Navigating a wilder side of China

Our first challenge in Shanghai involved finding a taxi. While I had written down in pinyin and Chinese every tourist attraction Lauren and I hoped to visit, I could not find a Chinese address for the hostel where we planned to stay, Mingtown Hikers' Hostel. I hoped we would find a driver that understood the written address, "450 Middle Jiangxi, Shanghai." No such luck. Lauren and I (conspicuous in our bright orange "I am volunteer" [sic] shirts and BOCOG name tags that we had worn in hopes that the ticket salespeople would smile upon Olympic helpers) thought we would have to run from taxi to taxi in search of an English-speaker. We're used to drawing strange looks from locals, but this situation promised only embarrassment for us until, hooray (!), a crossing guard took the written address and ran off to find a translator. Within minutes Lauren and I were rocketing down the Shanghai expressway. Rocketing barely begins to describe the drive. "This is so Grand Theft Auto," Lauren said to me. I could hardly make out her words due to temporary deafness from blaring horns. But off we flew through the city in a one-hour slalom to the finish line at 450 Middle Jiangxi.

Elation! We arrive at the hostel. Devastation. No rooms remain vacant. The friendly receptionist directs us to a hotel around the corner, which offers us a room for nearly the same price as the hostel. We accept and drag our tired bodies to our room. The door opens to a cute-looking room. But Lauren has her mind set on one thing, soft beds. She runs across the room, flings off her bags and pounces on her bed. Thud. More rock-hard mattresses, but we sob for only a few minutes. We have an entire city to see! After a quick change out of our neon orange, "Hey, I'm a tourist!"-screaming shirts, we head out to discover the "real China." Discover it we do.

cheers for two more cinderblock beds!

Nanjing Road, the main shopping strip

Compared to the mild-mannered, police-patrolled, landscaping-perfected Beijing, Shanghai looks like a nuthouse to us. Vendors try luring us down alleys, mopeds nearly mow down crowds of people, and two men--one wearing a curly, brown women's wig, the other sporting a few tennis racket bags (with no tennis rackets), follow us through the streets. Lauren and I dart into a bank and lose them before they can cause any trouble. Luckily, Lauren and I are occasional nuts, and we learn to blend in as much as we can for being camera-wielding Caucasians.

We make our first stop a diner then head to the river for a boat tour. We cruise for an hour, snapping pictures of the architecturally stunning buildings of Shanghai. Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque and Art Deco buildings line one side of the river (the popular Bund area), while on the other shore, shiny, modern skyscrapers soar overhead. After the tour, we ferry away from our hotel's area (the classical building side) to the modern coast. We search for free wi fi in the Super Brand Mall, but end up returning to our side of the river to borrow the hostel's internet.

classical architecture at the Bund

the Oriental Pearl Tower (left) stands above other modern buildings

Overall, we both had a positive experience in Shanghai. We discovered a side of China very different from the charming Beijing we have come to love and enjoyed the fascinating new side just as wholly.