Bang to Hangzhou Week 2

Gardens

Old Town Square

Severly hungover I somehow managed to check out of the hostel before 12 and get myself to the bund for some daytime snaps. Unfortunately having had no time to plan anything we had no idea where to go from here.

We made a trip down to the Yew Gardens and then found ourselves in Shanghai old town. This was the first bit of traditional China I had really seen in Shanghai so far and it was impressive, although a little too pristine  suggesting it was more for show than an attempt to retain its history. Still good fun and good end to our mini trip. The whole day was overshadowed by the events of the evening somewhat. I found out that the Hangzhou football team had a league game against Shanghai and somehow a small group of football fans from the study China group became more than half of the group.

 

Hangzhou : Shanghai

Shanghai : Hangzhou

We arrived at the awesome Yellow Dragon Stadium 5 minutes from our dormitories and took our pews after finding myself a Hangzhou shirt to switch into after arriving in my Shanghai shirt. The game itself was pretty poor and I can’t say too much for the level of skill in the Chinese football league. However on this occasion the fans of Hangzhou Green Town had another form of entertainment. This manifested in the rowdy section of the crown making Britain proud of its sporting hooligan heritage. Although Shanghai took a lead early on Hangzhou managed to claw a goal back midway through the second half. The game seemed to die off at this point which is astonishing considering it was barely living before.

 

A fairly unimpressive crowd in a very impressive stadium

Everybody agreed it was about time for a day off from the dingy depths of Coco Banana and so we all headed for a solid nights rest. 

Shangerrrrrrs

Today was filled with classes again which followed pretty much the same structure. Me and a few friends from the course had decided this weekend would be our best time to head out to Shanghai to see the sights. Although this meant we missed the visit to a Chinese family on Saturday we all agreed we couldn’t miss Shanghai when it was only an hour away.

After heading out the previous day to pick up tickets we were confident our journey would be without a hitch. Unfortunately, and most likely due to our poor language skills we managed to get a taxi to the completely wrong station without enough time to get to the right one.  So after some puppy dog eyes at the information desk we managed to be put onto the next train to Shanghai without having to change the tickets.  This train actually ended up getting us there earlier than we had planned so all in all a kind of success.

Train Friend

We made our way up to the hostel we had booked and dumped our bags. We were tired hungry and had zero energy so of course we went straight to a bar. In our room we met a Chinese student on his last day of travelling in Shanghai and somehow managed to persuade him to follow us out even though he had less than 10 hours till he had to board a train home.

I got in touch with Lisa again as she was also in Shanghai with some of her friends as it was there final weekend in China and we found our way to a Bar street. Very quickly we found that Shanghai costs pretty much the same if not more than London UK. After a severe battering of our livers and wallets we managed to find our way home to the hostel and get some sleep. Apart from poor Dennis who had around 2 hours until he had to leave. Dennis was a guy we met in our hostel dormitory from Wuhan, China. When we arrived he was packing bags ready to leave Shanghai the next day, but somehow he was persuaded to come along with us to the bar and only as we left did he tell us he had to be woken up at 7am to leave. The responsibility for making sure this happened fell to me somehow, so my sleep was interrupted midmorning to wake up Dennis. 

Just arrived in Shanghai

Tourists?

Saturday was the day of the family visit which we had missed. But after speaking to everyone that did attend them I was a little annoyed I had missed out. Each family had their own days out planned for the 2/3 students that visited them. Restaurants, lake tours and home cooking dumplings are just a few things that some of them got up to.

We however had only one things on our mind. The famous Shanghai markets. We asked a few of the other people in our hostel where to head for a bargain and we were given a number of possibilities. We made our way to the recommended market, here we found ourselves walking out the metro into several multistory buildings wall to wall in stools and shops. We had a wander around to get a feel of things before we attempted to haggle as we definitely did not feel confident when so outnumbered. Not to mention being followed by 3 different men all trying to take you to shops around the complex and watching what you look at to tempt you with ‘cheaper’ and ‘better quality’ items. This is made even more frustrating by the fact that even when we told them to go away in English and Chinese they laughed and carried on.

So time to haggle, I had found some shoes I liked, problem I had was I didn’t have any idea how much they were actually worth. So I came in with a ridiculously low bid and was laughed out of the shop. 1 - nil market sellers.

