Graham visited Yiwu market last year and was amazed by it. Ever since he has told me "you have to see it to believe it" so we made sure to visit Yiwu on this trip. Even though he had told me about its size, it was still astounding.
We flew via Kunming Airlines from Chongqing. Fortunately, we left our hotel earlier than planned, as the trip to the airport took longer than the concierge estimated. On the basis that whether you're sitting in e hotel or the airport you are still waiting we decided that we'd leave early. There weren't too many hold ups with the traffic so I think the concierge may have been an optimist.
In the streets of Chongqing we saw a real mix of Chinese people, all ages, types, and socio economic backgrounds but we didn't see many Westerners. Everywhere we went, people stared at us with serious faces. If we smiled or said hello in Chinese we might get a nod, but not the usual smile or reply in turn. At the airport it was lovely to run into people who smiled at us and seemed delighted to try out their English on us. I guess they are more used to dealing with people of different nationalities.
Yiwu was a total contrast. Because this is a commercial marketplace, there are people from around the world here buying commodities to sell in their own countries. As a result, we didn't feel like outsiders. Everywhere we went people were saying hello, in Chinese or English.
Of course, the taxi driver tried to rip us off by offering to take us for three times the actual fare. It's such an irritation, as it happens over and over again. We ended up paying the price that was on the meter, which felt like a major victory. The hotel was lovely. We had a room on the top floor, which gave us a great view. It came complete with computer and fax machine. Obviously a lot of business is done at the hotel. It's located at the market so is an ideal location for buyers.
We dropped our bags and headed off into the market. I'll add a map into the blog to show you the size of the place. We went in through the entry at Hall 2. It was enormous, a huge cavernous space. You could see that there had been shops around the edges, but they were stripped out. Without being able to ask, there's no way to know if the businesses have relocated to the newly built sections of the market or if they have closed due to the economy. Once we went into the market place proper, there were stalls everywhere. My first introduction to the markets was the "tools" section. Graham's testerone levels immediately rose as he made contact with his inner toolman. I immediately checked the floor plan for more interesting products!
Navigating the hall looked easy. There were six, no seven streets I told Graham. He laughed at me! I pointed to the signs. We were on the second floor of five with Streets 1 - 6 and one marked middle street West. He beckoned me over to the end of the hall and around the corner, on the other side, there were streets 7 - 12 and middle street East. 14 streets across this section and stalls up and down as far as I could see in each direction. The building curves, so you can't see the whole way. I then looked at the stall numbers. I was in the middle of hall 2 and the stalls already numbered over ten thousand. The highest number I saw, over in Hall 5, was over 67000.
While the stalls varied in size, they seemed to average about 2.5 to 3 m wide. They were jam packed with products of all kinds. In e tool section there were stalls that only sold tape - duct tape, packing tape, sticky tape, electrical tape. Other stalls sold scissors, others had wrenches and socket sets. In the stationery section I thought I saw a stall selling pasta then realised they were displaying 25 kg sacks of rubber bands. We saw stalls that sold supermarket shopping trolleys and generators.
I enjoyed some sections more than others. The luggage section, with handbags, pursers, backpacks and suitcases, was fun. We bought Graham a really good quality set of two suitcases for 1200 yuan ~$185 Australian. We could have bought a 3 piece set for under 400 yuan, but we decided to go for better quality for our money. We'd looked at good suitcases before we left home and knew we were getting a real bargain.
We wandered through the toy section, which was a lot of fun. Again, so much choice. The stall holders start packing up at 4 pm, and our feet were killing us, so we decided it was a good time to head back to the hotel. I was pleased that I'd covered quite a lot of ground at the market place, but I later realised that I'd only been in halls one and two. There were three more to go!
We had been given a complimentary coffee voucher on arrival at the hotel, so we relaxed in comfort in the Executive Lounge. Sitting down was simply wonderful. After all the walking on the cruise and then in Chongqing and Yiwu, it was bliss.
After a rest we headed off to the night markets. Apparently we'd picked the taxi changeover time and were going to have to wait for an hour for a taxi at the hotel. We decided to go for a short walk. Next thing, a rickshaw driver approached us with his motorized rickshaw. We struck a deal for him to take us to the night markets for 25 yuan. We climbed in and it was on. I was hanging on to Graham tightly. The driver wound his way through traffic, over pavements, into narrow gaps, down the wrong side of the road. At one stage Graham warned me to keep my fingers inside the railing I was hanging on to for dear life as it looked like we'd be scraping past trees, fences and cars. Somehow, the driver squeezed through without damaging anything. He did have to walk the rickshaw at one stage. It was like being in a Fred Flintstone car.
He dropped us at the night markets. It was too early, which we'd known, but Graham navigated his way back to the hotel where he'd first stayed in Yiwu, and we found a restaurant nearby for dinner. We chose a restaurant with ducks hanging in the window and wood stacked outside. There were feathers in the doorway and the ducks were prepared and cooked in the window. We ventured in to find that the staff seemed like a gaggle of trainees. They hovered over us as we looked at the menu, and it seemed a team effort was required to take our order. When Graham ordered beer the bottle arrived but no glass to drink it with. A young waiter carried a couple of jugs from the kitchen, swinging them blithely, leaving a trail of water behind him. It was quite amusing.
The food was delicious. One of the dishes we ordered wasn't available, but no opportunity to order a replacement was offered. I would have liked a different vegetable dish for the variety but decided it was all going to be too hard to explain. As ever, there was plenty of food so we certainly didn't suffer as a result.
We bumped into a couple of Aussies in the lift at the hotel. I knew they were Aussies as they smiled and said hello. We saw them again in the street. They'd been dropped off at that end of the district and had no idea where to find the night markets, which were about five minutes walk away. We gave them directions, thinking we'd never see them again, but we kept bumping into them. Graham helped them out with an introduction to an agent to assist them to freight some purchases home to Adelaide, and we finally discovered their names - Jenny and Ryan. We ended up having dinner with them on Tuesday night, a lovely meal in the Western restaurant at the hotel. Quite seriously, I didn't want to walk any further than the lobby after spending Tuesday on my feet. I must have walked for a good 5.5 hours.
