard print sweater (I am so my mother) and noli got some awesome tee-shirts/dresses.

night market streets, lots of people

street food corn

Tuesday we started off the day with lecture on development in Taiwan at National Chengchi University, who was hosting us. They guy was an idiot and just told stupid stories and no one really knew what he was talking about. Apparently back in the day, Taiwanese tribes used to hunt each other (over women, territory, honor, disagreement), specifically for their heads. And then the lecturer proceeded to tell us exactly how the whole ritual works and the drying out of the head, etc. ewww. Basically, the indigenous people of Taiwan feel oppressed and are underpriviledged and poor, just like every indigenous group everywhere. Then we had lunch on campus with one of the deans. Me and a few friends ended up at the teacher table, which was a bit intimidating for awhile but turned out to be fun. They were speaking in Chinese (but would randomly intersperse English words cuz apparently they just don’t translate very well and they’d rather use the more precise word, pretty cool) but me and alex still contributed in Chinese. We discussed china’s development and if they’ll ever catch up to the US (some said never, some said like 30 yrs), We also talked about english education and teaching in English- everyone in Taiwan speaks English really well (relatively). Even shopkeepers and taxi drivers speak English. And the students and educated people speak really really well. People are really friendly in taibei too, they’ll just randomly start talking to you on the subway and stuff. Omg, the subways- pretty clean and modern (although some of shanghai’s lines are newer so those are nicer), but they have lines drawn on the floor so people wait in an orderly and civilized way to get on the subway. We don’t even do that in America! It’s so nice. And the pushing is at a minimum. Anyways, so we had lunch with the teachers, then a lecture on politics in Taiwan, which was supposed to be “unbiased”, HA. Good joke. It was soooo skewed. The lecturer kept saying awkward things to our teachers (who are Chinese obvi), like “ya, we stole all of your artifacts when we fled to Taiwan and kept them all. You probably would have destroyed them in the cultural revolution anyways.” (they’re in the national palace museum, which we went to on Friday) And he showed us all these videos about how china was preparing militarily for an attack, all the time, and how Taiwan should be really afraid of mainland china. It was all bullshit. And then he tried to tell us the video was unbiased and made by CNN. Ya right. Then we went to the legislative yuan, which is essentially their congress. And we watched another stupid bias video. Then I went to go get my purse back- cuz someone found it! Taiwanese people are soooo nice. She said she found it in a taxi so I went to her apt building to get it. And she found me cuz my phone was in it, but it had died so she found a way to charge it so she could call one of my friends! Sooo amazing! And all my money was in it too! Everything! It was so exciting. Then we went to Taipei 101, the tallest building in Taipei (101 floors I think). We heard the observatory restaurant wasn’t that expensive and it revolved around so you could see everything- not quite… ended up being a 6 course dinner. About $100 USD once you included the wine we ordered. It was delicious! International food- steak, salad, amazing mushroom soup, etc. we all had fun pretending to be rich and snobby and elite, even though we were just silly college students who made a mistake about the restaurant and showed up in tee shirts and jeans. Haha. And the restaurant didn’t revolve, but no big deal. Still amazing view. Then we went to 711 (or club 7-1-1 as we call it) to buy drinks (they have them everywhere- so convenient!), then went to a bar hosting a salsa night! So fun!

