After the dizzying experience of clearing out my apartment in Chonburi, I stored my luggage with my cousins and departed with some fellow teachers for China. We arrived in Shanghai early in the morning, and wandered sleep-deprived through an outdoor market on Zoushan Road in search of our hostel. There were live ducks, frogs and pigeons for sale, along with plenty of unfamiliar dried goods and pastries; just as I began to feel confident about my knowledge of Thai food, China blew my knowledge out of the water.
We met up with a friend who lived a couple blocks away, and he proved to be an invaluable guide thanks to his Mandarin skills and familiarity with the city. He introduced us to our first (but not last) Hot Pot experience in China, and showed us around the lovely YuYuan Gardens in the afternoon:
The next day we walked along the Bund, a promenade that provided a sweeping view of the grey Shanghai skyline. We took a ride through the Bund Sightseeing Tunnel, a cheesy but amusing tram ride that was supposed to depict a trip through the center of the earth (lights would flash around us and a speaker would announce something like “you are entering a meteor shower!”). We ended up in the Financial District, which was full of towering buildings including easily recognizable Pearl TV Tower.
Another rather metropolitan section of the city was the French Concession, where we shared a delicious Chinese dinner with our Shanghai friends at a restaurant called Sichuan Citizen. We hit the town that evening, and I tried some sort of rice liquor called baijo, which I’d be content if I never tried again.
Our second hostel was close to People’s Square, another uppity location in the city (you may be noticing a pattern here) where we tried some crab dumplings and braised lamb, and drank Longjian tea on a rooftop bar. I thought that we were visiting an unusual amount of cosmopolitan places in the city, until I realized that Shanghai was simply more modern than I was used to. Even the “local” part of town we experienced on our first evening was relatively clean. The waste management system, the subway and the buildings were all very efficient. Shanghai was clearly quite proud of this modernity, as I noted in the Shanghai Urban Planning Museum, which espoused the city’s progressiveness with regards to its urban development, modernization and environmental consciousness. 
Nothing indicated Shanghai’s city pride more than the Expo. The Expo was advertised throughout the city using a mascot named Haibo. I thought Haibo looked liked a glob of toothpaste, but according to descriptions he was supposed to represent international unity and development. The Expo is something like a modern World Fair, with large interactive structures to represent each country. We managed to visit seven countries (New Zealand, Indonesia, the USA, Brazil, Greece, Angola and the Netherlands), a number we later discovered was rather impressive considering the usual length of the lines. My favorite was the Netherlands, which had a round walkway winding up towards a flowery pinnacle, with unusual displays of modern art along the way.
Our last evening was spent in a bar called Vue, which provided a great view of the city, and even had a hot tub. While sitting on a large red pillow overlooking this futuristic city, I reflected on the vast distinctions between China and Thailand.
I’ll give Westerners some credit and acknowledge that most of the Americans I know realize that all Asian countries are not the same. However, much of Asia becomes somewhat of a blur in people’s mind, whereas everyone feels that a continent like Europe is clearly divided into separate countries and cultures. The distinctions can be just as drastic in Asia; in some ways China and Thailand were like night and day. Shanghai is economical and spotless, while I often feel Thailand to be rather inefficiently designed and maintained. This competence is reflected in the Chinese educational system, which my friend who teaches in Shanghai encapsulated in this description of his teaching experience: “Speaking to my first graders in English is like talking to small adults.” I thought about my first graders running in circles screaming in Thai, and could only laugh at the injustice (it’s worse if I considered how much more he gets paid than I did).
In the same token, people in China were the opposite of Thais when it came to being accommodating and jovial. I would occasionally ask someone in Shanghai to take a photo of us, and the person would walk by as if I were invisible. I decided everyone in Shanghai was very serious, but this was perhaps because I was fresh from the Land of Smiles. People in Hong Kong, however, were much friendlier… I’ll save this for my next post.
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