Shanghai pedestrian - I need new feet

Last time I left you, I was bored in the office counting seconds until... "until what?" I thought to myself. It's not like I'm chained to my desk. And even though some people might look upon playing hooky from the office as bad, I think of it as an adventure. Mostly because every time I step out the office doors an adventure awaits. I was waiting on the LMoRE guys to finish some work for me anyways. So off I go, into the wild blue(read grey) yonder.

Here's my plan, I have yet to see People's square, and I haven't been to west Nanjing road. So I figure I'll kill two birds with one stone and do both. I read in the lonely planet book that belongs to Kevin that I borrowed from Autumn that there's some fancy shops on west Nanjing road. Of interest is Silk King. So off I go, I tell Jorge I should be back by 6 in time for supper, but not to wait for me.

I walk down Nanjing road, east Nanjing road, just like every other day... except this time very few people ask me if I want a bagwatch. Maybe I no longer look like the kind of guy who would want a bagwatch. We were talking about drugs the other day, I don't remember who I was talking to, but it was someone from the US office. The reason we were discussing the topic is because we figured with so many people pushing bagwatches around, there must be some drug dealers. Neither one of us had been approached by anyone selling drugs. With my long hair I normally get approached for drugs in just about any new city I go to.

So I walk down Nanjing road with a few offers of massages and bagwatches but as I near people's square some guy walks by saying chi chi chi, or something like that. He walked very close to me, whispered the chi chi chi and just kept on going. I think to myself "I guess China has their share of crazies too" and go about my business. The another guy leaning on a wall trying to look nonchalant says something that sounded almost like hashish to me as I walk by. Ok weird. Then later a guy walks by really close and says "hashish, marijuana" and keeps walking. So they do have drug dealers in china. Here's the list of strange things drug dealers do to look busy apart from just walking down the street. Some guy was pumping air in a bike tire, some guy browsing a small shop, some guy at a bus stop, some guy just sitting on the steps of a hotel entrance, some guy perpetually waiting at a red light, he would change his facing when the lights changed, so that he was still facing a red light. And my personal favorite, a guy in a phone booth, he opened the phone booth door as I walked by and said "hashish, marijuana" into the phone as if he was still talking on the phone. He was the loudest one because I didn't walk too close to the booth.

I got to people's square, it's not a square, it's huge, it's got a fountain and a museum, and some paved areas, some grassy areas. Anyways, it's pretty cool. I did not get approached for a tea scam sadly. As the scam goes, a couple walks up to you and asks you if they can practice their English with you, then they tell you that they're going to a tea ceremony, you go with em and you end up with a big bill for tea. I was going to tell them that they were in luck and that I was an English teacher, and if they paid for the tea ceremony I would give them tips on their English. I couldn't pay for the tea ceremony myself because I don't have any cash and clearly if I paid then I would be teaching them for free. Unfortunately, I didn't get to test my reverse tea scam scam.

After people's square I headed to west Nanjing road. It just so happens that people's square is what makes east Nanjing road turn into west Nanjing road. I walked around a lot, I took pictures, I found Silk King. I wish I had come to silk kin before going to Hangzhou, this place had really cheap prices for some good silk. I roamed around some more, there were many fancy shops here, some were even American brand shops like the Nike store. Not so many offers of drugs or bagwatches here. I did find a very interesting side street.

The side street was crawling with people and was bordered by small food shops. People were lined up for meat on a stick. Chu WenJiang taught me how to say dog meat, Gou Rou sounds like gow roe. But every shop I asked laughed at me. I guess maybe they thought I was accusing them of selling dog meat. I should have asked how to say I want to eat dog meat. Anyways, I ended up with beef, octopus and something pretty much unknown. I think it might have been beef tendon, but I'm not sure. It was chewy and tough, but tasty.

At this point I made up my mind to buy more silk. I roamed around looking for a bank I recognized, there are so many banks in China it's kinda funny. There's stuff like "The industrialized bank of Shanghai" or the "Shanghai cultural bank" or the "Agricultural bank of China" not to be mistaken with just the plain old "Bank of China" or the ICBC, one of the c's is China, the other might be Commerce, but who cares really. I found a bank, got some money and headed to Silk King. I bought some silk and the lady made a funny face when I paid for it in cash, she laughed and told her friend something to the effect of "holy shit, did you see all the cash in this guy's wallet?" She came up to me and said that they accepted credit cards. Look lady, the reason my wallet is loaded with cash is because almost nobody in China accepts credit cards. Had I noticed that your shop took credit cards I would not have scrounged around for a bank. That's not exactly what I said, I was slightly more polite, in fact I just said "Ok" and kept counting the cash.

Here's the deal, in China, you can get a good meal for under 10 rmb (people say Yuan, but rmb is faster to type). In fact, if you cook at home, it's probably even less than that. So 100 rmb is a lot of money, you can buy just about everything you need for a few days maybe even a week on 100rmb. So walking around with 1500 rmb in your wallet is crazy talk. I saw one local's wallet, and all he had was about 130 rmb in it, give or take a few because it's hard to count when you're looking in someone's wallet. Now, let's put this in US terms. 10rmb is $1.50, 100rmb, $15, 1000rmb $150. Tell me you've never walked around with $150-200 in your wallet and I'll call you a liar. It just so happens that if you're walking around with $200 in your pocket in China it happens to be 15 very large bright red bills. Making them very recognizable.

So I spent my money in the silk shop, there was a little mix up. I thought the lady said that the chiffon was 40 rmb per meter, and that the other silk was 88 rmb per meter, and the satin silk was 138. Turns out that the chiffon was 88 and the other silk 40, the satin was indeed 138. I ended up spending a bit more than I expected, but still dirt cheap compared to US prices.

