別の外人

Again, sorry for the delay in posting, have fallen behind a bit with the last few days of hecticness... gah really actually can't wait to start class and get a bit more time (maybe) :P Though that said, I know that as soon as we start, I'll get tired and run out of time and agh yeah.

On Tuesday, we decided to all go to Jing'an, where Jo lives, to go look around, see her flat and just generally explore a new area. We met up for breakfast of dumplings (I think a pattern is starting to emerge now) and then went to try and get a mobile phone or a sim card etc from the large market we have in Xujiahui, called Metro City, but there were so many really crowded floors, full of fake merchandise (and overpriced at that) that we ended up going next door to the Best Buy, where we all came away with a phone and sim card for about £30/40 :) Pretty good really... I mean yeah we could have got it cheaper in a market, but I don't think any of us wanted to run the risk of ending up with a fake, crappily made one which would fall apart within a few days. After that, we reemerged from the massive building, and went to find a bus stop.

Now, none of us knew this (except Jo and Connie most probably), but Chinese buses have no rhyme nor reason. There are 1000 different bus lines in Shanghai, but no central record, and no way of knowing where each bus goes from a certain stop, and no way of knowing which stop has which buses unless you find the stop you want. We wanted bus 830, but we couldn't find a stop this bus stopped at anywhere. Plus you don't put your hand out to summon them, they just stop and you run to it, jump on and drop 2 kuai into the box. We ended up getting on a random one that some guys said went to Jing'An, and we made it safely :D We walked along some small streets, some street seller streets, and some busy roads, before going up to Jo's apartment. Inside it's gorgeous, outside it's very Chinese, and the lift is a bit scary, but meh mine will be like that :P She seemed so at home there, and I can't wait to move in my place now, and finally unpack my suitcase :D

We got lunch in Jing'an, from some random street-side cafe, for about 50p, which wasn't half bad. In the evening, went out for Jennie's birthday, which kinda failed... we went to a nice restaurant on a street near me, and then walked all the way along Nanjing Xi Lu towards the Bund, walked down the Bund, and saw very few bars (and the ones we saw were like £5 a glass of wine). We know there are 100yuan all you can drink offers out there, we just haven't found them yet... We saw many touts and this one beggar girl with a mother. I think she had no legs or something, Connie and Abby thought she was just standing in a hole xD We ended up walking about 5 miles, doing the veryyyy long way round back from the Bund, but ended back up in People's Square which was good. Adele, with her blisters, was especially pleased we made it back before the Metro shut.

On Wednesday, after I went to see my new flat (have changed from the previous one as the girls dropped out and it would have been all boys) which is on Guangyuan Lu, still pretty nice with a double bed etc, we went to Qipulu, a massive 'fake' market area, and when I say massive, I mean massive... all the streets around this massive store complex with lots of complex narrow corridors selling everything for an alright price, better once you've haggled them down, were selling loads of random stuff. The entire area was buzzing with life, people shouting for customers, dodgy looking guys siding up to you to offer you 'DVD, watch'... unnerving. When we all met up at the metro, Jo was already outside waiting for us, accompanied by a Chinese lady. We all presumed Jo knew her, and so chatted along to her in Chinese... turns out the woman had randomly started talking to Jo, and we're almost definite she was trying to sell us her cheap Maybelline-ripoff makeup, Mary Kay. We were a bit nervous she was gonna try and charge us for being a guide, as she did lead us to the general area we needed to go to, though we haggled the prices ourselves (Roxy flipflops for £1.70, cute parasol for £1.40). Once we got into the large market, me and Connie managed to get rid of the lady, but very politely of course, and we wandered through the narrow corridors of stalls. There were 5 massive floors... so intense.

Every time we stopped at a shop, the owner sitting at the door would jump up immediately and presume you wanted to buy it. The expression 'women keyi yidianr kan kan ma?' proved very useful. We got an entourage of sonme sleazy looking man who wanted to sell us his shit watches, and some woman who kept trying to lead us to her stall. We mostly ignored them, because we didn't want them to become our guides, but if they got too forceful, we did do the whole 'bu yao' thing, though these people just ignored it. Eventually we lost them, and came away poorer, but with clothes (me and Abby managed to haggle this one skirt she really liked down from 95yuan (expensiveeee) to 50, basically half price :D SO impressed, as she offered us 65 as her last offer, we went to walk away, and so got it for 50.

Walking down the street, people needed the loo... turned out it was a communal squat trench, or as Nerys called it, a 'canal'. The door was propped open... I didn't even venture in xD We then tried to find a Western shop with western style toilets, saw a KFC and that also turned to be a squat, but in its own cubicle. We then caught the metro back (though while walking through the station, we came across some shops that sold these demonic-eyed barking dogs... SO FREAKY).

When we returned, we dumped out stuff in people's hotel rooms, then ventured on out to find the supermarket. I have a supermarket fairly near my flat, yay :D Not that I'll be buying much from there, but some things were great value... 29p for the large size bottle of beer, anyone?? :D Fish so fresh that it was still alive, interesting fruit and veg...
...and all I ended up buying was a bar of 'Dove' (like Galaxy) and some washing liquid. What an exciting life I lead xD Went back to the hotel, washed my clothes from the flight, Japan, ferry and China, and felt very proud.

Thursday, we arranged to meet outside Shanghai Tiyuguanzhan (Shanghai Stadium Station) at 1pm, so I was fully intending on getting a proper lie-in... but for some mental reason I woke up at 8.30am. Pain :( We went first to a roadside seller for some xiaolongbao, and then to IKEA, bought some cheap nice things, and I bought a duvet for my new flat :) Jennie has now got a flat sorted, with my landlord actually I think, which is great :) We then explored campus a bit, went to locate the swimming pool, which was fairly abandoned with lovely green water (it's only open June til August), sorted out Abby and Nerys' internet and tried to sort out their keycard problem, before me and Jo went home. Stopped off on the way to pick up some mantou, yum yum, then ended up walking all the way from Huaihai Xi Lu down Panyu Lu before getting onto Guangyuan Lu (my road) and then Huashan Lu for the metro and bus stops. Jo went off to try and find a bus stop for her bus, and I came back to the hotel and chilled. Tomorrow is the entrance ceremony, and I think we get our student cards, yay :)