Shanghai tourism souvenirs design competition winners

Shanghai tourism souvenir design competition wrapped up

I love these souvenirs. How cool do they look? Watch the video and check out the Shikumen door pendant, or Maglev train pen! and course I love the xiaolongbao ( 小笼包 / 小籠包 / soup dumplings) boxes!

Watch the CCTV news report video here.

Carrefour Gubei Half Price Day May 1st

I haven't read anyone else reporting on this yet so so far.. You heard it here first.

On May 1st Carrefour Gubei (not sure about the other Carrefours in Shanghai) will have a half price or 'buy one get one free' off all food (hey don't quote me on this though).

To counteract the "anti-French" thing currently going on, the manager is going to see if people can resist a sale.. when it's been known that people have queued on the paths outside for hours because the eggs were on special... just a few RMB jiao/fen/cents off!!

Well my opinion is that of course no Chinese can resist a sale as great as this. I don't think I'll be going. I want to stay alive and not trampled on by mobs, thanks.

PS I sent hubby a link to that Shanghaiist article and he was too scared to go to Carrefour but tried his luck on the weekend and absolutely nothing happened - haha.

Dain Ti Hill dinner and Electronic Translator

The reason why I haven't uploaded any pics for ages to my blog is because I've been having computer problems. Well not really problems as such but it's just running extremely slowly, it's driving me mad. I should get it checked out but have heard that people that deal with Macs in Shanghai aren't very knowledgeable. Ugh. Anyway despite this I'll do a post with a few pics.

Last night we had dinner in Dain Ti Hill in Metro City. We've been there a few times, but always at the one in Grand Gateway. They are on both the 4th and 5th floors in that building. We had a seat right next to the window, that look out of the huge glass/metal 'globe'.

We ordered a couple of dishes.




Tuna Salad



Chinese-style sushi with prawn, mango, and special sauce



Chicken with pine nuts (except we think they forgot the nuts!)



Fried fish



After that we went to the basement to look for an electronic dictionary/translator for the hubby. He's been going on about getting one for ages and we finally got one. We were there till after 10pm, when the stores were all closing! The one he got is a Besta CD-900. It cost 1300 RMB. It has a full colour screen. The one with a black and white (green and black?) screen cost 850. It is quite a big difference in price but we figure the colour one was better for a few reasons: the colour screen, the much brighter screen, the pen/stylus is stored inside so it won't accidently fall out, it has the ability to add SD cards later which translate between Chinese and European languages, the battery is like a mobile phone battery and fully rechargeable (the B&W one uses AAA batteries).

There are so many features it's mind boggling. It even has this cute picture dictionary. But the main feature of it that's one of the best is the ability to write characters. So if you see a character and you don't know what it is you just write it in and it tells you on screen what it is, the definition, translation, and how to pronounce it. There is audio accompanying all the thousands of words stored in there. It is also an MP3 player and more.

It's pretty cool. I wouldn't mind one for myself except I wanted traditional characters as well, and that model cost more than 3000! Such a huge price difference. Besides, I found myself getting distracted by cameras (as I'm a camera nut). When hubby was looking I wandered to the Canon camera stand next door and asked if I could have a look at their SLR cameras. It's such a difference to hold one of those instead of a small point & shoot camera! I tried the EOS 400d and EOS 40d and there is a huge difference between those two as well. I asked hubby which one I should 'get' (hypothetically speaking) and he said the smaller one. He said, quote, "The bigger one is a big man camera. It's just a big penis extension." Hahaha. Erm. As you can tell he is not into cameras at all. He is happy with his Kodak p&s camera that he got free from work!







In other news, the weather is getting warmer. It's still sunny almost every day which is great, and I can't complain about that. However, it's still as dry as heck. Almost every morning my right nostril is bleeding. Not a lot, not running, but it's still kinda scary to see. :( It's a light watery red, the colour of tomato sauce. And I'm still getting itchy eczema lumps on my face and neck every day. ARGH!

The price of food!

I'm not imagining it. My ayi has mentioned it to me but I kinda 'forgot' about it (because, well 5 RMB is a lot of money to her!).. but man! Everything has been going up (something to do with the weather down south I think?) - Rice, meat, fruit, veges. Imported food not so much but that was always expensive anyway.

They say it's cheap to eat in China.. well only if you like Chinese food!

Last week I went to City Shop in Gubei. First time I've been in all the time I've lived here (LOL). I bought so many bits and pieces and it ended up costing me almost 500 RMB! I nearly had a heart attack! I was actually looking at prices too when I was buying stuff and usually choosing the cheapest option.

