shanghai, china

so i'm a little late on this one, too.

but i just want put down a couple thoughts about my visit to shanghai.

why visit shanghai?

well, the weekend i went was a long weekend for me.

it took place over lunar new year. so we had monday off of work.

and our school also gave us tuesday off (some schools got friday and monday off, some schools only got monday).

so i was allotted a fair amount of time to go.

of course, the most weighted reason to visit china was because of friends.

smith wilbanks and melissa mills, two alabamians i met at the capstone, were planning on studying abroad in china this semester.

before the semester started, they wanted to see some of china and it just so happens that they would be in shanghai (a 2 hour flight from seoul) over my long weekend.

but don't think i'm leaving out yurie akatsuka.

a japanese national, yurie studied at the university of alabama for a year and met smith, melissa and myself in tuscaloosa through various paths.

personally, yurie and i spent a fair amount of time together in the tri club.

of course, after a year in bama, she returned to japan to finish school, where she is now.

so it fell together very well:

a 4 day weekend.

3 friends from home.

additionally, yurie's personal itinerary made going very easy as well.

being in japan with more time off than me, yurie could do whatever and meet smith and melissa in china whenver.

so yurie came to korea to meet some korean friends she met in tuscaloosa.

and also to meet and hang out with me.

(after our shanghai excursion, yurie would return to seoul for an overnight layover, leading to another night of hanging out.)

as fate would have it, we also booked the same flight from seoul to shanghai.

we get to shanghai, meet smith and melissa, and the walking began.

i say 'walking' because none of us are apparently very decisive and we are all very okay with anything to do.

so we spent a fair amount of our time walking.

but we saw a pretty good bit of the city.

amongst the things we saw:

a karaoke/noraebang with a rat to welcome us (the girls would have none of it, though i recommend we buy it a beer; i'm sure it would have been to cool to hang).

the gate of the zoo and the precipice of pandas;

the world's highest observatory;

a lot of other cool buildings;

a couple of cool jade buddhas engulfed by scores of people;

a sweet-as-hell maglev train;

a metro system with a hell of a lot of character.

some of these and more have photographic support which can be seen on facebook (i don't like uploading twice).

would i recommend china?

yes.

go if you have the chance.

but don't expect too much.

i feel like shanghai was very well kempt because it's one of the world's largest metro areas and a former playground for the west.

of course, i only hypothesize that china funnels resources here.

i have no evidence of this.

in short, china is a pretty cool place to see.

would i go back to china?

maybe.

with serious peer-pressure.

maybe not even serious persuasion; i fold like a lawn chair under peer-pressure.

the flight to shanghai was short and decently cheap (approx. $250).

however, the single entry tourist visa was approx. $135.

yes. i said $135. for a single-entry tourist. even for only 4 days.

if i go back to china, i won't go back to shanghai.

i'd rather see another place, of course.

i doubt shanghai is worth repeating at this point.

plus, i have other unseen asian destinations.

just a couple of quick thoughts about my first trip out of korea.

many thanks to smith wilbanks, melissa mills and yurie akatsuka for one hell of a weekend.

lots of love,

jo