Wednesday we started off going to the Guomingdang (Kuomingtang), which is the nationalist party that originally fought the commis and fled to Taiwan in 1949. A rep from the KMT talked to us about issues and such and then we got to ask questions. It was sooo interesting. He gave us real, honest answers (of course bias, but that’s the point, it’s what he really believes). He kept looking at our teachers and saying “your government…;you….”, it made them pretty mad and it was awk. We went to the headquarters of their election campaign too. We watched a bunch of campaign adds, which didn’t really say anything about the issues or the candidates. Just random stuff about the river in the city and this really cool sand artist. Basically they told us the only thing people care about and the only thing that influences their vote is cross-strait relations (china and Taiwan). The KMT advocates the 3 NOs: No reunification, No indepence, No use of military force. The DPP supports independence and really pisses china off all the time and tries to be as separate as possible. 2000-2008, the president was DPP and there was a lot of tension between china and Taiwan. Turns out that president got arrested for corruption, haha. But ya, so this is a mayor election happening. And even though the mayor doesn’t really have anything to do with china, it influences every issue- example: Chinese students who come to Taiwan to study, do they get scholarships like Taiwanese students? Or should they not cuz they aren’t Taiwanese? KMT would say yes they get them, and the DPP would say no. the KMT pretty much just advocates the status quo. We asked the KMT guy what would happen in the long run, but he said it was too hard to tell. You can’t vote until you’re 20 in Taiwan. They have a president, and a parliament with a prime minister. And they have two extra branches of gov’t we don’t have- control and examination. They basically monitor stuff. I guess they need it with those corrupt presidents running around. Apparently though they tried to model everything after the US cuz we’re their idol. Did you know Taiwan wasn’t a democracy and was under martial law until 1987? And they didn’t have real functioning elections for everything until like 1999. So recent!

random fact: Taiwan barely has any trashcans. They’re a rare find on the street. We were seriously baffled by this and talked an entire bus ride about it with the Taiwanese students with us. Apparently they either just don’t have as much trash or if they have it, they just carry it around with them until they go home. (this is a big problem at the night market cuz you have all this food trash and its gross) but at the same time, it’s relatively clean so people actually just don’t have as much trash/take it home. And at home, they don’t put their garbage on the streets to be picked up. No, they wait at home on garbage day and listen for the garbage truck music (piano stuff, kinda like an ice cream truck) and then bring it outside when it gets to their house. Weird huh?

Anyways, I loved all the politics stuff. It’s so crazy and so interesting. People in Taiwan are so afraid of what could happen, America is so ambiguous with its language about Taiwan (although our weapons sales to them are pretty clear), and the Chinese soo want it back. Anyways, so then we had a gross lunch, and listened to two more lectures. The first guy was supposed to talk about Taiwan economy stuff, but just talked about random general econ stuff and it was boring. The second guy was awesome though- he was the vice president of the S & P! so smart! He said he felt kinda responsible for the financial crisis, haha. As he should. And he had really interesting, concise, and useful things to tell us about the Taiwanese stock market and such. Oh ya, and he invented/coined the word “securitization”, as in asset securitization. Smarty pants. Then we took a gondola, with a glass bottom, to the top of some mountain nearby. But it was dark by the time we got in so we couldn’t really see much. I was pissed. Taiwan is really beautiful btw. So many mountains and trees and water. You know movies set in ancient china where they float around on huge boats through green mountains and lush valleys? That’s what Taiwan looks like. Unfortunately I couldn’t get any good pics to capture the beauty. L ate a quick dinner at the top, sitting on the floor. Then I went to the night market again, but we went to a different area at shilin and I tried oyster pancakes, a specialty in Taiwan. It’s really an omlette with some thick jelly like stuff in it with some oysters and sauce. I didn’t really like it. Bought some cool sunglasses. Went to a pet store, I wanted to buy every dog in there. And there were so many dachshunds (java baby I miss you!!) – so cute. No btowns though (miss you too mad dog). Ate some more tropical fruit.

Thursday we went to a “Taiwanese business” which was essentially the Chinese version of Verizon or at&t and they just gave us a presentation on their services. I played snake on my phone. Much more productive. Then we had a yummy Italian lunch where I had squid ink risotto (remember that in Venice mom and dad and emmy?!), yum! Then we went to the international flora expo. Unfortunately no one told the Taiwanese that nobody cares about the flora expo and that the real expo was in shanghai (not that people outside of china really cared about that one either). People were like, oh it’s so cool, you have to go. They didn’t even have that many flowers though. I was expecting botanical garden stye, plants everywhere. But they were very contained and well groomed, but probably not in full bloom yet. I still liked it though, cuz it was weird and funny. Took lots of pics, played in the hedge maze (reminded me of kate blackburn’s 8^th grade bday party at the corn maze! Anybody remember that?!) 