We also bumped into some fellow Aussies in the night markets. Graham and the guy struck up a conversation while I was buying my jewellery. The wife took the opportunity to do some jewellery shopping of her own.They were a Chinese-Australian couple from Sydney. We bumped into them again the next day near hall 1. It was amazing to bump into anyone we knew, however slightly, given the size of the place and the number of people that were there.
On the Tuesday, we aimed to get from one end of the markets to the other. We found the grand entrance at Hall 4. It was new when Graham was here a year ago and Hall 5 was not yet built. We got some great photos of a model of the complex as well as views from the outside of hall 4 and the end of hall 5. A large part of Hall 5 was empty and they were still fitting out parts of level 4 and all of level 5. What's amazing is that it will probably all be fully tenanted the next time Graham visits.
We then made our way to the end of Hall 1. We did make a purchase half way through, which we dropped off in the hotel as it was too heavy to carry around with us. We managed to buy a box strapping tool. There I was, with all sorts of serious shopping opportunities, and I handed over cash for a box strapping tool.
We worked out we'd been on our feet for four and a half hours when we finally stopped for a rest. If we'd stopped earlier we would never have made it back to the end of Hall 1. After half an hour I was ready to go again, as i did want to buy a handbag or two and a few hats. I left Graham in the hotel room and headed off into the markets again. It took me half an hour of quick walking just to get to the hat section. After all that I didn't end up buying any, as the stalls that sold the types of hat I liked didn't have signs up saying that they would sell at retail. I wasn't up to trying to talk them into selling me just one. I headed back to the hotel room.
It was already after four, so I didn't expect any bags places to be open. There were quite a few still open, but again, the ones that said they had stock didn't have the handbags I was interested in. I think I was overtired too, which meant that all I really wanted to do was get off my feet. I was pleased though that I'd had the courage to venture into the market on my own without Graham as back up.
It's probably just as well that I didn't buy too much in Yiwu. I still have to pick up my new clothes from the fabric market in Shanghai and work out how to get them all home. We're going to pack a suitcase with my old clothes and send it back to Australia via post or a parcel service. Graham is going to ask Jack to help us out with that. It will also solve the problem of how to get the box strapping tool back home. It's fairly heavy, and isn't something Graham would want to be lugging around China with him for the next four weeks.
The one thing that was disappointing about our stay in Yiwu was the television. We had HBO movies in English, but they were all dreadful! :-(
Sunday, April 15, 2012
Sunday, 8th April - Chongqing
We spent Sunday in Chongqing. I had hoped to see the pandas at the zoo, but we ended up having a quiet relaxing day instead. We arrived at the hotel, thinking we would have to store our bags until check-in time, but there was a room available for us straight away. Apparently it was an upgrade to an executive room. It was a nice enough room, but it did make us wonder what the room Graham had booked would have been like.
We dropped our bags in the room and headed out to explore the surrounding area and find out where the subway was. Our plan had been to catch the subway to the zoo, but we both realised that we were too tired to enjoy a zoo excursion. We walked for a few blocks, wandered into a market that we discovered was mainly for birds, found our way past all kinds of knitted goods, then stumbled across an interesting temple. We discovered a tourist area at the junction of the two rivers and then managed to navigate our way back to the hotel with the help of Graham's iPad and some helpful shop assistants.
Interesting things we did see - lots of men with a big stick and ropes, which they used to carry heavy items. There were men offering to take our suitcases up the many steps to the road, but Graham carried them up. Our large suitcase weighed 22 kg, and the smaller one would have weighed easily half that, so it was an impressive feat.
We put our feet up for a while, then ventured out again in a different direction during the afternoon. Another rest before dinner time, another walk, a complete lack of finding any local restaurants that appealed to us, and we found ourselves deciding to eat at the hotel. That's really unlike us, but it suited us both. Steak for dinner and we were asleep in no time.
Oh, just as expected, we didn't see Easter eggs for sale anywhere. :-)
We dropped our bags in the room and headed out to explore the surrounding area and find out where the subway was. Our plan had been to catch the subway to the zoo, but we both realised that we were too tired to enjoy a zoo excursion. We walked for a few blocks, wandered into a market that we discovered was mainly for birds, found our way past all kinds of knitted goods, then stumbled across an interesting temple. We discovered a tourist area at the junction of the two rivers and then managed to navigate our way back to the hotel with the help of Graham's iPad and some helpful shop assistants.
Interesting things we did see - lots of men with a big stick and ropes, which they used to carry heavy items. There were men offering to take our suitcases up the many steps to the road, but Graham carried them up. Our large suitcase weighed 22 kg, and the smaller one would have weighed easily half that, so it was an impressive feat.
We put our feet up for a while, then ventured out again in a different direction during the afternoon. Another rest before dinner time, another walk, a complete lack of finding any local restaurants that appealed to us, and we found ourselves deciding to eat at the hotel. That's really unlike us, but it suited us both. Steak for dinner and we were asleep in no time.
Oh, just as expected, we didn't see Easter eggs for sale anywhere. :-)
The cruise itself, 5-7 April, Yangtze River
Well, I thought I was going to have lots of time to write in my travel journal. It hasn't turned out like that at all. Graham was sure that we'd be sitting on the balcony, listening to music and watching the river go by. While there have been times that we've done that, they have been less frequent that either of us imagined. I was convinced that there would be boats queued all along the river, and that it would be crowded with traffic. Again, I was wrong. The trip has defied expectation and yet, it's been absolutely wonderful. I am so glad we came and did this.
The daily schedule is published the afternoon before, so you know what you're in for. Never having been on a cruise before, I imagine this is fairly typical. Each of the days has followed a similar pattern. Breakfast, a tour, lunch, a tour, dinner, a party. There have been activities mixed in, such as demonstrations of local crafts or Mahjong lessons. Times for key river events such as passing through the locks or the gorges have been posted.
