Shanghai's Amazing Race

I got my textbooks yesterday along with my homework. I placed into Intermediate 2 which is nice but will challenge me at the same time I think. I am also taking Managing Sustainability in Transnational Business as well as Marketing Management in Asia and Emerging Markets which will both be interesting. It'll be a busy semester but a good one! In the afternoon they had a race prepared for us, it was all over the city and it had about five clues in all. Our team was five people and we raced off to  start. Yet after two hours we still couldn't find the first clue. We got so lost at one point and emerged from the metro at a totally different point than we intended. Finally we all decided to stop and eat, we were all starving by that time. We were on Nanjing road though which is supposed to be a big place to go see so we walked that down for a while. It was neat because you could see modern Shanghai alongside European architecture from when they had been settled there. This part was also much more international and westernized than the part of Shanghai we were in. It was a neat trip but we were tired at the end of it.

Today I got a phone here. It cost me 160 RMB here which is the equivalent to about 25 dollars which is not bad. We then went on a mission to find the black market here. Apparently the market here is huge and you can find just about anything you're looking for. We took the metro, which I think is always an experience, to inner Shanghai. The metro here is very nice though, kind of spacey and very clean. Again like yesterday we searched forever and we found a type of market but I dont think it was what we were looking for. I think it'll take us a while to figure everything out here. It was drizzling but we wet to the Bund anyway just to see it and it was amazing. Pictures don't do it justice whatsoever. I'll probably talk about the Bund more next time when I go again, since the skies weren't very clear today. Then we walked down Nanjing Road which looks just like New York but is forever long. You can probably find anything you'd ever want here. In a way it was overwhelming because there was so much of it. We finally settled in Pizza Hut ( an upscalish restaurant here) had a glass of wine and something small to eat, before we headed back. It was a great day and we saw so much, yet it's amazing to know you haven't even seen half of it. 

People's Square, they say this is the center of Shanghai

Beautiful European architecture is seen everywhere in this part of Shanghai. 

The Bund- It was very cloudy that night but the view was still amazing. The bottle opener looking building is the World Financial Headquarters. You can walk across the top of it, which is a glass bottom bridge, and they say you can observe the curvature of the earth.

A view from our side of the river. A huge boardwalk lines the river and then shops, cafe's, restaurants, and hotels line the street behind it.

A view of the boardwalk. 

Nanjing Road- Every imaginable store lines these streets.

It is beautiful to walk through though. Here you can relax and not worry about the deathly traffic.

A couple was dancing in the streets. They were having so much fun.

Well that's it for today. Off to bed for me and hopefully more exploring tomorrow.

Till next time.

Love,

Stef