Me and Magnolia blossoming at the expo

traditional dance

victory, found the middle of the maze :) 

friends at the flora expo

then we had a “farewell” banquet buffet with the Taiwanese students. Then we went karaoking. Sooooooo fun. People were soooooo into it. I love karaoke. The best part might be the rando stock footage that they play for songs that don’t have videos (or they just don’t have the real videos) so they use random footage from America in the 80s. so good. Total eclipse of the heart was epic. EPIC.

Friday we had a free day so we went to the national palace museum. Really cool building. And inside they had cool scrolls, calligraphy, the jade cabbage (it was a big deal), miniature ivory carvings (so amazing), and more. Me alex and magnolia discovered a secret garden. It was pretty great. Then we took the subway to Danshui, which is a costal city/suburb of Taipei in the north, about an hr subway ride. We really wanted to go to this one restaurant in castle that took us an hr to find. Then when we found it, the restaurant wasn’t even open, only the café. So we ate there. It was on a big hill so there were great views of the mountains and the ocean. The waiter spilled really hot nacho cheese on me, but it only got on my hand and it was really funny. Then we walked around the streets for awhile, very night market like. Then magnolia and I went to another town where they have these natural hot sulfur springs. It was really relaxing. Then we went to the shilin night market again. Tried to go bowling, but you needed an ID and a bunch of us didn’t have them. Seriously, an ID (18+) for bowling? We played arcade games for awhile while we waited for our other friends to bring us our IDs from the hotel. I discovered I’m quite miserable at bowling these days.

Saturday morning we left and came back to shanghai. As soon as we got on the plane, it was apparent we were returning to the mainland. Everybody was screaming and running around and pushing each other. Chaos. The usual. The flight attendant at one point actually had to ask one group to be quite. And people say Americans are loud and obnoxious…

Today I went to a forum on China, Canada, and the G20 for my internship. It was in English this time so it was infinetly better than the religion forum. People there were soooo friendly and just wanted to talk and give out business cards (people were surprised I didn’t have a card, seriously? “Julia Nethero, Vassar College, Junior”, pointless). One guy even said I needed to come to his city and give a speech to his university and they’d pay for everything. Who does he think I am? What can I talk about? Bra fitting I guess…haha. I said I’d think about it. I know so much about the G20 now. It’s crazy. And Canada, random.

Nothing too exciting happeneing this week. This weekend is Linh’s bday so that’ll be fun. And mom and dad are coming in a week!!!!!!!!!!! 20 days until my bday!!!!!!! And we only have 5 weeks left here in china. Weird… I miss America and my friends so much but I know I’ll miss china once I leave. And I’ll miss my new friends L most people are from CA so it’ll be hard to see them.

woah. I think that’s it for now. 

(more pics later)

Halloween in Shanghai!

sorry I haven't updated in awhile, nothing too exciting going on, but I'll tell you about it anyways:

So I had some papers do (or so I thought) a week ago and I actually did work last sunday- it was crazy! Classes here are so easy, although Chinese is a bit harder. But eventually you get used to the chinese thing and it's not so hard.

Two mondays ago we went to a chinese high school for a tour and such to go along with our education portion of my Shanghai Metropolis class. The school was crazy nice- they had robotics labs, badminton courts, a natatorium, and an astronomy observation telescope thing. like seriously?! It has more facilities than my high school definitely, and maybe even more than Vassar. The kids live there, so that's different. Not everyone goes to boarding school in China but the smart/rich kids mostly do (I think) cuz they have to prepare for the Gaokao (high test literally). They have one shot (per yr) to pass the gaokao to graduate. then your scores are compared with everyone else in china and then universities pick you based on your score. So almost nothing else matters but your gaokao score. It's pretty terrifying, the lives of chinese students. They also have no fun, or least that's what it sounds like. They have "extracurriculars" but for like one hr a day, then go back to class or have dedicated hw time or something. Lights out at 10:30 (and by lights out, they mean we're shutting down the power). Basically their entire first 18 yrs of life are dedicated to getting the highest score possible on the gaokao and if you do poorly, you bring great disappointment and embarrassment onto your family and you loose face (face is kinda like reputation, but not really, hard to explain) and you go to a bad school so you'll never get a good job,etc. But it was cool to go to the school. We had a lecture from the principal and got to talk with students for an hr. They were funny.