On Thursday, the first tour was the optional tour to the Tribes of the Three Gorges, in Yichang. A local tourist initiative, the buildings have all been constructed in the last decade or so, to showcase the culture of the local tribes, such as the Tujian minority. There is a walk up and down a gorge, to a couple of large waterfalls. As you walk along the walkway, the locals give performances, demonstrating hat life used to be like. There are people washing clothes, a young man courting a woman by playing the flute as she stands and twirls her umbrella, people fishing, and a mock wedding ceremony is performed at the end of the tour.
The scenery is magnificent. While the performances are great photo opportunities, the Yangtze tributary itself is simply spectacular. Graham and I both had cameras and went completely snap happy. Oh, to our complete surprise, only three westerners did the tour. We had an English speaking guide to ourselves. A large group of Chinese formed the other tour group and there were a number of groups from other tourist boats. We all wandered up and down the gorge before converging for the wedding ceremony.
It was the fourth English speaking tour for our Guide. Our fellow tour group member, Britt, is a German tour guide. it was interesting to listen to the types of questions she asked. She seemed more interested in the authenticity of everything. I was just enjoying the whole experience, while Graham was really into the scenery. Having such a small group meant that all three of us got to ask the questions we wanted.
There were a lot of steps. I'm glad we're both reasonably fit. This tour is doing Graham a valuable service, preparing him for the kilometres of walking he will have to do during the Canton Fair. It's also keeping me fit for my running. I haven't been keen on running in China because of the heavy smog, but I'm certainly staying running fit.
We arrived back in time for lunch, where we got to know the people with whom we would be sharing our meals for the next three days a little better. We are clearly the early birds of the group and we were finished breakfast before some of them even arrived. Our table companions include an old couple from WA, Stan and Maureen, and their son Brian, an English lady, Kim, and her daughter, Hannah, who is studying at Xiamen University, and an American couple, Joanna and Fred. We've also met some Kiwis, Kristin and her husband whose name I never did hear, and Aussies, Joanna and Steve, who are teaching in Suzhou. I haven't learned everyone's names. It doesn't seem to matter.
After lunch we climbed onto a bus for the Three Gorges Dam tour. This was spectacular, due to the sheer size of the dam. I enjoyed taking photos, as did Graham, and there was a book for sale at the site, with lots of facts and figures. We saw the two way, five step lock that we would be passing through that evening. It was astonishing to hear that it would take us four hours to pass through the lock. We also saw the ship lift, that is still under construction. It will take small boats through in 40 minutes once it's completed.
Back at the boat there was a freshwater pearl and embroidery demonstration. Graham passed on that. In fact, only a handful of people attended. It was really a "this is what we have for sale and this is why our prices are so high" demo, which I had expected, but I did learn some useful things, like how to recognise real pearls. I will have to test out my new found skill.
We approached the lock, which took long enough. It looked like we were going in, but the gates closed and we were in the queue for another 40 mins. We decided that we had enough photos from the sun deck on the top of the ship and headed back to the quiet comfort of our own cabin and balcony. Entering the first of the five locks was fascinating. The lock is 280 m long and the step was taking us up approx 22 m. The gates seemed to take forever to close and then the water poured in so quickly. We sailed into the second lock, then went to dinner. After dinner we went to the party for a while, then we're back in the cabin to see the boat pass though the final lock and sail out the other end.
On the Friday, the organized tour was a trip down Shennong Stream. We were divided into groups. Our local guide, Lilly, a member of the Tujian minority, met us on the cruise ship. We transferred to a smaller boat to begin our journey. The scenery was fascinating as we travelled through a series of gorges, before boarding smaller boats, called pea pod boats, which a group of five Tujian boatmen paddled upstream. The captain steered while the other four, three in front and one at the back with the captain. To our surprise, one of our boatmen was 80 years old. The oldest one is 86 and most of the boatmen were 60+. They row up to the meeting place, row us for an hour, then row back to their village. We were told that they have to row for three hours each way to get there. I read later that they share the rowing up and back and we did see that they were in groups on the trip back. For the seven hours they get paid 40 yuan plus tips. The suggested tip, shared between the crew of five, was 10 yuan per passenger and there were 14 passengers on our boat, so it seems that they make between 60 and 70 yuan for each day that they work. That's around $10.
We were treated to some Tujian songs, told about local customs, the trackers (3 of the 5 crew) pulled us along the stream with a bamboo rope while one boatman stood up front and used a bamboo pole to keep the boat from the shore and the captain steered. The trackers used to pull the boats naked up until about 20 years ago. Now that the water level is so high due to the dam, it was done just as a small demonstration for the tourists. We bought a book and DVD for additional information, which we found really interesting.
After lunch Graham and I headed off on the optional tour to the White Emperor Palace. We were the only westerners so we effectively had a private tour. Our tour guide was brand new, having arrived in the area to go to Uni to study agriculture only ten days earlier. She was so keen to do well, and was the best English speaker of all the local guides we had. This tour wasn't as interesting as the others but it did give us the opportunity to have our picture taken with the view that is captured in the 10 yuan note. We were both really pleased to do that.
We skipped the party, preferring to have an early night. We climbed a lot of steps on our second tour and we were quite tired. Apparently the climb used to be 1000 steps, but the water level has risen ith the dam and there are now only 300 steps. We climbed a few of them more than once as well, to go back for a photo at the 10 yuan view marker. It was worth the extra few steps as it was much less crowded when we went back.
On Friday we visited Fengdu, the ghost city. This tour was really good. Again, there were a lot of steps. there were 130 steps just to get from the boat to the beginning of the tour. Graham was a man on a mission, counting 459 steps to the top of the hill. There were lots of interesting things to see on the way. We took so many photos!
Back on the boat we had the afternoon to ourselves, although there were a few activities organised. I went to the gift auction, where the souvenirs that were available for sale in the boat gift shop were auctioned off at more reasonable prices. I didn't buy anything, preferring to save my mad money for the Yiwu markets or Shanghai. After that, I went off to learn to play Mahjong. That was a lot of fun. I can see why people enjoy it so much. Graham spent the afternoon relaxing. In fact, he was fast asleep when I got back from Mahjong.