Food Hall at the Market

After this confidence-destroying blow I decided to set my sights on something I could perhaps value. Football shirts. A small stall packed to the brim with shirts awaited me and it seemed each teach I wanted a shirt for they did not have. But I finally found myself a Shanghai shirt which I fancied and the bidding began. Starting at a outrageous price around £50 I laughed and went in for around £6. This carried on till the price was around £15 but I wasn’t too happy with that. Luckily my fellow shoppers joined me and bought other things too making the price drop. Finally down to a reasonable price I let my money go. Like a drug though, this was addictive. Stool after stool I got my fix trying to battle down prices with the pro’s. I have no doubt in my mind that I was worse off but it was so much fun I didn’t really worry about it.

Some friends were now joining us back at the hostel after their family visits, so when more people come we just have to party harder. With our group torn about where to go we split with half of us heading out to Bar Rouge, a famous rooftop bar overlooking the bund with outrageous prices and and high class clientele or another bar street and then a club.

As my friend Lisa was heading back soon I met here after a quick glimpse of the bund at a bar street with a couple of friends. We then made our way up to Muse2 (M2). This club did not disappoint, with pretty much all of us having been without a ‘western’ club in so long it was about time things got messy and so we gave it our all. 

Bare Dance Skillz

After many many many beers and many many awkward dance moves we got turfed out in the early hours. Now the tricky part. Finding a way home. After aimless walking for 20 minutes we discovered we had a card directing us to the hostel which was extremely easy to read considering that daylight had now reached us and the ‘Shangers’ businessmen had started to crowd the streets.

...at last

… Sleep.

Kung-fu!

Tai-ji and Kungfu is a lot harder than I thought it would be. We started off with an ice breaker where we would run around and listen for the teacher to call out a number. We then had to get into groups of that size, whoever was left over would then have to become a bunny rabbit in front of the class. Easy start but once the real lessons started I realized maybe I am not the most flexible of people and so struggled with pretty basic movements. After only half an hour I had worked up a well earned sweat. Our kung-fu teacher was a feisty little woman who could kick you clean in the face pretty easily so I paid pretty close attention for this class.

Kung-fu class

Tai-ji

The most amusing part of the class may be the point where my friend Dan almost feinted midway through the session. Strangely enough he feinted in the lessons where only had to close our eyes and breath. Clearly he had embraced the cheap Chinese alcohol way too much. Midway through the breathing exercises with everybody's eyes closed we opened our eyes to see Dan stumbling around on the spot completely unable to see or hear any of us. I guess you shouldn’t find it funny and I should mention he is now fine.

Next up once again I had another language class, these classes were fairly fast paced and so if you didn’t try to read a little of your notes outside the lessons you would without fail turn up everyday and have no idea what was being said. Nevertheless the basics were finally sticking.

Grandma's Kitchen meal

Cheeky bit of fish

This evening a group of us went out to try a restaurant chain prominent in Hangzhou, Grandma’s Kitchen. Here we were given a private room and luckily plenty of patience. Our favourite places to eat so far in China seemed to be places that have had a menu with pictures. Here we ordered a tonne of dishes including a portion of duck tongues. Although not the worst, I wouldn’t recommend them as it mostly consists of a piece of gristle with skin around it, apparantly there is a skill to eating them and most Chinese people actually love them. The rest of the meal was amazing and as was commonly the case it cost next to nothing. Splitting the bill left us with around £6-8 each for a huge meal and drinks too.

Cant complain. 

First week of Study China

So today is day 3 and also Chinese valentines day and therefore another reason to go out. But before the fun begins we had a tour of Hangzhou that I conveniently overslept for and so instead spent the morning wandering the streets to see if i could find any hidden gems. I also took this opportunity to go for a run on the track which was completely empty in the morning. As I soon found out for good reason, I managed about 4km before almost drowning in my own sweat. Turns out 40°C is a little hotter than I was used to.

This afternoon we had our first Chinese Business Culture class which turned out to be a lot more just Chinese culture and our teachers life stories which all in all were fairly interesting. 

 

After

Before

So after a quick bite to eat, we were on our way out. A pre drinks session turned very quickly into just a lot of people sweating in a lobby and so soon after starting we went out to a wine bar the Vineyard. The bar quickly emptied after our rowdy group arrived perhaps ruining what was perhaps a romantic evening for some Chinese couples. Shots, cocktails and way too much beer led us back to the familiar entrance to Coco Banana club, to which we were quickly becoming well known customers so it seemed as our orders were already known by the staff after only 2 previous visits.

Wednesday became my day of rest. With a day of Mandarin lessons that I only just managed to stay awake for, my football session in the afternoon finished me off. An early night was ideal considering my 7 am start on Thursday for Tai-ji and Kungfu lessons.