I'm back! My week spent in Shanghai was pretty interesting. There were high points and things that I hated too. Shanghai is one of the business centers in the world. There are so much high rise buildings and most of the city has a modern look. Of course there are still areas that resemble the "old" Shanghai. If you go into Pudong, the new rebuilt district, it looks really nice. The streets are wider, there are lots of greenery, and all the buildings are relatively new. My first few days were pretty much spent shopping with my cousin. She took me all over Shanghai through malls and street stands. After that I went sightseeing with my parents. We visited family from my mom and my dad's side. Then we did some more shopping on the last day. From my short time spent there I'll summarize the good and bad parts of Shanghai.
Food - Of course China has the most authentic Chinese food. The food here doesn't compare. The price of food is also cheap relative to food here. The only thing you might want to beware of is that expensive restaurants may not taste as good as local shops. We went to one of the more famous and expensive places, and the food isn't as good. The portions they give was like half of that at other restaurants.
Shopping (Clothes) - There are so many places to shop. Malls, small stores, and stands. The malls there are huge. The average mall has about 8 stories. The malls look similar to that of malls here, except each store is smaller in size. As you might know, most of the prices of things, especially clothes, can be negotiable. Sometimes for 10 or 20 percent of the original price. Most of the time you can take off at least half. What I found was that in order to get the best deals you have to spend lots of time haggling. The owner or salesperson is not going to let you get away with a low price easily. Usually it takes a good 5-10 minutes of pleading, whining, and cursing to get the price really low, combined with walking away at the end. Usually if your initial price is above their profit margin, they will lower their starting price, but sometimes if you start with a price below their invoice, they won't even lower their initial price even if you walk away. There are so many people shopping that they can really care less about one potential customer. Seriously, in China there is no recession. They are still growing and usually there is about 5 shoppers per salesperson. When there is that many people there, they tend to increase their prices and are less willing to lower their price by even 50%. Shopping in China has become more about combining skill and luck. You get the best deal only when you are the last person in the shop during closing time.
Traffic - If you think traffic in America is bad, think again. All the aggressive drivers and people on cell phones here can't compare to the normal driver in China. There, everyone drives dangerously close to the car in front. People there use the horn and high beem more in one day than we do in years. It was a miracle I didn't witness a single accident in my 8 days there. No one follows the traffic regulations. Besides stopping at a red light, everything else is fair game. Besides the bad driving, traffic congestion is crazy. Small streets usually only have one lane. Only the freeway has three lanes. During rush hour cars crawl on the highway. It takes an hour to go like 10 or 15 miles.
Public Transportation - Besides walking and taking a taxi, they have buses and a subway. Usually the subway is the quickest type of transportation. A ticket costs usually $2-5 depends on how far you need to go. There are 8 subways in Shanghai and knowing which one goes where is confusing. When you need to switch lines, you sometimes have to walk a long time through a tunnel. During rush hour, the subway is packed. You are pretty much surrounded by bodies. The buses only take you to a limited amout of places. It also costs $2 per ride. Just like the subway, during rush hour people cram into the buses too. People's hair sometimes gets caught in the door.
Air Quality - One of the things I hated was the air quality. Once you land at Pudong International Airport, you can see a layer of pollution. It's so thick that it's difficult to see very far. Everyday when I woke up, I can see it in the air as well. To add to the pollution, it seems like half the people in China smoke. Besdies in vehicles, they are allowed to smoke anywhere, and sometimes people still smoke in taxis. I hate when I'm sitting in a restaurant and the tables surrounding me are all puffing smoke. It's just their way of life I guess.
Housing - Compared to houses here, homes in Shanghai are much smaller. Homes are build like apartments since there is limited room. Each floor usually houses two families. The typical house has a living room, small kitchen, bathroom, and two or three bedrooms. Every house has air conditioning but no heater. Despite all this, housing in Shanghai is incredibly expensive. They rival housing in New York City. A house (approximately 1000 square foot) in one of Shanghai's outer district costs roughly $200,000 U.S. Housing in central Shanghai costs about $750,000 U.S. Even though food and clothing is inexpensive in China, most people can't afford to buy a home even if they saved for a lifetime. Their current homes are ones the company provides for its workers. Now, more and more foreign business owners are paying people to abandan their homes in central Shanghai, so they can build skyscrapers. Most of the residents live in the outer districts of Shanghai.
Noise - I can't sleep past 8 o'clock everyday because there is so much noise in the streets. People are constantly honking their horn, yelling, and creating lots of noise. When I stayed at the hotel, they were doing construction across the street, so every morning it would be incredibly loud. But I guess you get used to it if you actually lived there for a while.
Shanghai is growing so rapidly. Next year is the world expo. Shanghai is trying very hard to rebuild old structures, clean up the roads, and beautify the city within a year, much like Beijing did during the Olympics. Besides the air quality and traffic, I enjoyed my short stay in Shanghai. It really feels like China's version of New York but with so much more people. There are some incredible sights in Shanghai, and there is so much to do there. If all you want to do is shop, you can probably shop at a different place everyday for months.