The last dinner was quite enjoyable, particularly as our table had gotten to know each other a little better by then. One more night on the boat, and then an organized breakfast, pay your bill, and general exodus and our tour was done. We were both really glad we'd done it and would recommend it to others without hesitation.
The daily schedule is published the afternoon before, so you know what you're in for. Never having been on a cruise before, I imagine this is fairly typical. Each of the days has followed a similar pattern. Breakfast, a tour, lunch, a tour, dinner, a party. There have been activities mixed in, such as demonstrations of local crafts or Mahjong lessons. Times for key river events such as passing through the locks or the gorges have been posted.
On Thursday, the first tour was the optional tour to the Tribes of the Three Gorges, in Yichang. A local tourist initiative, the buildings have all been constructed in the last decade or so, to showcase the culture of the local tribes, such as the Tujian minority. There is a walk up and down a gorge, to a couple of large waterfalls. As you walk along the walkway, the locals give performances, demonstrating hat life used to be like. There are people washing clothes, a young man courting a woman by playing the flute as she stands and twirls her umbrella, people fishing, and a mock wedding ceremony is performed at the end of the tour.
The scenery is magnificent. While the performances are great photo opportunities, the Yangtze tributary itself is simply spectacular. Graham and I both had cameras and went completely snap happy. Oh, to our complete surprise, only three westerners did the tour. We had an English speaking guide to ourselves. A large group of Chinese formed the other tour group and there were a number of groups from other tourist boats. We all wandered up and down the gorge before converging for the wedding ceremony.
It was the fourth English speaking tour for our Guide. Our fellow tour group member, Britt, is a German tour guide. it was interesting to listen to the types of questions she asked. She seemed more interested in the authenticity of everything. I was just enjoying the whole experience, while Graham was really into the scenery. Having such a small group meant that all three of us got to ask the questions we wanted.
There were a lot of steps. I'm glad we're both reasonably fit. This tour is doing Graham a valuable service, preparing him for the kilometres of walking he will have to do during the Canton Fair. It's also keeping me fit for my running. I haven't been keen on running in China because of the heavy smog, but I'm certainly staying running fit.
We arrived back in time for lunch, where we got to know the people with whom we would be sharing our meals for the next three days a little better. We are clearly the early birds of the group and we were finished breakfast before some of them even arrived. Our table companions include an old couple from WA, Stan and Maureen, and their son Brian, an English lady, Kim, and her daughter, Hannah, who is studying at Xiamen University, and an American couple, Joanna and Fred. We've also met some Kiwis, Kristin and her husband whose name I never did hear, and Aussies, Joanna and Steve, who are teaching in Suzhou. I haven't learned everyone's names. It doesn't seem to matter.
After lunch we climbed onto a bus for the Three Gorges Dam tour. This was spectacular, due to the sheer size of the dam. I enjoyed taking photos, as did Graham, and there was a book for sale at the site, with lots of facts and figures. We saw the two way, five step lock that we would be passing through that evening. It was astonishing to hear that it would take us four hours to pass through the lock. We also saw the ship lift, that is still under construction. It will take small boats through in 40 minutes once it's completed.
Back at the boat there was a freshwater pearl and embroidery demonstration. Graham passed on that. In fact, only a handful of people attended. It was really a "this is what we have for sale and this is why our prices are so high" demo, which I had expected, but I did learn some useful things, like how to recognise real pearls. I will have to test out my new found skill.
We approached the lock, which took long enough. It looked like we were going in, but the gates closed and we were in the queue for another 40 mins. We decided that we had enough photos from the sun deck on the top of the ship and headed back to the quiet comfort of our own cabin and balcony. Entering the first of the five locks was fascinating. The lock is 280 m long and the step was taking us up approx 22 m. The gates seemed to take forever to close and then the water poured in so quickly. We sailed into the second lock, then went to dinner. After dinner we went to the party for a while, then we're back in the cabin to see the boat pass though the final lock and sail out the other end.
On the Friday, the organized tour was a trip down Shennong Stream. We were divided into groups. Our local guide, Lilly, a member of the Tujian minority, met us on the cruise ship. We transferred to a smaller boat to begin our journey. The scenery was fascinating as we travelled through a series of gorges, before boarding smaller boats, called pea pod boats, which a group of five Tujian boatmen paddled upstream. The captain steered while the other four, three in front and one at the back with the captain. To our surprise, one of our boatmen was 80 years old. The oldest one is 86 and most of the boatmen were 60+. They row up to the meeting place, row us for an hour, then row back to their village. We were told that they have to row for three hours each way to get there. I read later that they share the rowing up and back and we did see that they were in groups on the trip back. For the seven hours they get paid 40 yuan plus tips. The suggested tip, shared between the crew of five, was 10 yuan per passenger and there were 14 passengers on our boat, so it seems that they make between 60 and 70 yuan for each day that they work. That's around $10.
We were treated to some Tujian songs, told about local customs, the trackers (3 of the 5 crew) pulled us along the stream with a bamboo rope while one boatman stood up front and used a bamboo pole to keep the boat from the shore and the captain steered. The trackers used to pull the boats naked up until about 20 years ago. Now that the water level is so high due to the dam, it was done just as a small demonstration for the tourists. We bought a book and DVD for additional information, which we found really interesting.
After lunch Graham and I headed off on the optional tour to the White Emperor Palace. We were the only westerners so we effectively had a private tour. Our tour guide was brand new, having arrived in the area to go to Uni to study agriculture only ten days earlier. She was so keen to do well, and was the best English speaker of all the local guides we had. This tour wasn't as interesting as the others but it did give us the opportunity to have our picture taken with the view that is captured in the 10 yuan note. We were both really pleased to do that.
We skipped the party, preferring to have an early night. We climbed a lot of steps on our second tour and we were quite tired. Apparently the climb used to be 1000 steps, but the water level has risen ith the dam and there are now only 300 steps. We climbed a few of them more than once as well, to go back for a photo at the 10 yuan view marker. It was worth the extra few steps as it was much less crowded when we went back.
