Adventures in China

Day 1 - Shanghai arrival

I've finally arrived in Shanghai for my much anticipated holiday to visit my friend Colette and do some sightseeing around Shanghai and some southern areas of China. The landscape here reminds me so much of Korea. It is definitely still early spring here, everything is still very brown. I'm hoping that things will start to green up before I go.

Colette and Corey live in a part of Shanghai known as the French Concession. It has loads of winding streets and narrow lanes and the architecture in this part of the city really has a 1930s European feel. Some of the buildings are really stunning while others are in need of some substantial repairs. This photo, is the little street across from the apartment. It has cute little shops and restaurants on the street level and apartments above.
Many of the homes and buildings here are behind high fences and gates. While you walk down the street, you catch glimpses of life behind the wall, laundry strung up on the trees, people playing badminton... Some of the walls and gates have really great designs...I'll have to see about getting some more photos of the walls, gates and doors in this part of the city.

It was close to dinner time when we got to the apartment, so we headed out to get some dinner at a Japanese style restaurant who's specially is curry ramen. The restaurant was unfortunately out of curry so we had to order something else, but it was quite tasty. Following dinner, we headed off by foot around the city to keep me up late enough so I would adjust to the time difference. We took the metro to People's Square and meandered down Nanjing pedestrian street, admiring the lit up buildings and old architecture along the street. The street is a popular tourist destination, so has its fair share of people trying to sell handbags and watches, which I declined.