Day 3 - Touring Shanghai

Ming Vase

With a population of 24 million, Shanghai is the largest city in the world and we set out to tour it all in one day. Of course that isn’t possible but the tour we arranged for today promised the “must-see sights” so we settled for that. There were six people in our group which is a nice size and we started with a one hour stop at the Shanghai Museum. That was enough time to see a good bit of the museum and we particularly enjoyed the jade and vase collections with some pieces quite old. The piece at the right is from the Ming dynasty (1368 to 1644). It is hard to talk about Chinese history without talking in terms of dynasties which traditionally started in 2070 BCE with the Xia dynasty and continued for the next four thousand years.

Reclining Buddha

We then stopped at the Jade Buddha Temple which was built during the Qing dynasty, the last imperial dynasty of China (1644 to 1911), which makes it relatively recent. No photos were allowed of the actual Jade Buddha which was stunning, but I have one of a reclining Buddha which I think is ceramic. Our guide explained that only 20% of the people in China are religious with four major ones being Buddhism, Christianity, Muslim and Taoism, in that order. We visited a Tao temple later in the day.

Pudong Area and the Haungpu River

We then went to the Bund which is the old waterfront area with many buildings from the colonial period of the early 1900s when Britain and France controlled major portions of Shanghai and the building along the Bund reflect that period. Immediately across the Huangpu River is the new Pudong section which represents the recent growth of China during the last twenty or so years. The tall building you can see is the second tallest in the world. The one with the round balls is the Oriental Pearl TV Tower and the lower ball is a roller coaster.

We also made a couple of mandatory touristy stops during the day which are kind of par for the course with Chinese tours. We visited a pearl and jade center, a tea tasting and a silk center. Each one teaches you something but their main goal is to sell you their products. It’s about fifty percent educational and fifty percent marketing pitch.

Xiao Long Bao

We got back to the hotel around five, rested up and took the subway to have dinner at a soup dumpling place that was raved about on the internet. The restaurant was Linlongfang and it is a tiny, family-run, hole in the wall kind of place. Jeanne had the traditional xiao long bao pork dumplings and I tried the crab version. They make the dumplings to order and the pork ones were excellent while the crab ones were good but not as good as the pork. The pork ones were 18 CYN or about 2.50 USD for an order of 12.

Garden Near the Bund

We have decided that Shanghai is pretty much like New York City, but maybe a little better because much of it is newer and better maintained. There are flowers everywhere and displays for their impending 70th anniversary as a republic. Shanghai also has some shabby places but you never feel unsafe. It's also a mix of ancient and modern. There are some strange sights like street sweepers everywhere with what look like 1000 year old straw brooms then nearby are groups of people staring at their cell phones.