Downtown Shanghai

This is my first weekend in Shanghai. To kick start the week end my office colleagues here hosted a dinner party for the entire team to welcome me to Shanghai. Wah kya baat hai!! The dinner was in a hotel in downtown Shanghai. Our office in a industrial area and the ride is really long. You need to cross the river to go to downtown shanghai. We rode on and on and on and it was a long ride and when we entered the downtown shanghai called as Puxi, you can see that it is very colorful and bright. Then we were in a elevated road all the time and reached a major junction where you are like on top of the world. It looked like we were at least 6 floors above the ground. It was a major interchange to change directions. The roads would just wind in and out. And then we reached our famed destination. We were riding in a BUICK (these are made by GM in shanghai). The restaurant where we were supposed to eat was based on the Xinjiang province of China. This is present in the north of China bordering with Russia, Mongolia and Kazakhstan. These guys are known for the Goat/Sheep meat. They are mostly Muslims and they have inherited their culture and religion mostly because of the Silk Route. I was made to sit in a position where in you can see the stage. I was told that there will be a show by a troupe which is traditional Xinjiang. Their folk culture. And the first thing that came in was the beer; it was called BLACK BEER, a local brewed beer in Xinjiang. It was black in colour and looked more like a cola and beer taste was not there. And then came the first meat of the meal. It was horse meat!!! I said ok….i cant eat that. Then came the goat meat and it kept on coming. It taste good, preparation was more the Indians do but a little cooked. Some of them not all. There was capsicum masala which was spicy and yummy. And then after we were done with the Black Beer we got the Harbin Beer another Chinese beer. The sad part of the beer was that it was not chilled. Later I learnt that the Chinese did not know how to drink beer. There was this kebab of thing cooked on a strong stick, it was good. Then the entertainment starts. A girl came out and she started dancing to the tunes of Xinjiang music. She came to our table (we were sitting on a big round table) and started dancing and she pulled in John (our chief engineer) to dance with her. It was so entertaining. The nest event from her was balancing a stack of six cups on her head. She got one more person from our team (Dave) to balance a cup on her head. The next one was belly and booty dance, and the favorite target was me to dance with her. He he he he he I just went der and showed the lady how to shake it!!!! It was fun. Then there a couple of Chinese and Russian songs. They were melodious and emotional song. I got to know the gist of the songs that were being sung. And then John and other two guys had to leave as they had landed in shanghai earlier day and were tired. And then the mood on the table was very light. We got more beer and did Gumbhe (bottoms up) Chinese love to do that. And as we were drinking there was the last show and again I got a chance to dance with the lady on the stage this time. Oh boy it was fun. Some crazy steps and moves which made sense to the Chinese. It was around ten when we left the restaurant and headed back to my hotel. On the way back we passed through the Shanghai TV Tower. It is very very tall. Ever since I have been here in Shanghai the weather has been changing from cold to chilly to sunny to rain. Keeps fluctuating.

The next day Allyn and I decided to go to Puxi and check out some electronics in a big mall. Allyn is a Japanese bachelor born in Canada and now working in China for the past 9 months. He is a interesting guy, he has this attitude of traveling and experimenting. He is guy who takes calculated risks. So after breakfast we headed to the nearest Subway station which is Shanghai Science and Technology Museum. We took a taxi and went there. We boarded the train to go to People’s Square. Here we had to interchange to another line and though may as well have a stroll on Nanjing road. This road is like Brigade road in Bangalore. Crowded lots of people and many shops offering you so much to buy. We did not walk the entire street just a little bit and then took a deviation as Allyn wanted to get some screws, there is this street which sells only hardware. After he got his stuff we went to the subway and took the metro to our destination Shanxi where the electronics mall was supposed to be there. When we reached Shanxi there was nothing, Allyn was confused and called up one of his friends from office and came to know that we are 3 stations behind. So we got back and went to Xujiahui. Interestingly if you are a foreigner in Shanghai there are a lot of people who wants to be friends with you and sell stuff to you. DVD and watches and shoes and things like that. When we got out of Xujiahui subway, we just entered the mall where only and only electronics goods like cameras, hard disks, computers, laptops et.al are sold. It was a like fish being sold in a fish market only that not @ of a kilos. I just wanted to see and feel Shanghai as language is a big problem here, and this was a nice opportunity and exposure. I checked out a couple of stuff. Now we were hungry and went in search of food and landed in a hotel serving only dumplings. We got goat dumpling, veg-n-chicken dumpling, peanuts, Tofu , Kombu (a sea weed) and cucumber. Yummy all of them tasted so good. Allyn was specifically looking for some hobby kits. While searching for it he dumped into one of the sales girls who recognized him. They had earlier met in a mall in Pudong. Here we tried ask them about the places where Allyn’s stuff was available. After we got the address we went in search of the place by foot. The search looked like a never ending one. But finally we ended up in a place which was selling only consumer electronics. Huh what a waste of energy. So we came back to our hotel in metro and taxi. In the Shanghai Science and Technology museum grounds people were flying kites and roller skating. What a way to keep yourself busy.