Shanghai: A new crew

11-20
I got up at a decent time considering how late I went to bed.  I went down for breakfast in the hostel and slowly everyone from the night before showed up.  Erika came first, and she had a note that the Harry Potter girls left us.  How exciting.  It turns out they got back to the hostel around 2AM and walked in and asked reception they had a note for the "Harry Potter Girls".  The girl at reception was still there and apparentlay had to hold on to a chair as her body contorted wildly from a major epiphany.  She then dug our note out of the trash and gave it.  The Harry Potter girls left an equally spectacular note for us and slid it into Erika's bedroom.
on the back of one of those tourist train cars and took it for a ride for a bit.  Then she jumped on another one, but got in the front seat with the driver--we didn't think he was going to like it, but she didn't get arrested.  After that she set off the security alarm at a drug store because she ran inside to look at a display of candy.  She picked a package up and thrust her arm out, as if to show me, but it crossed the security barrier.  Then she kinda stood there playing with setting off the alarm--the people at the drug store did not appreciate it.
We got out Egg Tarts and they were special.  Then we had some Korea food. I really have missed the Korean food actually--I thought I would be happy with Chinese, but I think the variety is just not as great as I had hoped.  After eating I said goodbye to Erika (but we may meet back up in Hong Kong) and the Harry Potter girls and went to get my train ticket.
I got my train ticket this time and only had to wait in one line.  So I went back to the hostel to book my next hostel and hang out until dinner time.  I got too hungry too quickly so I went back to that awesome noodle place next to the hostel and got some mein.  It was meant to be just a snack.  I met the previous nights fellowship at 7 again and we all headed out, Sans one Harry Potter Girl, Debs, who had a date with a local chinese police officer she met.  We went back to the street noodle place--it was easily all of our favorite food.  We got there and ordered, but then discovered there was a dumpling lady hiding on the next corner, so I opted for just a heap of dumplings instead (I wasn't that hungry anyway).
After dinner we walked towards Raffles--seriously we love Raffles, but some people in our group had not tried the Egg Tarts and they kept hearing about them and well, I wouldn't have had a problem eating another one anyway.  On our way to Raffles we passed this restaraunt where a super tall albino lady, dressed in a wedding dress, was getting her picture.  She was a cyborg, we are pretty sure.  Ryan actually was convinced she was just a mannequinn. Like seriously convinced, so I walked him back to prove she could in fact move on her own.
As we were walking down the road a pack of short asian women descended on us skating with wheels you strap onto your shoes--also selling them.    It was like the battle from return of the jedi, and these women were tie fighters zipping in and out.  Their wheels even glowed as they spun, leaving behind streaks of light.  Ryan bought a pair but he couldn't manage to use them very well.  Juliet fared better, but scared a lot of people while she skated too close to their rears.
Raffles was open this time--yay.  The Egg Tart place was open--yay.  The Egg Tarts were all gone--boo.  We settled for another snack place that had teas and grass jelly.  We caused great pain to the people working there as we asked questions and pointed at things.  But it was their own fault really, as their menu was disorganized and unclear.  The grass jelly was wierd but alright.  Juliet didn't like the tapioca balls.  She spit them out in my tea accidentally, as she thought it was empty.  That was pretty funny actually.
We went back to the hostel to hang out for a bit--drink some beers and wait for Debs to hear about her date.  It was terrible.  They guy took her to a hostel for drinks and tried to convince her that it was too far to come back to her hostel and that they should instead get a room there.  It was the kind of date you come back from and take down a half bottle of rice wine in one swig, which is exactly what she did.

We went for street bbq and encountered a new character--a homeless man who was sleeping on the street who was missing patches of hair and screamed like Chewbacca: Hairless Chewbacca.  We wandered a bit before the street bbq and randomly found a fancy pants club that was just 2 blocks from our hostel.  We were surprised, but after  street bbq Debs tried to get a group of us to go--nobody would go but me, so Deb and I went to this club dressed like slobs.  We didn't even expect that they would let us in, but they did.  It was more of a western style club. There was a guy who looked like Lex Luthor there that tried to tell us how he was rich.  He offered to buy Debs a shot--I got mad not because he didn't buy me one, but because Debs didn't ask for a shot of kryptonite.  We stayed long enough to get a few funny pictures and then left.  I'm still waiting for her to post them on facebook.