I walked home from west Nanjing road, it was getting dark, I got a few good pictures though. Speaking of pictures, this whole walk I spent getting pictures of people. I took some pictures of many types of people, pretty much whatever caught my eye. Some of them were of good looking women hahaha, but a lot of them are of fashion victims. Fashion here is pretty much screwed up compared to anywhere else. There are so many different styles that make many people stand out. Super short skirts, bright pink dresses, sequin, polka dots, and the all time favorite, super short shorts, some even have short shorts with mini dresses that almost entirely cover the shorts. People where shirts with English written on them, some are brand names, but most are knockoffs. I guess to a Chinese person, Absolute Vodka and Asbeout Vodka look about the same. Some girl looked like she was in a Kriss-Kross video! Hilarious. The worst fashion though is nylons that start from just below the knee and go up. So basically it's like nylons with the sock part cut out so that it only covers the legs. Hopefully this fashion will never make it to North America. I will also post a picture of "Is this a guy or a girl?" because that one kinda threw me for a spin, and I could see the person. Talk about fashion victim.

Anyways my short walk to west Nanjing road took only 4 hours or was it 5, I lost count. I came back to the office, got a couple of pork buns from the guy across the street. I think he doesn't like that I overpay him for his buns. They cost 1.5 rmb, and I pay him 2. He's ok with me paying 2 rmb for 1 bun, but when I gave him 4 (instead of 3) for 2 buns he looked a little funny but pocketed the money without protesting. I think if I see him while I'm with a Chinese speaker I'll get the person to translate that I know his buns cost 1.5 but they're so delicious that I am happy to give him 2 rmb for them. I mean for me 1 rmb is 15cents, so overpaying by 7.5cents won't break my budget anytime soon. But for him 0.5rmb probably goes a long way.

Anyways, I hit the office to get my stuff and it turns out that the Internet at night is lightning fast compared to the Internet during the day. So I surfed a little, killed some time, waited a bit to see if Trish would log on. 10pm came around and the office was almost deserted, so I headed to the hotel.

I woke up this morning at around 8:30, headed up for breakfast from the hotel restaurant. The waitress there is really nice, I think she likes me because I make an effort to speak in Chinese, she smiles at me a lot. Breakfast here is almost always the same... so whatever. I had some good dumplings and some fruit. Off to the office, I found two little boxes on my desk, both with a little teddy bear glued to the lid. One had a pink bear and another had a blue one. I thought someone was having a baby, but it turns out it's for a wedding. It's a little celebration of people getting married or something. Inside the boxes were some Dove chocolates... Dove, the maker of soap, now makes chocolate. Anyways, I fixed some stuff, did some work and then George comes along.

George might have to stay a bit longer, so I'll be heading home alone. Not a big deal really until you take some time to think about it. Getting to the airport and on the airplane is the easy part, many people at the airport will speak enough English to help me out. The taxi there should be fine, I'll just give him a card that says take me to the airport. The big problem is when I land in SFO. The plan was that George's wife was giving us a ride. So now I'll have to cab it to George's because my car is there. But that's where there's more trouble. I gave my car keys to his wife in case she needed to move my car. But his wife might not be there. So she might leave my keys with Wan Feng, another guy from work who lives nearby... Wan Feng barely speaks English and he might not be home either, but his wife whom I've never met might be? This is sounding better and better. I think I'll get George to tell his wife to hide my keys somewhere and then I'll just grab them from there. Grr...

Anyways, last night I saw JianZhong, so I invited him to lunch. I thought he had forgotten, but he showed up around 11:45 and asked me if we were gonna go to lunch. I tell him sure, let's invite a couple more people. He invites the entire Map QA team. To be honest, I didn't mind at all. They do hard work for us, they deserve a treat. I tell him if everyone comes I'll have to stop by the bank first though. He just laughed, but then JianZhong laughs a lot. Turned out that only one other person joined us. Wang ChangHu aka. Roy. Roy's English isn't so great, so I had to try and include him in the conversation. He listened intently though, I think he was trying to understand what I was saying.

Wang ChangHu ordered lunch. It's the norm in China, one person orders for everyone, they only give you one menu per table anyways. He ordered off the lunch menu, which has never happened before, everyone always orders from the real menu. We got a lunch set: soup, rice, tofu, frog legs, cucumbers, bok choy, beef and mushrooms. Wang ChangHu asked me if I ate everything before he ordered. And by asked me I mean he asked JiangZhong and then JianZhong asked me. When I said yes, Wang ChangHu started ordering. Anyways, the food was excellent as always. But the surprise was in the bill. All this great food, granted there was not much meat, but all this great food for 78 rmb. $12... that gets you 2 subs at subway, and maybe 2 cookies if you're lucky. Clearly not enough for 3 people. Here for $12 you're afforded a lunch fit for a king.

Over lunch I told JianZhong that I would like to try dog, snake and turtle. Though, most importantly dog because it's illegal in the US. He said that he wouldn't eat it, but he's not against taking me somewhere where they serve it. So I got Ed to help me find a restaurant that sells dog and other foods, we found a good one that was apparently recommended to Ed earlier this week but not because they served dog. JianZhong called to make sure they had some available. So tonight I'm going out to dog town with JianZhong, Wang ChangHu and Lin Ying, that last one is a girl. I can not for the life of me tell the difference between girl names and guy names here.

There's a good reason for me not being able to tell the difference between guy and girl names in China. Not just that all the names sound the same but... even the Chinese can't tell! Apparently there are very few (if any) names reserved for girls or guys in China. Who knew?

So, I should finally get to eat dog tonight, and then we're gonna go play some snooker or something. Sounds like a blast. Hopefully my feet won't hurt too much, they're a little busted from the 5 hour walk yesterday.