On Friday we visited Fengdu, the ghost city. This tour was really good. Again, there were a lot of steps. there were 130 steps just to get from the boat to the beginning of the tour. Graham was a man on a mission, counting 459 steps to the top of the hill. There were lots of interesting things to see on the way. We took so many photos!
Back on the boat we had the afternoon to ourselves, although there were a few activities organised. I went to the gift auction, where the souvenirs that were available for sale in the boat gift shop were auctioned off at more reasonable prices. I didn't buy anything, preferring to save my mad money for the Yiwu markets or Shanghai. After that, I went off to learn to play Mahjong. That was a lot of fun. I can see why people enjoy it so much. Graham spent the afternoon relaxing. In fact, he was fast asleep when I got back from Mahjong.
The last dinner was quite enjoyable, particularly as our table had gotten to know each other a little better by then. One more night on the boat, and then an organized breakfast, pay your bill, and general exodus and our tour was done. We were both really glad we'd done it and would recommend it to others without hesitation.
Tuesday and Wednesday, 3rd and 4th April, Yichang
Tuesday was a travel day. We were going by train from Hamgzhou back to Shanghai to catch a 12:45 flight to Yichang. Trudy picked us up to take us to the railway station at 7:30. While the train trip back to Shanghai wouldn't take long, I was concerned about the wait we'd had the previous day. Graham was much more relaxed about our chances of buying a ticket.
After being dropped off, we queued in a line of approx 20 people. Suddenly they all sighed and moved to other queues. The ticket window had closed. I was surprised that nobody complained but Graham tells me that it happens all the time. We found another queue, that was moving really well, until we got to 5 people from the front. Then it just stalled. And stalled. It took us quite a while to work out that the person at the front of the queue was buying multiple tickets. He was buying them one at a time. We have no idea why, but that's what was happening. There was also no indication that he was going to buy 50 tickets this way. We had effectively ended up in a queue of 70 people instead of in a queue of 20 people. Fortunately, we still managed to get a train at 9:30. I was fairly stressed that we might miss our flight when we first got there, but Graham reminded me that we could always change our flight as our Yangtze cruise didn't start until the following day.
Once we had the train ticket everything flowed like clockwork. We arrived in Shanghai in plenty of time, we didn't have to wait to check in for our flight, we found a comfortable coffee shop where we were able to wait once we were through security, we had good seats on the plane, the flight to Yichang was uneventful and we had no trouble getting to our hotel.
Graham booked the Ramada, because he recognised the chain, as he didn't have much idea of what would be a good hotel or location in Yichang. You can't go by stars, as they can be self-allocated here. Anyway, it turned out to be an excellent choice. The location was great, the hotel was one of the classier ones we've stayed in, the staff were well-trained, the room was excellent, the bed was extremely comfortable, there was a lovely deep bath, breakfast was delicious - he definitely did well with his selection.
We didn't have to get to the boat until the following afternoon, so we had time to explore. We found a street market, complete with street food. That's always fun. Graham had snacks. I tried some of his potato, had a sort of sausage on a stick and a taste of what we'd thought was an egg dish but ended up being a type of filled bread. On the way back to the hotel we ventured into some streets with really old apartments and public toilets, similar to the hutongs in Beijing but not quite as old. I would never have had the courage to go there on my own but I feel safe with Graham.
As we wandered around we were looking for t-shirts for Graham. He didn't bring any with him from home, as he planned to buy them here. That sounds easy in a country where there are so many places selling men's shirts, but not only do we have to find the right size, and the right style, the shirts have to meet the Graham test - they can't be too expensive. It doesn't matter whether or not the shirt is a bargain. If Graham wouldn't spend that much in Australia, it's too much here too. After thinking that all we were going to find in the area was expensive trendy gear or shirts with slogans that weren't quite right in English, we found three t-shirts for him that ticked all the boxes. I was pleased, as all the clothes shopping so far has been for me. Not that three t-shirts comes close to levelling the shopping playing field, but it was good to know that he had bought something for himself.
For dinner, we picked a direction and found a restaurant. We ended up having a delicious meal. It was very spicy. We think we may have been eating Sichuan style food. Obviously westerners don't eat there often as all the kitchen staff came out to look at us. Funnily enough, there was another Westerner in the restaurant. We don't know if he got the same attention on arrival or not. When we left, Graham used his iPad to tell our waitress that the meal was lovely, which also caused a lot of interest.
The next day we were boarding the ship after 5 pm. We didn't have to check out until 12 so we headed off to explore after breakfast. It was raining, so we bought umbrellas at the nearby supermarket then picked a direction. We found a market district and a children's playground on our travels, then went back to the hotel to pack and check out.
We left our bags with the concierge, who offered to arrange a taxi for us later that afternoon. I should have waited until we were ready to leave to make the booking, as the taxi time became earlier and earlier. Graham shrugged it off as we would be able to board and then wander around the passenger terminal before having dinner in a waterfront restaurant. Not knowing any better, it sounded like a reasonable assumption. We went back to the market district and ventured into the shops.
What fun! Graham found some lovely t-shirts at a great price. It's always the way ... You struggle to find something and then, when you have bought them you find more at a better price. I bought some belts and some warm leggings. I was really getting into it! It was great practice for Yiwu. We also stopped for some street food. I wasn't hungry but Graham had a chicken drum stick. He said it didn't really taste of chicken any more as it was covered with spice, but he still enjoyed it.
We then went looking for coffee. Easier said than done. We noticed that many of the shops where you would expect to find a seated area were counter service only. We decided to head back to the hotel for coffee at the 3.3 Fashion Pub. It was a comedy, getting served, and Graham's cappuccino was mainly cold froth, but the chairs were comfortable, we were out of the rain, and we didn't have that long to wait. The venue's toilet was actually outside in the foyer of the hotel. The concierge spotted us, and the next thing we knew our taxi was there, more than an hour earlier than the early time the concierge had booked it for. Tempting as it was to send the taxi away for an hour, we decided that it was as convenient to wait in the passenger terminal as it was at the 3.3 Fashion Pub.
