China - Day one

Day 1 Ni han pyon liang – I think you are pretty.
After a crash course in physical therapy for my finger I hopped on a plane to Shanghai on Friday morning, arriving Sunday afternoon. It’s not like my sleep schedule was regular anyways. With the head cold the entire week before and surgery the day before, I was already a right mess. Hell, I was probably operating closer to Shanghai time than CA time.

I’ve done well with flights lately. Not having to be wedged between the fat man and the screaming baby is always a blessing all by itself. This is especially true when the flight is fourteen hours. This time I had the pleasure of sitting next to Jennifer, a young sales woman for a Chinese company who was returning home after a series of conventions.

Her Chinese name is so close to Jennifer that it was an easy choice for her American name. In fact you almost couldn’t tell the difference when she said it fast. Jennifer endured my endless questions about China and how to say different things when we were between naps and even got in a picture. I really am getting better at talking to strangers, a skill that hasn’t come easy to me. By the end of the flight I knew how to say ‘I do not understand’ and I relearned ‘I think you are pretty’. I learned the latter from a friend in the US the previous week, but I figured it might be better to take the passive aggressive approach since we’d have to be friends for the next 14 hours.

Luckily for Jennifer, she slept more than I did. This gave me time to unwrap my finger and go through my physical therapy excercises without showing off my disgusting wound. Well, its kinda cool from a boy’s perspective; but I figured she wouldn’t hold the same opinion.

A Chinese man I talked to on the plane, and many others throughout wanted to know about the financial crisis in the US. I couldn’t really say more than the standard boiler plate about home loans and such. It is clearly an important situation that is being followed the world across, as people would continue to ask everywhere along the way.

Arrival was a sleepy one. We were greeted by a friendly vendor who took us to our hotel. After freshening up, we went to eat with Adrian and some of his employees. Walking is a heroing experience. People aren’t afraid of cars, and cars are not afraid of people. It makes for a country wide game of chicken.

Diner was a German restaurant not too far from the hotel. On the riverside next to the restaurant (called the Bund) we saw fireworks launched from a river boat. I would never have guessed how much gun powder that boat was packing. After about 20 minutes the 30-odd foot boat was done. All the while, a newly wed couple was having their pictures taken with the Bund and fireworks at their backs. Adrian says he doesn’t know why they had fireworks, but that it would have been impossible for the couple to have arranged it. So I guess that just make them the luckiest couple in Shanghai that day, their wedding pics must be spectacular.

The food was very, well, German. Not great, but I wasn’t very hungry and it was fun in the spirit of the latter days of Octoberfest. I even had a little beer. Beer still all tastes the same to me, and that’s not a compliment. There was a quartet of singers / musicians who butchered one American song after another in front of us. Behind us was an enjoyably boisterous table who loudly toasted each other in Chinese with great regularity.

It just all felt surreal, so I took it all in and enjoyed it as such. Coming back to the hotel, the view overlooked the Bund, and it was spectacular with all the buildings still lit up. Sleep came quick that night.