Unfortunately this was a very boring week. We had an exam on Thursday the 19th. And considering I am not spending all day everyday studying, I had a lot to learn before the Exam. In addition there was an Exam on Monday the 23rd.
On Friday the 20th, we did end up going into the city for a little while. We met up with some Chinese people that we met a long time ago at Windows. We just hung out and had a few beers than headed home for the night. The bar was fun because two of our Chinese classmates came with us, and when other people started talking in Chinese they would tell us exactly what was just said. Even though it was a short night, it was nice to get out for a while and not think about studying.
After our exam was over on Monday the 23rd, went went to our last class and then headed into the city. Caitlin and I went and grabbed some cheap burgers and then other people met up with us to blow of some steam and have a night of drinking.
Caitlin and I were the first people in Windows (around 6pm) and we were also the ones to close Windows at 4am. The night was so much fun, we were planning on leaving around 10 to get the subway back to Minhang but someone else was already headed into the city so we decided to stay out. Abhinav, Adam, Caitlin, Matt and I were the ones that stayed out. There were a lot of people there that we were talking to, but we ended up talking to 4 British guys the most. They were traveling China for 5 weeks and only had a few nights left in Shanghai. When windows closed, the 4 guys and us headed over to Tongren Lu. We ended up in some bar. I taught one of the guys a common dice game in China. We stayed there until the subway opened and made it back to campus around 7:30AM.
Tuesday March 24th…I was able to get a few hours of sleep before waking up to get to class. After class I slept most of the afternoon and then Caitlin and I headed back into the city to meet the british guys. We ended up going to C’s and playing a lot of dice. It was another fun night. The taxi driver that took me back to Minhang was hilarious. I was trying to bargain the price of the Cab ride, he was trying to have me pay exactly what the meter would have been, I got my point across that I knew that wasn’t a deal and he finally agreed on my price. On the way back we had a very broken Chinese conversation. The only English word he knew was ‘okay’. When I didn’t understand something he was saying in Chinese he would just laugh at me. He was so funny; I wish all of the cab drivers were as animated as he was.
Wednesday March 25th… After class on Wednesday a few of us went back into the city. We stopped in Xujiahui to have our favorite dumplings for lunch! After lunch we went to peoples square and found the Shanghai Urban planning building. This building was really neat. There was a 3-D model of the city of Shanghai. It was fun to pick out places we had been and see how far away they actually were. It is hard to really gage that sort of thing from the subway. They also had a section on transportation in Shanghai and a big area on the development for the 2010 World Expo that will be held in Shanghai. It was neat to see where things would be built and the different designs that were presented originally. I really enjoyed seeing the whole city and getting an idea of how big Shanghai really is!
After the urban planning building we went and walked around Nanjing lu for a while. After a short amount of time we decided to meet up with some of the other guys so we went to catch a cab. The available cabs that we kept seeing were on the other side of the street. Kevin, Eric, Caitlin, I decided to cross the street to get a better shot at a cab. We were in the pedestrian walk and when we get to the other side a police officer comes up to Kevin and says ‘I am Shanghai Police’. We were getting J-Walking tickets!!! Turns out the walk sign was red….but no cars were coming, so that warrants a J-walking ticket. The cop asked for our passports and none of us had them with us. So he started writing a ticket and told us to sign our name…well there was no proof of what our name was or any other contact information so all I put down was Mac. He wrote out 4 different tickets, one for each of us, and it took forever!!! I was laughing so hard as Kevin was getting his. He was the first to get the ticket…and at first I was under the impression that he was just writing one for all 4 of us…wrong he wrote 4 individual ones. The cop understood English so I know he could hear me joking about the situation. It took about 20 minutes and I am sure the amount of paper he went through cost more than what he made off of us. By the way 5 RMB is equivalent to about a $0.70 ticket. Of course while the tickets were being written there were a number of empty taxis that had past, not to mention all of the vehicles that ran red lights, and numerous other J-walkers, but that’s okay, he got the stupid Americans.
After getting in trouble with the Chinese Law we met up with Matt and Joe for a German dinner. It was a great place that Joe had been to before. It was in a very large expat area. The restaurant had live music and a great warm cozy atmosphere. We spent a while there just eating, drinking, and joking around. After dinner we got on the subway and headed back to Minhang.
It was a fun day out in the city and I still cannot believe that I got a J-walking ticket!! Oh China!
No comments:
Post a Comment