Today we drove from Hangzhou to Shanghai for our last day of the tour. Our family decided to stay in Shanghai for one extra night, so for us there's no goodbyes quite yet. First - shout out to our driver, I mean he drove us from Nanjing to Shanghai in crazy China traffic and it turns out he starts another tour again tomorrow! What a stressful sounding job :/
The first thing we did when we got here was visit another jade factory (figures...we're all becoming Jade experts). This one was kinda amusing - they had the representative announce he would give us a 90% off discount, and then one of his assistants would say "BUT SIR! 90%? THAT'S TOO MUCH!". It was hilarious! Completely acted and totally unconvincing. Anyways, we had lunch before being taken to a Chinese medical pharmacy where they gave us free foot massages and tried to sell us products - the usual. Afterwards we were taken to a market - a real market this time, where we had the chance to buy some souvenirs and wander around before dinner. After dinner we went on a boat cruise (on a bigger boat, not the small ones like yesterday) and we saw Shanghai as the sun was setting, as well as the night scene with all the building lights on. It was gorgeous and pretty laid back, afterwards we walked around an older neighbourhood which has been transformed to a trendy restaurant district....and that pretty much concluded our tour. Oh! I should also mention, that night on TV they aired "China's got Talent", "The Voice of China" and "Chinese Idol" all in one night. I literally had the time of my life flipping between shows xD
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| Jade Figure....I got bored and took pictures of things |
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| Boat Cruise! |
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| Shanghai by night |
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| So exciting xD |
So today, many of the families on the tour left Shanghai to go to other places within China (after all, you've already come halfway across the world, might as well make the most of it). We had a lot planned for our day, but we ended up only going window shopping. I have to say, Shanghai is really nice, I feel like I'm in the fashion district 24/7 in this entire city. The men are in suits, the women in dresses and more people are fluent in english which is a plus. My sister and I went to the H&M outside our hotel, and it's really nice - the clothes are smaller, and their styles are more suited towards the warm weather. I think it's more expensive, but the sale section is a lot better than what I've seen in Toronto ;) After our little clothes shopping adventure we got day passes on the subway and headed out to pedestrian mall. We ended up spending almost four hours there which knocked out most of our day. Turns out the security check here in the Shanghai subway isn't as intense as in Beijing - they're still here but usually they just let us through without checking. After the pedestrian mall we went out for dinner, and intended to see part of the Shanghai night scene before we remembered the subway closes at 10:30 and we made a run for it catching one of the last trains.
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| Across the street from the hotel |
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| Shanghai Buns nommmyyy |
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| Taken during our run to the subway |
Our last day in Shanghai was spent packing and chillen in the VIP lounge in the airport (Toronto's was better though....not that I'll have a chance to be in these business class lounges for a while...). The flight home was smooth, and really fast compared to our trip to China. I can't get over the pods, they fully recline into a bed...I mean how cool is that!?
Now we're getting over the jetlag and dealing with more power outages due to Toronto's freak weather. Somehow it's worked out that the weather here in Toronto is similar to the weather we left behind in China...how is this a thing? Overall, the trip was amazing - I really liked Hong Kong, and the tour was fantastic giving us a glimpse of different parts of China. Compared to China, Toronto seems pretty boring...but I don't think I'd be able to live there (mainly the heat...I'm SO bad with heat), visits are enough for me. Now I have to recover from this trip ASAP and get ready for New Brunswick/Japan! I'm so glad I'm not working this entire summer (for once), this is hands down the most exciting couple of months I've had in a while!
-M
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