The taxi ride was fine but there was no passenger terminal. New Century Port ended up being a pontoon along the river front, with a wooden shack that sold drinks, and a couple of benches. We were able to board the boat but we were there at 3:30, more than an hour and a half before we were supposed to arrive. Everyone on board was excruciatingly polite, but there was nowhere to put us. We ended up having to wait until 5:30 to check in. Fortunately, there was a sofa where we could sit for the two hours, and a bathroom. Dinner that night wasn't included. We figured that we would drop our bags, get a taxi back into town, have dinner and then return before 10 pm, when check in time ended. Apart from the waiting, it wasn't going to be a problem.
At 5:30 we were shown to our cabin. We were told to leave the bags. We didn't know why, until they took us to see the presidential suite. We were being offered an upgrade for 2000 yuan (~$320 for four nights). The suite was magnificent, maybe 5 times as big as our room with a large forward facing balcony, but our room was pretty good, so we turned it down. The price dropped straight to 800 yuan. Tempting as it was, we still didn't take the room. I found out later that the people who did take the two suites paid 1200 yuan for them.
We overheard someone else asking about dinner and discovered that we could have dinner on board for 100 yuan each. The taxi into town was going to cost us 100 yuan each way, so we figured dining on board was a good option. We ended up having a very pleasant Chinese meal. Fairly westernized, but you would expect that on a cruise boat. We also booked the two optional guided tours for 960 yuan, bought President Cruise windbreakers for 150 yuan each, took the laundry package for 128 yuan and bought the restaurant drinks package for 200 yuan each. We'd spent 2000 yuan and we hadn't even set sail! There were plenty of other opportunities to spend money - I guess the cruise company has a narrow window of opportunity to market to you and they were taking every advantage of it.
The windbreakers have been a great investment. We have been able to spend more time out on the balcony because of them, they are light and easy to carry, and they made a huge difference on a couple of our tours. The laundry package meant that we got all our laundry done for the entire cruise, including the dirty laundry we'd brought with us, for a terrific price. The restaurant drinks package has worked out to be good value for both of us. One of the optional tours turned out to be the best tour of the whole trip and the other one was quite pleasant. All in all, we are pleased with our purchases.
After being dropped off, we queued in a line of approx 20 people. Suddenly they all sighed and moved to other queues. The ticket window had closed. I was surprised that nobody complained but Graham tells me that it happens all the time. We found another queue, that was moving really well, until we got to 5 people from the front. Then it just stalled. And stalled. It took us quite a while to work out that the person at the front of the queue was buying multiple tickets. He was buying them one at a time. We have no idea why, but that's what was happening. There was also no indication that he was going to buy 50 tickets this way. We had effectively ended up in a queue of 70 people instead of in a queue of 20 people. Fortunately, we still managed to get a train at 9:30. I was fairly stressed that we might miss our flight when we first got there, but Graham reminded me that we could always change our flight as our Yangtze cruise didn't start until the following day.
Once we had the train ticket everything flowed like clockwork. We arrived in Shanghai in plenty of time, we didn't have to wait to check in for our flight, we found a comfortable coffee shop where we were able to wait once we were through security, we had good seats on the plane, the flight to Yichang was uneventful and we had no trouble getting to our hotel.
Graham booked the Ramada, because he recognised the chain, as he didn't have much idea of what would be a good hotel or location in Yichang. You can't go by stars, as they can be self-allocated here. Anyway, it turned out to be an excellent choice. The location was great, the hotel was one of the classier ones we've stayed in, the staff were well-trained, the room was excellent, the bed was extremely comfortable, there was a lovely deep bath, breakfast was delicious - he definitely did well with his selection.
We didn't have to get to the boat until the following afternoon, so we had time to explore. We found a street market, complete with street food. That's always fun. Graham had snacks. I tried some of his potato, had a sort of sausage on a stick and a taste of what we'd thought was an egg dish but ended up being a type of filled bread. On the way back to the hotel we ventured into some streets with really old apartments and public toilets, similar to the hutongs in Beijing but not quite as old. I would never have had the courage to go there on my own but I feel safe with Graham.
As we wandered around we were looking for t-shirts for Graham. He didn't bring any with him from home, as he planned to buy them here. That sounds easy in a country where there are so many places selling men's shirts, but not only do we have to find the right size, and the right style, the shirts have to meet the Graham test - they can't be too expensive. It doesn't matter whether or not the shirt is a bargain. If Graham wouldn't spend that much in Australia, it's too much here too. After thinking that all we were going to find in the area was expensive trendy gear or shirts with slogans that weren't quite right in English, we found three t-shirts for him that ticked all the boxes. I was pleased, as all the clothes shopping so far has been for me. Not that three t-shirts comes close to levelling the shopping playing field, but it was good to know that he had bought something for himself.
For dinner, we picked a direction and found a restaurant. We ended up having a delicious meal. It was very spicy. We think we may have been eating Sichuan style food. Obviously westerners don't eat there often as all the kitchen staff came out to look at us. Funnily enough, there was another Westerner in the restaurant. We don't know if he got the same attention on arrival or not. When we left, Graham used his iPad to tell our waitress that the meal was lovely, which also caused a lot of interest.
The next day we were boarding the ship after 5 pm. We didn't have to check out until 12 so we headed off to explore after breakfast. It was raining, so we bought umbrellas at the nearby supermarket then picked a direction. We found a market district and a children's playground on our travels, then went back to the hotel to pack and check out.
We left our bags with the concierge, who offered to arrange a taxi for us later that afternoon. I should have waited until we were ready to leave to make the booking, as the taxi time became earlier and earlier. Graham shrugged it off as we would be able to board and then wander around the passenger terminal before having dinner in a waterfront restaurant. Not knowing any better, it sounded like a reasonable assumption. We went back to the market district and ventured into the shops.
