Exploring My Backyard - Shanghai!

As part of my plan to explore on a daily basis, yesterday, I recruited Elinor to seek out the Confucius temple here in Shanghai. We took a new metro line (Line 8! Whoot whoot!). I got to practice my Chinese a lot, as I had no idea where we were and furthermore, no idea where we needed to go. The Confucius Temple is nestled in a quiet Shanghai neighborhood in northern Puxi (Puxi meaning west of the Huangpu River). We saw an adorable primary school, delayed a child from getting beat by his mother, and did some window shopping. Elle posed with some ridiculous mannequins.



For 5 kuai, we gained entrance to the temple, which is maintained by the local municipality. To say that the Confucius temple, which served as the first library in Shanghai, is not a popular tourist attraction is an understatement. God bless Communism though, because for all two visitors, they had atleast 3 workers for each of us... none of whom could give tours in English.



The signs are pretty informative though. Apparently much of the temple was destroyed over the centuries by wars and fires. It was restored during the Qing Dynasty around 1830s. Over the years it served as a library, a school, and a place of worship.



Today it is wedged amongst Shanghai's many residential high rises.



We used the empty attraction as a photo shoot for us. In case you're wondering, the timer on my camera works just fine :)



Today, we went on a group field trip to the 2010 Shanghai World Exposition staging center. There they have a museum like exhibit that tells the history of World Expos as well as shows the plans for Shanghai's expo. I cannot even describe how much work they have done in Shanghai and are planning on doing to prepare. It promises to be a phenomenal event. China is ready to show the world what it is capable of. The pavilions alone are awe-inspiring.



I am most excited about the Technology and Urban Best Practices Center. This is going to be where all the countries unveil their best innovations to the world. This is why there are world expositions. My favorite exposition, not only for its innovations, but also its impact on the architectural development of Chicago was the 1893 World Expo. Additionally, it was at that exposition that a little known company called Kodak introduced the first camera. Other inventions, including the telephone and the Ferris wheel were introduced at expos. I hope some crazy new technology will come out of this great gathering.

During my visit, I was also interviewed by Xinhua News Agency, the Chinese news source (think NY Times)! They asked me a few questions about what I thought about the expo, what my favorite country pavilion was (Britain, Spain, & China), and what I thought about America being noticeably present. The U.S. has yet to unveil its pavilion. I said that if the United States is thinking about saving $10 million or so on a fancy pavilion, I think that would probably be a good idea, considering the financial state of the country. However, it is more likely the United States will reveal at the last second, create some hype and have some bangin' pavilion put up in record time.

I miss you all so much! Sometimes I forget just how far away everyone is. I hope to come back to you a smarter, more cultured, and all around lovelier Meaghan Barbin than the one who left you... I am making strides every day to fulfill that promise ;0)

Sange is gone.

Life is slow in Shanghai this week. I have a Chinese midterm on Friday that promises to be unpleasant to say the least. I haven't been doing anything exciting, however, I do have some bad news.

February 9, a bunch of students in my program went to the Yu Yuan Gardens for the Lantern Festival, the last important day of celebration in the Chinese New Year festivities. The gardens and bazaar were decorated to close the celebrations.



It was during our celebration of the Lantern Festival that Amanda and I bought our pet fish. A street vendor was selling keychains with live fish in them! As this seemed the height of extravagance, we had to have one! The key chain came with 2 fish in it... no food :( For less than $1 USD, I toted my keys around accesorized with a jazzy new set of fish.

Amanda cleverly named her fish, Yu, which means "fish" in Mandarin. I named my fish, Sange Xingqi, which translates to "3 Weeks." I felt like my fish was a fighter, and in for a long life (by fish standards). Some of the boys remarked that it would probably be more suitable to name the fish Sange Tian (3 days), but I held my ground.



As of 16:48, Shanghai time, Yu and Sange Xingqi passed on into the next fishy life. Yu is survived by Oh Mei Da. Sange Xingqi leaves behind a loving ginger, Bai Mei. They were admirable little keychain pets, far outliving their life expectancy; except for Sange... that little guy still should have held out for at least another week and a half... Though they may have suffered in the end (and my guess is that they did), may God have mercy on their little fish souls. They saw a little piece of this world, mostly from the view from my handbag, but they had eachother, and that's what truly matters in this life. Amen.

Suzhou

For everyone, who has been long awaiting my next post, here it is! I tried to catalog my amazing Chinese New Year adventure, and I did... in my journal. Perhaps the greatest adventure of my life, it is too many words to re-write. As I will be eager to see you all, to make you hang out with me and listen to me drone on about the wild unknowns of China, I'm saving those tales for when I see each of you in person.

Saturday, as you all know, was Valentine's Day. Though not a big deal amongst the Chinese constituency, it's still hot with Shanghai's large expat community. However, we spent the day in Suzhou, a city about an hour and a half west of Shanghai, historically significant, as it gained popularity and grandeur during the Ming Dynasty, when it flourished due to its key role in the silk trade. Suzhou is now famed for its gardens, famous sites, and factories.

We started out the morning at the Gardens of the Humble Administrator or Zhuozheng Yuan.



If you care for a brief history lesson, the gardens were first built in the 16th century by a retired magistrate. However, the ownership of the gardens changed many times since then, as has subsequently undergone further development and ornamentation with each owner.

The gardens imitate many facets of nature important to Chinese symbolism, such as lotus flowers, waves, and mountains. The garden also features many Tai Hu rock displays. Wikipedia tells us that, "sculptural Taihu rock is especially prized because it represents wisdom and immortality, and is only procurable from Tai Lake, just west of Suzhou. During the Song dynasty, they were the most expensive objects in the empire."



While these objects make for wonderful pieces of sculpture, they also make for great climbing. As we're all just big kids, we were up and down every taihu sculpture in the garden.

A lot of aspects of the garden were pulled from traditional Chinese songs or poems.



The garden consists of several resting houses and pagodas, that are surrounded by all manners of man-made lakes, canals, hills, caves, and vegetation. The idea is that by creating elements of nature, they were creating areas for contemplation, places to seek inspiration.



After the Gardens, we headed to a silk factory to see and learn how silk is made. A guide showed us around and explained to us that the worms whose cocoons produce silk threads, are drawn to the area because of the mulberry bushes that grow there. They pick the cocoons and then unravel them for the silk. It was interesting to see. There were very few women working the day we were there... partially because it's Saturday, but also because the mulberry isn't in bloom and there aren't very many worms. Did you know that it takes such a long time to procure the silk that they only can weave about 5 meters of fabric a day?!



We grabbed lunch at a restaurant right beside the factory. The food was less than amazing, but we were all starving, so we inhaled it, before getting back on the bus. On the ride over to our next destination, Ryan, a class clown of sorts, overtook the mic often used by tour guides and entertained us all with Chinese raps, "history" of Suzhou, and other gimicks. It killed the time in a great way until we arrived at Tiger Hill, our final destination of the day.



Tiger Hill, or Huqiu Shan, is the burial grounds of King He Lu, the founder of Suzhou. Apparently the hill gets its name from the rumor that three days after he died a white tiger came to guard his remains and refused to leave. During the Song Dynasty, a pagoda was built on top of the hill. The Cloud Rock Pagoda (Yunyan Ta) is now the second most leaning structure in the world (or so I hear?) We were pretty tired after running around all these spots, so most of us slept on the bus back.



It is supposed to look like I'm blowing over the pagoda! Oh well!