For my internship, we met downtown somewhere and had a delicious lunch. We didn't really talk about anything. bUt my internship supervisor gave me (and Jurie, the other intern from my program) a gift from Beijing (cuz he had missed our internship the week before travelling)- "tuckahoe pies", small snacks that have rice paper on the inside and some kind of jelly in the middle (kinda weird). Then I went to qipu lu (cheap fake market) to work on my halloween costume (see pictures later).

We had our chinese midterm last week so that kinda sucked, we had to study a lot for that, but I did well so yay! After the midterm (we got out like really early) I had a nice day to myself- gym, manicure/pedicure, panini and latte for lunch, and a leisurely walk home.

Friday night was the big halloween night celebration here even though halloween was on saturday. We went on a boat cruise (like the pirate one we did awhile ago). It was a big chilly but I had a coat so I was ok. It was really fun!

The group in costume

Me (Barbie) and Woody (Jeff)- I'm doing a barbie pose, that's why I look kinda weird, haha

Nancy Drew (Magnolia), Pocahontas (Alex), and Barbie (Me) with the pearl tower in the background

So ya, that was fun. Saturday I went downtown with a few friends to the most amazing dumpling place ever- Din Tai Feng. It's taiwanese but they have them all over (the only one in the US is in LA- so if you live there, gooooo!!!!). Obviously it was delicious. Then we got cold stone ice cream- yum! Then we drank some nice german beer. Then a really nice fake market (as in things look real) where I bought a diamond zebra striped rolex (as in the diamonds are in stripes like a zebra)- it's classier than it sounds- and a blue chanel bag. :) very exciting purchases. That night we went to our fav local bar helens and people were dressed up so it was fun!

Sunday I just hung out, monday had tons of class, tuesday I did my internship in the morning and we had lunch, then saw Wall Street with my friend Jurie. It was pretty good I thought. I really enjoyed reading the chinese subtitles to see how they translated things.

Yesterday I played tennis, probably the last good weather week we'll have for a long time. It's a bit chilly, but not too bad. Last night we went to another Ladies Night at Zapatas, a mexican bar. It was free margaritas until midnight so that was fun obviously since the margarita is my fav. :)

Today I had lunch with Magnolia and Du Laoshi, my chinese teacher from Vassar. We talked about classes and such and it was fun. And he "qing"ed us (treated us) to lunch so that was extra exciting, and delicious!

No class tomorrow- yippee! Saturday we leave for Taiwan for a week as part of the program. I'm really excited- supposedly Taiwan has the greatest food! think tropical fruits, themed restaurants (there is even a poop themed one, where everything looks like poop), bubble tea, night market snacks... yum. btw, one reason to come to china (in addition to the other 239884059824952) are the night markets. Basically, lots of food (and sometimes clothing, accessories, books, etc) vendors pull up with their carts or their bikes that have a little food prep area on them. They just park on the sides of the street so you can't really get through (somes the popo come and break them up- one time I was trying to decide if I wanted noodles or dumplings, then I decided and was all excited. As I was about to order the popo came and they all biked away with their little kitchens on the back. sooo sad). They have popcorn, chuanr (meats, veggies, etc. on a stick and grilled), dumplings, noodles, rice, and other things that you can't really describe, the closests would be sandwiches I guess? This is where you find all the crazy weird foods that you hear about in china. There's a tiny night market near my wednesday night class that is always an excellent dinner. yum yum yum! so come to china and we'll go to night markets.

44 days left in China! 30 days until my birthday! yippee! Miss everybody! Love you!