What fun! Graham found some lovely t-shirts at a great price. It's always the way ... You struggle to find something and then, when you have bought them you find more at a better price. I bought some belts and some warm leggings. I was really getting into it! It was great practice for Yiwu. We also stopped for some street food. I wasn't hungry but Graham had a chicken drum stick. He said it didn't really taste of chicken any more as it was covered with spice, but he still enjoyed it.
We then went looking for coffee. Easier said than done. We noticed that many of the shops where you would expect to find a seated area were counter service only. We decided to head back to the hotel for coffee at the 3.3 Fashion Pub. It was a comedy, getting served, and Graham's cappuccino was mainly cold froth, but the chairs were comfortable, we were out of the rain, and we didn't have that long to wait. The venue's toilet was actually outside in the foyer of the hotel. The concierge spotted us, and the next thing we knew our taxi was there, more than an hour earlier than the early time the concierge had booked it for. Tempting as it was to send the taxi away for an hour, we decided that it was as convenient to wait in the passenger terminal as it was at the 3.3 Fashion Pub.
The taxi ride was fine but there was no passenger terminal. New Century Port ended up being a pontoon along the river front, with a wooden shack that sold drinks, and a couple of benches. We were able to board the boat but we were there at 3:30, more than an hour and a half before we were supposed to arrive. Everyone on board was excruciatingly polite, but there was nowhere to put us. We ended up having to wait until 5:30 to check in. Fortunately, there was a sofa where we could sit for the two hours, and a bathroom. Dinner that night wasn't included. We figured that we would drop our bags, get a taxi back into town, have dinner and then return before 10 pm, when check in time ended. Apart from the waiting, it wasn't going to be a problem.
At 5:30 we were shown to our cabin. We were told to leave the bags. We didn't know why, until they took us to see the presidential suite. We were being offered an upgrade for 2000 yuan (~$320 for four nights). The suite was magnificent, maybe 5 times as big as our room with a large forward facing balcony, but our room was pretty good, so we turned it down. The price dropped straight to 800 yuan. Tempting as it was, we still didn't take the room. I found out later that the people who did take the two suites paid 1200 yuan for them.
We overheard someone else asking about dinner and discovered that we could have dinner on board for 100 yuan each. The taxi into town was going to cost us 100 yuan each way, so we figured dining on board was a good option. We ended up having a very pleasant Chinese meal. Fairly westernized, but you would expect that on a cruise boat. We also booked the two optional guided tours for 960 yuan, bought President Cruise windbreakers for 150 yuan each, took the laundry package for 128 yuan and bought the restaurant drinks package for 200 yuan each. We'd spent 2000 yuan and we hadn't even set sail! There were plenty of other opportunities to spend money - I guess the cruise company has a narrow window of opportunity to market to you and they were taking every advantage of it.
The windbreakers have been a great investment. We have been able to spend more time out on the balcony because of them, they are light and easy to carry, and they made a huge difference on a couple of our tours. The laundry package meant that we got all our laundry done for the entire cruise, including the dirty laundry we'd brought with us, for a terrific price. The restaurant drinks package has worked out to be good value for both of us. One of the optional tours turned out to be the best tour of the whole trip and the other one was quite pleasant. All in all, we are pleased with our purchases.
Monday, 2nd April - Hangzhou
Today was all about seeing Trudy. Trudy is the first Chinese business person that I really got to know. Not the first I met, but she took us to dinner on our first night in Hangzhou a few years ago, before a factory visit the next day, and I spent time with her in Guangzhou this time last year at the Canton Fair. Graham catches up with her on most of his visits to China. She is extremely professional in business, supplying a number of the items in Graham's furniture range.
We started the day by heading off to catch the train to Hangzhou. We caught the metro to Hongquiao railway station. It was much more crowded today and the queues to buy a ticket were extremely long. With hindsight, we should have done this earlier, as we bought the ticket around 9:00 had to wait until 13:15 for the train. This is unusual in Graham's experience. What we hadn't counted on when we made our plans was that today was the first day of the Qingming festival, a three day holiday in China, and that Hangzhou is a popular tourist destination. The Qingming festival honours the dead, with people tending the graves of their ancestors and burning paper tributes to them. Apparently 120 million people visit their ancestors' graves at this time, according to an article I read in China Daily.
Anyway, it was chaotic. We bought our tickets and settled in to wait. There's always an upside, as it meant that we were able to check out our return journey the next day. As we wandered around the railway station, we discovered that we could walk across to the airport terminal for our flight to Yichang instead of returning there via metro. Better yet, we discovered that our check in counter was the closest one to the railway station. That might seem trivial, but these airports are enormous!
I love people watching, and this was a veritable feast of opportunity for some serious observation.There were people of all ages and socio-economic circumstances travelling. We saw people with bundles tied in string, workers with their tools in buckets, young families, elderly people, fairly much everyone except for Westerners. There were a couple there, but they always seemed to be in the distance.
There was a lot of confusion about. It was clear that some people rarely travelled and didn't understand where they should be or what they should do. There were others who were clearly meeting people at the station, who were frantically looking for them at the gate. The gates opened 15 mins before the train departed, but people started queueing 30 mins before that. If two trains were departing from the same gate within half an hour of each other, the two queues became blended, causing absolute confusion at boarding time, with people trying to go through with invalid tickets, then panicking that they were going to miss their train. Somehow it all got sorted.
One advantage of being early was that we up knew exactly what to do when it came to our turn. We boarded as smooth as silk. The train was really comfortable. The trips have been great as I've been able to write up my blog entries.
At the other end I followed Graham's lead. I remember our first trip, when neither of us knew what we were doing. This was so much less stressful, as Graham has travelled by train in China so many times now he's become an old hand at it. Even my last train trip, from Guangzhou to Hong Kong, wasn't this easy. We made our way along with the crowd, out of the station, and walked into apparent bedlam. Graham told me that Trudy was waiting nearby, led me straight to her, and I was safely ensconced in the car in no time.
Every time I see Trudy I am struck by how tiny she is. I feel like a giant beside her. Her 11 year old daughter, Christina, is as tall as she is. Trudy is like a pocket dynamo, full of energy. I met Christina for the first time as well as Trudy's five month old son. He doesn't have an English name yet. His Chinese name means happy and improving each day.
