Meeting The Godfathers

Me and my friend Peter went to Huaihai Lu to get some coffee. Ended up not finding a coffee place, but we sat down in this tiny open cafe at Huaihai Park for a glass of lime juice and Strawberry milkshake. There, a group of old men are enjoying their teatime as well. The Park reminded me of New York's Central Park. But then again, the weather got to chilly, so we left after Peter finished writing 9 postcards and I finished half of my homework.



Off to more good places with not so killing windchill...

Saturday Night Out

This Saturday was raining all day long. But we went to visit Pudong, the financial district of Shanghai to have a nice (American) dinner at a place called Blue Frog. Yadien's in town, so Me, Mita and Patra, and David showed him the Pearl Tower. (He wasn't quite impressed although it is the landmark of Shanghai...) It was not a good day to look around, so a few snapshots and we're off to the restaurant by asking direction to this lady. She seems to know her way...




The Pearl Tower


Blue Frog at SuperBrand Mall


The wonderful dinner of Fajitas and Onion Rings


The Onion Rings are so good, Mita decided to take it home as her jewel

Da Bao

Due to too many works to be done, I had 2 nights of take outs!

This one is from a Muslim Chinese restaurant (yes, that means, they don't serve pork)
Simply fried rice. And the small bite size ones are rice-filled shaomai
They're so good...

Shanghai Ren

Isn't this old man adorable?
He runs a bike shop down the street from where I live.
He always look happy and look at those stuff he has in his shop!!

Small is Beautiful

We went to Taikang Lu today.
It's not far from Huaihai Street, but taking a cab is always good. It's not THAT close.
So, in Taikang Road, there is this teeny weeny alley that leads to wonderful shops and cafes.
I love this place. Next time, I promise myself to spend more time and check out the shops.

They have arts and craft shops, like this one of Indonesian crafts, named Hari Rabu (Bahasa for Wednesday)



And of course Chinese goodies. Beautiful shop!


I love the way this alley can actually manage to squeeze everything into one place

Palm Sunday

It's Palm Sunday in Church this weekend.
But the palm leaves in Shanghai is not so much like in Indonesia.
Just because the old lady told us it's palm, but the one the priest had was so much bigger and it was just like the one back home.

So, question for everyone,
is this one type of palm plant?

But, with Palm Sunday, this means Easter is next week!
Hope everyone is doing well during this Lent time.

Cheers!

Chun Tian Niao

The bird of spring has entered my room :)







A mural in my dorm room. Cos dorm setting, or hotel room in this case, is just ain't cool.

Life in Shanghai

Of all the things, I realized I haven't shared the place I'm living at.
Well anyway, here it is



This is the front entrance. 'Nuff said. Not my type of lighting arrangements...


And when it's time to do your laundry, well... you have to keep one side of your room to dry the clothings. Keep the heater in your room on for a night, and voila! Nice clean clothes in the morning.
As it is said on the box, "It's nice as A-B-C, Attractive, Beautiful, Clean"
Like this...

Pizza Hut in Shanghai or Abu Dhabi?

They are having this Arabian menu in Shanghai.
And look at the girls!! They all dress up with the veil and some gold coins
HAHAHA

Yuyuan Market

Another great place of Shanghai.
Nice souvenir shops, more expensive than other place in Shanghai I've been, but bargain, bargain, bargain. It's always good.





This is the famous dumplings.
The line was, I mean, IS always too long, but they say it's really, really good.

Xintiandi

Lots of cafes, lots of good looking restaurants, and it feels like you're in New York.
It's nice, but haven't actually sit and enjoy the scene. Maybe when it's warmer, later this year.

The best part of Shanghai. So far...

Huaihai Road.

I like...

People's Park

People's Park is magnificent

Jenny

This is Jenny.
I managed to get her to pick me up.
She showed us around, took us to get dictionary. I heard some other students will get computers with her, private Mandarin courses...

Well, anyway... She's a big help for new students in Shanghai.

Ni hao!

Hey everyone...

I'm in Shanghai now.
Thought this blog will help me to share some snapshots of the city.

Oya, by the way, we came here with an agent called, Mandarin Expert. They did a great work taking care of our enrolment and visa and such, but let me tell you, DO NOT use this agent if you are ever coming to China. We found out that we were not picked up at the airport, 4 of us had to find their way to their school, with no address, not to mention the ability to communicate with the taxi driver.

But anyway, we are doing okay now.
Here is the airport.

We arrived at 6.40 am on Saturday, 23 February 2008. It was freezing!