Shanghai

I guess I'll go backwards, starting with this past weekend's trip to Shanghai.

A friend of mine, Ernald Furxhi, works at the Undergraduate Admissions Office for Drexel. He came to Beijing and then to Shanghai for meetings, lectures, and college exhibitions pitching Drexel to Chinese high school students. A number of months ago, we met and realized that we'd both be in China at the same time. He invited me to come to the college exhibition in Shanghai and help out, as it would be nice to have a real Drexel student there. I said sure.

My experience airport experience was strikingly different than when I first came to Beijing. I could say what I wanted to say, and even had the confidence to speak in Chinese when people spoke to me in English. I'm still nowhere near fluency, but it's nice to see the difference between only 6 weeks ago and today.

Drexel was going to pay for transportation, hotel, and food. I had no idea what to expect. I told the taxi driver which hotel I was going to, and got really surprised when he turned in to the parking lot for the Shanghai Stadium. I thought that maybe he didn't know where he was going. But when I asked, I realized that it was me who didn't know where I was going. The hotel is one of the nicest in Shanghai, and definitely the nicest hotel I've ever stayed in. It is actually part of the Shanghai Stadium--like from the club on the top floor, you can look out the window at the field. I thought that was pretty crazy. I dropped off my luggage and ran over to the expo across the street.

When I arrived, Ernald showed me our Drexel booth and introduced me to Drexel's three representatives in China who would also be working with us. There were two older men, probably in their forties, Dr. Richard Wang (王彤) and Mr. Cai (I have yet to find out his full name), and a girl in her early twenties, Gloria (高雅). They work for The China Center for International Educational Exchange (中教国际教育交流中心), or CCIEE, which is a company that helps Chinese students search and apply for international universities. They seemed nice enough, but little did I know how much personality each had. Richard is a very smart man with a fluent grasp of both English and Chinese and a surprisingly great knowledge of Drexel. Gloria also speaks very good English, has really interesting opinions on life, and never seems to run out of energy. Mr. Cai speaks no English, but is such a personable man, he can make friends with anyone. He's always doing something funny, even when he's not trying--either making jokes, doing silly magic tricks, or trying to learn a little English. The five of us made an interesting group.

We worked all day Saturday. The event was basically a bunch of big rooms filled with booths advertising colleges from all over the world. Our little booth was on a corner, so we ended up getting a lot more attention than I might have expected. The crowd was mostly comprise of a single student and both of his/her parents. Most of the students spoke reluctant English as did many parents. This is where it helped to know some Chinese. Countless times, a family would come up to the booth and ask each other something assuming I couldn't understand. When I answered in Chinese they were kind of taken aback. Since Ernald speaks no Chinese and many of the parents spoke no English, I helped translate a few questions and answers. It was really difficult, but just a fun experience overall. I learned a lot.

Saturday night we went out to eat Shanghai food. 太甜的，不够辣。Too sweet, not spicy enough.

Sunday was another full day of work, but I got to eat the hotel's breakfast before we started. I was incredibly happy to find Chinese and Western breakfast food. I was in heaven. They had bacon, eggs, bread that tasted like bread, cheese, pancakes, hash browns, muffins, danishes--I didn't know what to do with myself. I honestly didn't even realize how much I missed all of that stuff until I saw it. Thinking about it still makes my mouth water...

On Sunday night we parted ways. The CCIEE people went back to Beijing and Ernald got ready to head back to the U.S. I had decided to stay an extra day and use my free time to see the city.

On Monday, I headed uptown to the Xintiandi area (新天地), which is full of modern Shanghai shops, parks, and lots of foreign restaurants. I've got a bunch of pictures that I'll put on the picassa or whatever I use.

I'll finish the story later, right now I've got to go to sleep...