Everything that I like to eat is damn expensive eg cheese, breakfast cereal/muesli, Western style bread (ie bread that is not sweet) and pastries.. etc.

A box of ordinary cereal (from Germany or UK) costs up to 100 RMB!
A packet of 250g shredded Coon Cheese (from Australia) costs about 40-50RMB. It costs less than that for the 500g size in Australia! ARGH!

This really really sux cos hubby and I both do not have huge appetites and do not really like Chinese food all that much. Plus recently we have barely eaten out at all and been cooking a lot more at home but really, eating out is still SO much cheaper than cooking at home.. so why bother?

So anyway then I went to Carrefour a few days later and only spent about 150 RMB.

Yesterday I went to Zara on Nanjing West Road. I just felt like going to Zara and never been to that store before. It was absolutely FREEZING yesterday. It must've been around the 0 degree mark for sure. Anyway there was no sale on and I didn't find anything I particularly liked/had to have (plus they were selling Spring/Summer clothing like t-shirts and sleeveless dresses, and I was thinking WTF? Because it's still SO cold)

Anyway so then I walked around looking for somewhere to eat. Since it was 3pm now (Yes I tend to eat breakfast and lunch very late) not a lot of places were opened. I ended up going to the top of Plaza 66 and had lunch at Zen. It was OK but I was not that impressed. First of all, the water in the tea tasted like tap water, even though according to them it wasn't (and it cost 5 RMB for the pot), second of all they took forever to come to me when I tried to grab their attention (when there were hardly any customers there at that time and enough staff) and thirdly, well there was no thirdly. The portion of my lunch was huge and I took the rest home and had it for dinner.

Then I went next door to the Shanghai Centre to go to Paul's. The most delicious bakery ever! But boy oh boy are they expensive. The smell in there drives me crazy and I want to buy the entire store! But alas the prices are a real turn off. In the end I got 3 things and it cost 82 RMB - a berry tart thing, an apple thing, and a breadstick thing with olives and herbs in it.

Then I went to City Supermarket and bought some stuff. I was disciplined this time and didn't go overboard (after my last experience) and spent around 100 RMB. I was supposed to buy rice but the variety wasn't that great and to be honest didn't want to carry such a heavy thing so this morning got my ayi to buy it for me from the supermarket across the road from our place, when she went to buy other stuff.

On Monday I asked my ayi where she got her puffy goose down jacket from and she told me she had it made at this place... I couldn't believe it. It looks so professionally done like something you'd buy in a store and I never thought you could do this. I have wanted a longish goose down jacket for so long but was trying to be 'good' since I already got that white cashmere coat made and I already own a goosedown coat (but it's only waist length). During CNY I tackled the shops (BAD mistake, it was crowded as anything) and tried in vain to search for one amongst the crowds. I have so many criteria and just gave up. Plus it was impossible to try anything on and I HATE the rude unhelpful salespeople.

Anyway so my ayi told me I could get it made at this place and she only paid 190 RMB. I nearly died!! $30 for a custom made goose down coat? Can you believe it? I paid about $200 for mine in Australia and it's not that great. She even told me she thought it was 'ugly' haha. (I bought it in 2004 just prior to going to Europe). Well there are like NO choices in Australia.. and are all freaking expensive. Anyway so I was getting really excited dreaming in my head of colours and styles.. then this morning she tells me that that place has closed down since Spring is coming! ARGH!

I know it happens in every place around the world but I really really hate how in winter they bring out summer clothes and in summer they bring out winter clothes. I remember seeing these goose down coats when it was still 38 degrees in summer. ARGH!

Things to do in Shanghai...

After having guests stay with us recently I have made some mental notes of what they like to do.

Some are obvious like shop and eat, and shop some more, and eat some more... go to or just look at the Orient Pearl Tower. :)

Others which may not be so obvious but seem popular are:

1. Go to the fabric market. Get something made. If you want a suit you'll need at the very least a full week though. Simple things can be done in about 4 days. Bargain at least 10% if not 20% off! Start with 70% of the price they quote you. Addresses are listed in one of my older posts.

2. Get a massage. Massage places are EVERYWHERE and compared to almost any other country, are dirt cheap. The place we go to we pay 60 RMB for 1 hour for either a full body massage or foot massage. It is located in the Hongqiao/Gubei/Changning area known as "Little Japan" on Xianxia Lu and Zunyi Lu. It is always busy and they do a pretty good job!

