City Of The Future

Tuesday, August 2, 2005

Sorry everyone for the long delay in blogging! China's been keeping me a busy boy and I haven't been round to check my email and write in here as often as I would like. I've got a lot of catching up to do...

Michael and I spent five days hanging out in Shanghai and we had an absolute blast. It turned out, actually, to be one of the coolest cities that I've ever been to, and next to Hong Kong, I would place it as one of my most favourite cities in Asia.

I think you'd be hard-pressed to find two cities in the world (in the same country) that are more dissimilar than Beijing and Shanghai. Beijing is all about The Old, The Government, and The Control. Shanghai is like a city of the future where crazy skyscrapers rise high into the air, high-speed maglev trains zoom across the city at over 400 km/hr, and all the doors are wide, wide open for business. Goodbye stifling communist iron-fisting, hello capitalism and consumerism en masse! Wandering through the streets of Shanghai, you can't help but think that all the inspiration the city's urban planners used in creating the cityscape must have come from watching Hollywood movies about how cities in the future will look. Just the shapes and the colours and the designs, and the fact that everything is up, up, UP! It's so cool!

On our first day we went and checked out the Shanghai Urban Planning Exhibition Hall, and I was like a kid in a candy store there. Given the fact that I studied urban planning in university, and that I already am in love with this city, I was as giddy as can be while exploring the massive museum devoted to the city's past - and more importantly - its future. The prize jewel in the crown of this hall was the GIANT model of the city that they have in the centre. It's an absolute massive model displaying almost all of central Shanghai, complete with all the landmark towers (past and future ones they hope to build), rivers with boats, thousands of apartment towers, and LRT lines criss-crossing the city. Man, I wish I had one of these in my house!

One of the greatest surprises in Shanghai is The Bund. The Bund is a street and promenade along the river where all the old historical colonial structures have been preserved. Constructed during the 1930's when Shanghai was in its trading-post-to-Europe heyday, this long curving row of truly magnificent and grandiose buildings stand humbly in a stark juxtaposition to the forest of super-skyscrapers glaring down at them from across the river in Pudong. For a city that's hell-bent on being in the centre stage of the world in the (near) future, it's amazing that this piece of history has been saved from the wrecking ball. The Bund is now one of Shanghai's premier attractions, and when lit up at night, makes for a particularly awe-inspiring evening jaunt.

Unfortunately in the middle of my time here in Shanghai I suffered from extreme stomach cramps that left me tied to my bed (and not in a good way.) The pain was honestly so bad that I didn't want to eat anything or even move that far, so I lost a whole day and a half just lying around the hostel while Michael went off exploring. This is the second time in less than a month that I've had these extreme stomach cramps, and I'm beginning to think they're linked to my malaria medication... Hmmm....

Some other sights that we checked out while in Shanghai included the inspirational Shanghai Museum, the neck-craning-inducing neighbourhood of Pudong, and a great afternoon strolling through the French Concession (another pocket of beautiful European colonial architecture that somehow has made it to 2005.) We both did a little shopping, ate some great food at various restaurants (1221 was especially delicious!) and met some really friendly people in our hostel.

Speaking of meeting people, I also got to spend some time hanging out with my good buddy Ryan Bird! Ryan's an English Teacher in Taiwan but happened to be on vacation too and in Shanghai the same weekend we were. It was great to meet up with him and spend time hanging out and catching up. Ryan's a great guy and makes for marvellous company - he's witty and intelligent, charming and humorous, good-natured and a helluva lot of fun to just be around. (Sorry ladies, he's already got a girlfriend!) What's especially cool is that everytime we've ever hung out together, it's been in a different country. We've never spent any time together in the same country more than once! How crazy is that? Either way, I was really happy that I got to meet up with my friend and see him again. Good luck with the rest of your travels, Ryan! :-)

We left Shanghai on a Monday evening and braced ourselves for another long, long train ride. It's 28 hours down to Guilin and this should be our last marathon train ride of the trip. Here we go! :-)