Shanghai: lazy

11-19
I was considering moving to another hostel today just to change things up, but I was feeling really lazy at breakfast, so I passed.  I met 2 girls from Scotland and a girl from Sweden while eating breakfast  They were telling me about Laos.  Wow, Laos sounds Swiss Family Robinson fun.  The Swedish girl, Erika, needed to buy a train ticket, so I went with her, because I needed to get mine for Hong Kong.  I introduced her to the Baozi, which I usually eat for breakfast (or in this case, secondies).  Some Baozi's are like grenades of juice, or oil, or some mystery liquid.  They seem to always go off on rookies.  Good thing Erika had swooshy pants on.  She didn't seem to care though.  Some people have gotten mad.  Warning them would be the nice thing to do.
The Train station was just a few stops on the subway.  It looked like an atom bomb had been used to level sports stadium, and then they had built the train station on top of it, using some of the larger chunks of wreckage in the construction because they were too difficult to move.  We found the automatic ticket machines.  But oh no, you can only buy certain tickets with the automatic machines!  That is so bunk.  So we walked around a bit until we found the ticket counter.  It was kinda busy--we popped in a line.  Erika got her ticket to Guilin, but they lady wouldn't sell me one to Hong Kong--she was pointing to another area of the room.  So I went over there and waited in line again, got to the booth, and same thing, except this time the guy at the ticket counter said "Line 12". Ok, I got it.  Hong Kong is a really special super irritating thing to buy.  Unfortunately I had to get to my pseudo job interview and I couldn't wait anymore, so I left.
I had a pseudo interview at Concept Art House, which is an outsourcing company based in SF.  I probably shouldn't discuss the details of it, but the studio was in a cool neighborhood.  It looked like SOMA of San Fran, an ex-industrial now-trendtastical shopping, living, business district.  I could work here, totally.
The girls I met for breakfast wanted to get a group together for dinner, so we all met at 7PM at the hostel.  It was me, Erika, Scottish girl (Debs and Nan), a Russian guy, Ryan from Florida, and Juliet from France.  We walked down to this food street south of People's Square.  There were a lot of seafood places with bins of fish and such at the front.  Just like in Korea--gross. No thanks.  We went to a Hot Pot place instead.  It was really good, but the waitress really didn't seem to like us.  It was probably just overwhelming for her.  Juliet didn't want to pay for the chopsticks (you have to pay if you use the ones they give you) and kept trying to give them back, then the waitress just stormed off.  Maybe a cultural nerve?  The food was good and wasn't too expensive, but we were all still hungry after, so I suggested we go to Raffles, the mall with the excellent food court with the excellent egg tart place, and the Scottish girls had to see a movie there anyway.  We got to Raffles and it was just closing. Ack, but there was a huge crowd gathering for Harry Potter, which is what the Scottish girls were going to see.  We were going to go out to a bar later, so we told the Harry Potter Girls that we would leave them a note at our hostel to tell them where we went.  We left them and headed back to the hostel.  On our way back we found a street food guy making noodles.  YES.  It was really good--costs 10 Yuan, and was more filling than the 70 Yuan dinner.

We got back to the hostel around midnight, but we were still determined to go out.  I wrote a beautiful not to the Harry Potter girls in a most harry potter style (I will try to find it and get a picture).  We tried to leave it with the girl from reception but she didn't understand and said she would be off work soon, so she wouldn't be around the deliver it, so we just put it in a bush at the front of the hostel.  We went to this Spanish bar in the French concession called Zapatas first.  I had been by there before but not on a weekend.  It was terrible--we might as well have been in the US.  We got one drink and left.  Erika tried to leave a note, for the Harry Potter girls, with the bartender but he didn't quite get it, but took it anyway.

We went to a more Chinese club next--it was a lot cooler.  The Chinese are more private when they go out; they like to hang out with just their friends at their own table and be themselves--they don't go out to be seen.  Instead they stand at their tables and do things like dance with one hand in their pocket or grab their girlfriend and try to giver her a sexual heimlich maneuver.  We went home after this, at around 4 AM.

Shanghai: Finally...

11-10
Took a G-Train to Shanghai today.  Holy Crap--348km/hr.  Thats amazing.  The train was very Star Trek Voyager-ish.  It took like an hour to get to Shanghai.  It was easy to get to the Hostel as the train station also connected to the subway station, which was also very sensible and well marked in English.  My hostel was near East Nanjing road, which is right by an intensly popular tourist shopping street.  This means there are lots of white people.  This also means there are lots of people preying on the wealth of the white people.  Eventually I learned the phrase "Boo Yeoh", the meaning of which I'm not exactly sure, but it stops the seller in their tracks--I think they must assume if you know enough Mandarin to say that, you probably know enough that you won't buy their crap.  I'll take it.

My hostel was ok.  I got a single room but it was so tiny the door couldn't open all the way, but it had all I cared for: bed and a bathroom.  I found some street noodles and called it a night.

11-11-11-15

I spent the next few days in Shanghai but I really lost interest in keeping track of it.  I met up with one of my first friends I made on my adventure back when I was in Seoul, John (Ireland).  He was trying to flee his job from Korea for a job in China but Korea wouldn't let him leave, at least for a few days.  It's a hilarious story, esepcially when he tells it, as he has developed a genuine distaste for certain parts of that country.  Anyway he's now in Shanghai so It was so great to see him.  He took me to a Brittish pub called "The Bulldog" in the French Concession neighborhood.  It easily had the absolute best spicy chicken sandwich I have ever had.  Pretend Wendy's hired a Szechuan chef for the day to grill burgers--thats about what it was like.  

I ran into some friends I had met in Beijing and Xian also.  Alex from Canada, my dumpling banquet friend and Dave from Australia, the guy who took a soup baozi grenade to the chest--what a hero.  

Overall Shanghai doesn't have a lot of touristy things to do.  I did a lot of walking.  One day I just went shopping down the Nanjing Roads.  Another day I took some time to visit a gym.  Overall though, I've just been taking it easy.  I moved to another hostel down the corner from my first one--it has a much larger cafe to hang out in, and usually we spend our nights there drinking and playing pool.  The bars in Shanghai are mostly overpriced and cater to westerners.