Wait, first, I am way behind on posting if you can believe it. I haven't posted about Kokonoe in the fall (or the time I went before), Futagoji and the Kunisaki Peninsula, Fukuoka's sumo tourney last week and I haven't told you about the other, what, four or five schools in "View From My Desk". So I have some work cut out for me over the next month I think and I will be cutting down on the trips to do so...and because I need to save about $4,000 by March to buy a car.
For those who might be wondering how a person could just pick up and go to Shanghai at the snap of a finger let me tell you it wasn't like that at all. Though prone to sudden fits of wandering the Earth like Kung-Fu's Kane, the truth is that I was invited to Shanghai almost immediately after arriving in Kusu by one of my supervisors, Goto, and the ball got rolling for an entry visa right away. To say I was stoked would be a gross understatement: only perhaps Istanbul, Tblisi (before the shit hit the fan) and Bangkok tickle my fancy as much as the thought of going to Shanghai did.
And now, because you knew it was coming, the "but"...
But as the departure time slowly grew closer clouds of doubt gathered overhead. First off, if I'm going to buy a car in just about three-and-a-half months I have to start saving my skrilla, chedda, dead presidents, etc. That ain't happening with $900 (+spending money) trips to China or even weekends in Oita City. Next, I was close to the breaking point with the Kusu JHS school trip and its insufferable "Itinerary" and within a week's time I'm going to hop aboard another hellish Japanese tour? To put it bluntly, fuck that, I'll take a weekend in freezing Kusu and my freedom over that in a heartbeat. I talked to Goto about canceling my reservation only to find that there was no going back--my Chinese visa was approved, the room bookings set in stone, yadda yadda. I should have pressed the issue, because I was soon to find that to be a bullshit excuse for "no, you're part of the educational department and this is more or less a 'business trip' at your expense".
Looking north over The Bund from our hotel and then the Oriental Pearl Tower. As you can see, air pollution is a serious problem in the city, possibly worse than LA. You wouldn't believe the size of my boogers...
Resigned to my fate I decided I wasn't going to let it get in the way of enjoying the fascinating place I was heading to, and landing at Shanghai's massive and architecturally stunning Pudong Airport things were looking promising. It got even more promising when I saw what we were riding into the city--a maglev monorail! The Shanghai Transrapid Maglev runs the 30km stretch between the airport and the Pudong #2 subway line in about eight minutes traveling at a top speed of 431kph (268mph) making that officially the fastest I've ever gone in a surface vehicle. From the end of the line we met our tour guide and hopped on her bus for the hotel over the river in the Hongkou district.
Views of the new Pudong Financial District from The Bund waterfront. There seems to be some growth on my head in the second pic. I'm seeing a doctor about it.
For a city of 18 million people (counting itinerant workers) Shanghai is incredibly compact, with almost 3,000 residents/sq km and it shows. Massive apartment blocks and high-density 4- and 5-story slum neighborhoods stretch almost to the horizon when viewed from the Oriental Pearl Tower, the highest viewing platform in the city for now. I'm willing to bet that any two square blocks of either kind of residence would house the equivalent of my humble hometown of Castro Valley.
Yet another Asian city with odd/nonexistent zoning. This slum (I really have no other word for it) restaurant was about a block from our posh hotel.
With those kinds of numbers you better believe traffic is a nightmare of epic proportions. It took us almost an hour to get maybe 10km from the station to the hotel over concrete slab streets in a bus with little suspension to speak of. God, what a piece of crap that bucket of bolts was--and not a lovable bucket like, say, the Millennium Falcon. The engine shuddered like it wanted to shake itself into oblivion, the carriage made a squeaking noise that came from literally everywhere (at least I didn't have to listen to the guide) and the brakes made the most horrible noise you'll ever hear, making me long for some good old fingernails on the chalkboard. The kicker was that the exterior was pristine, like it'd just come off the lot--the bus was the polar opposite of a sleeper/Q-car. But back to traffic, I wouldn't believe there were traffic laws in China if I didn't see people occasionally being ticketed for who-knows-what. Red lights are seemingly a suggestion as our bus driver and everyone else didn't mind rushing into cross traffic with their horns blaring to declare "look out, I'm coming through". There is never a second, day or night, when you can be standing at any point in the city and not hear a horn blaring somewhere. Scooter riders practically keep their fingers on the horn button, which I guess would be prudent since they're the most vulnerable motorists there. Oddly enough, the worst thing one can do as a pedestrian is be courteous and obey the laws as I discovered by the end of the first night. Waiting at crosswalks for the light to change got me funny looks from residents and almost run over a few times from red light-runners. The best thing to do is look confident while you cross, walk quickly or jog and always look in the direction of oncoming traffic for the eyes of drivers you can establish contact with. If you can get that contact they'll toss an anchor out the window if it'll help them stop for you.
Getting late so I'll cut off the travelogue here tonight and finish it up tomorrow. Until then!
--Matt
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