12 Days in China-- Day Two

DAY TWO

                Our first morning in China, and I still had no way to contact my family back at home. My stress level was slowly rising, like mercury in a thermometer. We headed down to our first breakfast buffet. An amazing assortment of Asian and Western breakfast choices. I noticed one of the women from our tour, Joanna, a hygienist, typing on her smart phone. She graciously let me send my husband a text. I told him we had survived the plane ride (contrary to his dire predictions before I left) and I asked him to try to get in touch with the phone company and see if there was a possibility my phone would work like they had said it would.

                Back in the room, Des and I tried to figure out how to work around the Chinese electrical grid to use our hair styling tools and charge my ipad and her ipod. The camera battery was easy, its charger was rated for high or low voltage, so we could plug it in directly. Finally between an adapter, a converter, a small extension cord borrowed from my dad, and a surge protector that included USB ports, we had an arrangement that seemed to work for everything else.

View from our hotel in Shanghai

                 We met the tour group in the lobby of the hotel, Joanna found me and showed me my husband’s reply: “kay." Only one word, but it was contact, and I felt much better. I was also able to email my mother from my Uncle Delmar’s ipad. So having wirelessly connected East and West, I could concentrate on being an American tourist.

                 More time on the bus, and intriguing daytime views of Shanghai. The people of the city were dressed très chic, with black being the most common wardrobe basic. I noticed many trees, more than I have seen in most US cities I have been in. The throngs of motorcycles and scooters often carried couples or a small, one-child family. Some of the motorcycles had been enclosed and functioned as mini taxis. All of them wove in and out of traffic precariously. Pedestrians crossed streets at their own peril. Buses were the ultimate kings of the road, with the bulk to back up whatever move they made. Our bus driver was the first of several who would all prove to be absolutely amazing drivers, blowing past people and things with only inches to spare and squeezing into tight places with pinpoint precision.

                The tour guide Emily told us some things about life in China, including a very recent change in the one-child policy. Apparently for a while now, if both parents were each the only child in their family, they could have two children. But the government just decided that if one parent was an only child, they can have two children without paying the huge fine. Just from what we saw in our touring, children seem to be greatly outnumbered by adults, but the reality may have been distorted by other factors, perhaps they were in school or they don’t go out on the town as much as adults. We didn’t notice groups of children playing together anywhere we went. Usually we saw the one child being doted on by parents and/or grandparents, although Emily explained that traditionally most Chinese do not express a lot of affection to their children; she does tell her young daughter that she loves her once in a while, but she felt this was as a result of her exposure to Western habits. She explained that most often both parents work, and so the grandparents have been left with a lot of the responsibility of raising the children. But it is getting to be less common for multiple generations to live together. The new generation wants to live in more modern housing, including a personal bathroom, not one shared by several families.

The price of housing is another issue, since it is so expensive and keeps climbing. We saw some six story apartment buildings, these were the older ones with stairs, no elevators. The newer and more numerous modern apartment buildings were much taller, and included the convenience of an elevator. In the cities, the traditional preference for a son has changed since the parents of the son are expected to provide housing to the new couple, while the parents of the bride only have to provide a much less expensive car. So a daughter is a good thing.

The greatest thing I learned about Shanghai—the men do the cooking!

Our tour group was taken to a medical center where a woman named Naomi founded a program for poor children needing medical treatment, The Children's Garden. She had originally come to China to help a friend who ran an orphanage and who had developed cancer. Naomi had stayed on to run the orphanage when the friend passed away, but then the government took over orphanages. Her energy was put into this other program, and she met us with a tiny baby strapped to her front. It turned out he was eight months old but much more petite than my three-month-old nephew! He was going through surgeries for a cleft, and his procedures would continue over the better part of a year. 

I got to hold the tiny 8-month-old.

                Inside we met the other children, including a girl who had been born without ears. One of the young boys was extremely gregarious and was thrilled to see himself when one of the women on the tour, Holly, turned on the camera on her phone. Then he wandered over to Des and nearly destroyed her ipod as he bashed it gleefully onto the ground.

                We ate a Chinese meal for lunch, and I discovered that I absolutely LOVE real Chinese food, which is not exactly like the Americanized version. (In fact, while writing this, I got an intense craving for good Chinese food and had to take a break and search out some Chinese recipes.) There was rice, of course, and then several other vegetable and chicken dishes placed on a rotating turntable at the center of the table. Des showed off her skills with chopsticks, but I was more intent on filling up on all the good food and stayed with a fork.

                Fully satiated, we were off to the Bund, a waterfront walkway along the Huangpu River that is a popular gathering place with fabulous views of the Shanghai high-rise skyline. We had our first experience with Chinese people asking us to pose with them in pictures, including with a wedding couple. Just about everyone is plugged in to their smart phone, and they seem to collect pictures of themselves with light-haired, blue-eyed Westerners. It kinda felt like being a celebrity, and of course Des got the record number of requests, and would continue to do so for the remainder of our trip. 

Des seated with Liam at the Bund. Look at that skyline!

We were asked to pose with this couple.

                Next we were dropped off at the train station for our ride on the bullet train to Beijing, reaching speeds of over 150 miles per hour. Our stay in Shanghai had been short but left an impression of a modernized city with a predominantly young adult population. Notwithstanding its modernity, we had encountered our first squatters (Eastern-style toilets, which do not seem to have an odor killing trap designed into them) and learned the value of bottled water.

An Eastern toilet, not too bad if you've been camping before.

A well-dressed Shanghai dog.

Views from the bus in Shanghai

                The five hour train ride showed us a view of many populated areas before it got too dark to see much more than lights. Our hotel room, even more beautiful than the last, overlooked a large area that had been a parking lot during the Olympics. We would see many people flying kites from there during our stay in Beijing. The wi-fi seemed to be trying to work on my ipad, but not quite succeeding; however, being from a rural area, this wasn't entirely uncommon, and I knew that sometimes you just have to give electronics some time to adjust to their new surroundings (touchy, emotional little things).
                We turned in for the night, our alarms set for an early rise. My world clock on my ipad said that it was eight o'clock in the morning at home-- my family would just be starting the day that I was about to leave behind.