A little bit of Putoushan in my life, a little bit of cooking by my side...

So i feel like its become a theme of me apologizing at the beginning of my blog for not posting one sooner and this one is no different! The weather in Shanghai is finally nice so we've been out exploring the city and to many peoples surprise i've actually been interacting with real people as opposed to those through the internet! Since its been so long this blog is just gonna be a little bit of everything..... (traveling back in time dududududududu)

This past weekend we took a trip with our program to an island about 5 hours away called Putuoshang 普陀山. This island is sacred in Chinese Buddhism and on this island lays one of the four sacred mountains of Buddhism. I was very excited to get out of the city for a weekend and experience the outdoors and fresh air. It seems the longer I have been in China the more I appreciate the natural smell. You know those people that you have to tell your leaving 15 minutes before you actually do so they will arrive on time, well that’s basically what you have to do for everything in China, for example we were supposed to leave at noon for Putuoshan but no fear our bus got in a car accident on the way and they were supposed to send another one so we didn't end up leaving till closer to two. Alright now your thinking ok so that was easy just had to wait a little, I gets better... although there was GPS system in our bus out driver didn't know where he was going and got us lost for 2 hours. Not to fear though we got some solid games of contact in! Thursday night we got to our hotel, which wasn't on the island since the last boat to the island left before we arrived, and then had a bonfire on the beach. Even though it was cold there are few things better then the smell of a bonfire and a clear sky to see the stars! We got to cook our own food, which was interesting to say the least, the lack of light and our lack of knowledge as to when the meat was done ended up in a few not so nice stomachaches! In true Chinese fashion we got to light off fireworks! That night we wanted to explore the city so we consulted our trusty "Lonely Planet: China" and unfortunately for us we looked up the wrong city and found all these great things to do but we were just 4 hours away from them! The next day we got to enjoy a beautiful boat ride through brown water to the island, I mean I guess you can't have it all, if you get cleaner air you get dirtier water. The island was beautiful but small. We got to see many a temples and go hiking!! One of the temples was on top of a hill and as we were walking up we saw many people bowing every three steps. Now they weren’t just nodding their heads this was all the way to the floor. And these people weren’t super young either. It was amazing to see that sort of dedication! One of the great parts of Putoushan was our wonderful tour guide. Now although we have improved our Chinese we are by no means fluent but someone forgot to forward this information onto him because he just kept going on and on and on and on and on about all these stories, and not only did he continue to talk he was speaking into a very loud microphone so there was no escaping him, not even the multiple “ting bu dong, ting bu dong” which means I don’t understand!
And that my friend was Putoushan...
After we got back to shanghai we went out for my friends birthday and that included a bar with a hot tub outside… jealous!?

Since we got back from Putoushan its basically been trying to fit everything in!
Here’s a little re-cap of everything!

Moganshan- this is a street that is full of art shops and also has a beautiful wall that is full of graffiti! We met a group of Chinese college students there who were in aw of this group of westerners. My friend who is doing her capstone on Chinese stereotypes of Americans was able to talk to these people and found out the following:
Americans like steak
Americans like chocolate

Cooking class- You cant live some place for 4 months and not learn how to make their speciality so we've been to a few cooking classes and learned how to make the famous xiaolongbao, sago soup, sesame balls and fried dumplings. The hardest part about all this was number one waiting till it cooled to eat it (yes i know thats an issue of a 5 year old!) and also putting the dumpling together, is really hard to do the folds and fit enough of the filling inside!

Restaurant week- this past week was Shanghai's first annual restuarant week so we went to some of the nicest restaurant in Shanghai and had a wonderful meal for only $40... not bad eh?

3. Finally the weather in shanghai has decided to be nice so even just that made this weekend wonderful! Friday we had an exam so we got done with class early, which clearly meant more time to play in the city! We got some clothes made at a fabric market so we had to pick them up which was an experience. At the fabric market they are mostly able to speak English, which is convenient, but something’s get lost in translation! When you say you want something tight it comes out loose. My friend got a dress made that needed a hole for the head clearly but what they ended up with was a hole that maybe their arm could fit through! It’s very hit and miss at the market but who doesn’t want custom made gown for $50! After we stopped by the market we went to stock up on gifts at Tao Bao Chen, which is a 5-story market filled with knock-offs. Over the semester we have become familiar with this place so we know more of less what it offers. With the upcoming expo the city it going through many chances and this wonderful market is one of the places effected. We were looking for Marc Jacobs bags but we couldn’t seem to find any sitting out and when we asked for them we were taken to back rooms where the labels weren’t on the bags. The sales people explained to us that undercover cops were coming in and arresting people that were selling fake bags. Lucky for us though we knew what they had from the times we had been before so when we asked for it they would take bags out from shoe boxes, other bags and other random hiding places… sooo tricky!

Now that the Expo is just days from its official opening all of the loose ends of the city are being put together so that Shanghai can look its best! One of the things that is very convenient for us is a new subway line that stops at all the tourist places, Xintiandi, Peoples Square, and Yuyunna Gardens, where we went on Saturday. Unfortunate for us everyone else in the city wanted to take advantage of the weather so this trip did not involve those wonderful dumplings but we did go to a cooking class and learned how to make xiao long bao and maso soup. Getting home we tried to do the typical “distract the taxi driver and 5 people sneak in”, the usual case is us vs. the taxi drivers but now with the tightened security it’s the taxi driver vs. the cop, so when we got in he told us just to duck when we saw a cop!

On Sunday I got the opportunity to go to a Chinese families home and have lunch. When coming into the home the hallway and elevator set us up for entering a lower end home but to our surprise it was a beautiful 2-bedroom apartment. Our hostesses were very interested in American and learning English so there was a lot of “how do you say….”. Something that I loved seeing was the way their 2 boys interacted, no video games or movies, they played make believe the whole time! We also got a singing performance by them; they sang us English songs and were very proud! I mean if I could sing a song in Chinese at age 5 I would brag! We got the opportunity to make more dumplings at their house. The way it seemed to work was that the men would entertain the kids and the women were making the dumplings. Amy and I got to help make the dumplings, I mean were going to be pros by the end of this!

Like I said before the city is putting on the final touched for the opening of the Expo. One this China is great at is putting on a show, they did it for the Olympics and now in true rival fashion Shanghai is going to be better than Beijing. They now have more strict security on the subways, and new expo taxi’s out that are much more strict with the number of people they take and Haibao is EVERYWHERE!

In one of my first blogs I talked about how I was excited to see the changes that would happen in Shanghai with the Expo and now as my times is coming to an end I have more and more of an opportunity to compare what the city was like 4 months ago till now. Last week with one of my classes we visited a community that was displace because of the Expo sight. At first glance it looked too good to be true, they had nice clean faculties, offered art classes, and provided assistance for job searching. But this seemed too good to be true and as we toured the center it seemed obvious that this biggest issue was taking away the sense of community that the Chinese emphasis so much. These people create connections and relationships with those around then and although they may not have great living arrangements the relationships mean more to them. Again the beautiful façade that China puts on.

This week my Mom and Dana Miller are coming to play in Shanghai with me and i can't wait! There is so much going on in the city with the Expo for them to see!!


t-minus 7 days till i'm Rocky Mountain High, i can't believe this semester is over, its crazy how much has happened i dont even want to think about it cause that means it really is the end! Right now more importantly im out and going to find some laundry detergent to do my unnecessary pile of clothes!

xoxo,
Aryn