When that's done, shop some more and eat some more ;)

Some places I can recommend are:

1. Xujiahui - where you can get anything under the sun, where there are 6? department stores, and the big Grand Gateway mall. Where the geeks can go crazy at Best Buy (or Metro City or Pacific Digital Plaza), and the foodies can go crazy at the top of Grand Gateway and Novel Place, and the shoe-aholics and clothes-aholics can go crazy at any store. My favourites are Pacific and No.6 department store. I can usually find clothes and shoes in there that I like at reasonable prices. The brands at Grand Gateway are generally way too expensive for me (since they are mostly foreign, mostly European brands). For basic staples (plain coloured tops, pants) Uniqlo (in GG) is great. Lots of easy-to-wear, mix-and-match stuff at great prices.

2. Huaihai Lu - previously known as Avenue Joffre, or the "Champs Elysee of the Orient" this road is about 15km long. Yep, mega long. It's divided up into three parts - West, Central and East. Most of the 'action' can be found in the Central part (which is also the longest). I have pretty much walked along the entire street. It is tiring but the most benefit can be gained (for a shopaholic) by walking across most of length of this street (not in the one go!). There is no point to take a taxi and you can take a bus or the subway but you miss a lot doing that since the stops can be far apart. If you are just randomly browsing it's much better to walk, and walk and... walk. Near Shaanxi Nan Lu, Maoming Nang Lu, Huangpi Nan Lu (and in between) there are lots of department stores and boutiques. This street is also the home of wedding dresses and bridal photography stores. One after another, big glass windows with glittering displays of fancy sequinned, frilled, coloured, embroidered, wedding dresses. Billions and billions of different kinds. They must do a good business because day or night, they are filled with customers looking at their large sample albums. I like to take the 911 bus along this street because it's a double decker one and you can feel like a real tourist sitting at the top and looking out the windows. At 2 RMB a trip it's fun just to ride the bus along the whole length of this road to get a feel of what it has to offer you! :) Once you have pinpointed the places that interest you (I actually marked on a map where my favourite stores were), then you can get out and start pounding the pavement.

3. Dain Ti Hill/Neo Tang Dynasty - crazy Chinese modern fushion cuisine. Really tasty. There are chains everywhere but seeing as I just talked about XJH there is one on the 5th floor of Grand Gateway. Usually it's so popular you have to queue for an hour or so but sometimes you can get lucky and only have to wait 5-10 minutes. There is also one in an expat type mall on Huahai Lu near the Hong Kong Plaza. The one with Delifrance out the front.

4. Lynn - modern Shanghainese cuisine. Now I don't normally like Chinese food much but this place was out of this world. It would have gotten a 10/10 if it weren't for the fact that they allowed smoking. The fish with pinenuts was absolutely delicious. It looks like an expensive type of place too (being right near the Ritz Carlton hotel and Nanjing Xi Lu) but for 4 people we paid 490 RMB including drinks.
99-1 Xikang Lu near Nanjing Xi Lu 西康路99-1号近南京西路

5. Wagas - the good ol' staple. My husband is addicted to this place. Opened by an Australian there are now restaurants all over Shanghai. It serves simple, healthy stuff - sandwiches, wraps, salads, pasta for a reasonable price, and great smoothies and freshly squeezed juices. Everything is really fresh! If you go after 6pm they have specials on the pasta. The one on Huaihai Lu near Huangpi Nan Lu is always busy and easily accessible.

Bruschetta

In an effort to be a good (50's style) wife I have tried to do more and better cooking lately. For anyone that knows me I detest cooking! Ugh. And I am weird in that I have not much interest in food nor eating. I hate grocery shopping.

So anyway, here is the bruschetta I made last Thursday, a week ago. What do you think? We have no oven nor toaster but a flat cafe-style toaster doobiewacker. I used 2 cloves of garlic, some spring onion, quarter of a red onion, one whole tomato, and some "olive" bread I bought from Carrefour (already sliced because I'm lazy). I finely diced/chopped all the ingredients. Then I added a dash of olive oil to the bread, spooned the mixture on and sprinkled on the Italian herbs (Masterfood brand - from Australia!)

You can add shredded cheese on top too. :)

It was so delicious, even if I do say so myself. The bread was perfectly cooked and crunchy and the toppings were tasty. The red onion was the magic ingredient, I think.

Now... what the diddly am I going to make tonight?

(PS this stupid layout on Blogger when uploading pictures sux!)