Shanghai Saturday...

China Day 8, and Shanghai by Day. It was the big tour day. We started out at the Shanghai Museum - it was fantastic! They had a whole section on folk costumes and I took over 100 pictures of everything interesting. Great exhibit, and I was glad to see a lot of Uzbek and Mongol stuff. I know some folks that will love to see those pictures! I wandered through the jade exhibit, the calligraphy exhibit, and the other exhibits in the museum. Great stuff, but I eventually wandered through and found the museum shop. Hooray for museum shops. I did the best I could to support the museum, and bought 5 books on various topics. They had a great exhibit book on the folk costumes, so I snapped it up. I also got postcards, gift wrap, and a few other little things. I did some damage on my credit card, but it was well worth it!

We stopped at the Silk Museum, and this one had actual displays on silk making. Very interesting, and I'm seriously considering getting a silk comforter. It's actually padded with raw silk fiber. really delicious, and they are warm or cool depending on the weather. And I finally found a pillow cover that will match my sister's new comforter. I'd been carrying around a tassel from her bed this whole time, but I had yet to find anything that matched. Happy birthday Suz!
Next up was the Yu garden and main shopping market. It was insanity making it to the garden, which was at the middle of the shopping area. It was just a press of people on all sides, tons of little shops, and Sunny waving her little flower as a flag for us to follow. We made it to the garden, and it was beautiful. Really surprisingly considering that the marketplace wrapped around the garden and was really loud. But you couldn't hear it from inside. It was a beautiful traditional Chinese garden, with gallerys and rooms spread through and a stream moving throughout. Lots of colorful carp, nice landscaping, interesting rocks, and it was rather calm and sweet. Built for the original owner's grandparents in their old age, they unfortuantely died before it was done. But it was a lovely garden.

The shopping, which I was looking forward to, was next. Back into the chaos, and we were off. I chose to skip going up in the Shanghai TV tower - I'm uncomfortable with heights and not fond of paying admission to exercie that discomfort. Besides, it's shopping in Shanghai! We bargained and haggled and got followed around by tons of people saying "fendi, gucci, watches, bags". The government has cracked down rather dramatically on the open selling of counterfeits, but that didn't stop us from being accosted by them offering to take us to the warehouse. I don't care much for brands anyhow, so it was easy for me to just say no. And you couldn't pick something up without the shop keeper being on top of you saying "very good price". That was a total lie, as it took time to haggle them down to realistic prices. We got to the point where we had a code word for not wanting something so we could just escape en masse. I ended up with a dragon kite, an owl kite, and a bunch of little goodies.

Then we cabbed to tourist dinner, and again weird mix of foods. French fries, chicken and veggies and various chinese dishes. Beer to drink, and good conversation about our various experiences. Some folks had skipped the tour things and had done their own thing in the city. Then it was off to a nighttime cruise of the Shanghai riverfront. Again, this is just a gorgeous city at night. The skyline all lit up is just dramatically beautiful. A bunch of Korean tourists were singing songs on the boat and we joined in with "the Wheels on the bus go round and round" complete with hand motions. One Korean couple started ballroom dancing to it, it was amusing. Then a roam along the Bund, which is the riverfront near the British Concession. Vendors accosted us regularly, and the most amusing thing they offered were the 2 wheeled skates you could strap onto your shoes. And they even lit up! Good price for 10 yuan...
Back to the hotel and crashing like a pile of bricks.