We dropped our bags at the hotel and then headed off to the Silk Market. There were so many beautiful things there. It was like I had given my eyes a gift, by showing the, so much beauty. I didn't realise that there would be ready made clothes there. I had expected dressing gowns, scarves and shawls, but just hadn't thought about tops, skirts, dresses and underwear. I will be better prepared next time. I just wasn't in the right frame of mind for trying on clothes with an entourage of people who were just there because I wanted to see the silk market.
I did buy two shawls for one of my sisters, a warm one and a lighter one. One thing that was really helpful when doing that was that Trudy told me that I should end up paying about 70% of the asking price. When I found the shawls, I added the ticket prices together, 178 yuan, but the shop keeper started at 140 yuan. I offered 60 yuan, thinking 2/3 of 180 was 120 so we might end up there. They stopped talking to me and started talking to Trudy. She was frowning and I thought I'd completely blown it. I was all ready to walk away and start again in another shop, but the offer came back at 100 yuan. Woohoo! I had done even better than I had hoped, even though I had help.
When we negotiated at the fabric market, we did a really bad job of it. I find it hard to start the bargaining and Graham starts too high, so it's almost not worth the effort. We will have to learn from this experience. I am going to practise at the Yiwu night markets. If I end up with nothing, that will be fine.
I did see some scarves I would have loved for myself, and waited patiently to be served, after I'd worked out which ones I wanted. Finally I managed to get starting prices for two of the four scarves I wanted (250 and 160) then the lady went back to her conversation. I waited a while longer for my other prices but was ignored. I figure bad service is bad service in any culture, so I put the scarves away, told Trudy that I would have bought all four if I'd been served and went outside to where Graham was waiting. Trudy came back to me after talking to the ladies in the shop with a price of four scarves for 400 yuan. I don't know how good a price it was, but I was over the buying impulse by then and decided I would do without.
We headed off towards another place Graham had told me about - a pedestrian street which was near a restaurant street and night markets. We decided to have dinner first. I was given the job of choosing a restaurant, so I picked one at random. It ended up being a great choice. We got there before the rush and then observed the place completely fill up, en turn tables over quickly. I don't know if it was popular or simply because of the holiday, but the food was delicious, the service was good and the prices were reasonable.
Oh, I discovered what the black stuff that I thought might be cabbage is. I asked Trudy as it was in one of the dishes we ordered. It's dried greens. So, now I know.
I really enjoyed dinner. It was a great opportunity to catch up with Trudy and to see her with her children. She told me that we were friends and so she'd brought the baby with her. If we were just business acquaintances the baby would have been left at home. I thought that was a lovely compliment to us. I loved seeing him. When I last saw Trudy she confided in me that she was pregnant. She always wanted a second child but it is only recently that she has been allowed to have one. It's great to see her with him.
After dinner we ventured into the pedestrian street around the corner. It was a combination of stalls on the street and shops along the sides. All sorts of bits and pieces. More silk, as Hangzhou is famous for its silk. Tea everywhere. The tea festival is on at the moment, with the early Spring tea now available. lots of souvenirs, feng shui, antiques, musical instruments. All sorts of snack food. There were small bakeries making traditional dishes. At several places there were two men swinging large wooden mallets, with people standing around looking. I wasn't tall enough to see past the crowd but Trudy told me it was a traditional dish that consisted of something sweet with crushed biscuits. They were flattening it into layers. Basically it looked like it was having the cr*p beaten out of it.
I went into a building that had been operating as a shop since 1649. It was selling a herb that is famous in China as a general tonic. It's supposed to fix back problems, upset tummies, etc. lots of people were drinking some sort of tea coloured water and buying the herb. I decided discretion was the better part of valour and didn't try it.
We bought some CDs with traditional Chinese music - Chinese bamboo flute and a stringed instrument that you often see buskers playing. This music will fit right in with Graham's pan pipes collection. We're planning to listen to it as we cruise along the Yangtze.
The night markets were more like a general market than a tourist market. We wandered around them and then it was time to go home. Trudy took us back to our hotel, where we found another street market! I had thought I was too tired to walk another step, but I revived. We dropped our purchases off in our hotel room and headed back into the fray.
This market had a lot of clothes, belts, shoes, hair accessories, etc. it was extremely crowded. I was pushed and shoved but I survived. I think it was good for me, as I'm not used to having people so close to me. I managed better at the train station the next day, just for having had that experience.
Finally we made it back to our hotel room. We sat up for a little while, chatting and listening to our new traditional cd before going to bed. The bed in this hotel really was like a board, but I was so tired that I slept quite well. In fact, I was so tired that I didn't brush my teeth, a really unusual occurrence for me. I think I was asleep before my head hit the pillow!
All in all it was a very full day.
We started the day by heading off to catch the train to Hangzhou. We caught the metro to Hongquiao railway station. It was much more crowded today and the queues to buy a ticket were extremely long. With hindsight, we should have done this earlier, as we bought the ticket around 9:00 had to wait until 13:15 for the train. This is unusual in Graham's experience. What we hadn't counted on when we made our plans was that today was the first day of the Qingming festival, a three day holiday in China, and that Hangzhou is a popular tourist destination. The Qingming festival honours the dead, with people tending the graves of their ancestors and burning paper tributes to them. Apparently 120 million people visit their ancestors' graves at this time, according to an article I read in China Daily.
Anyway, it was chaotic. We bought our tickets and settled in to wait. There's always an upside, as it meant that we were able to check out our return journey the next day. As we wandered around the railway station, we discovered that we could walk across to the airport terminal for our flight to Yichang instead of returning there via metro. Better yet, we discovered that our check in counter was the closest one to the railway station. That might seem trivial, but these airports are enormous!
I love people watching, and this was a veritable feast of opportunity for some serious observation.There were people of all ages and socio-economic circumstances travelling. We saw people with bundles tied in string, workers with their tools in buckets, young families, elderly people, fairly much everyone except for Westerners. There were a couple there, but they always seemed to be in the distance.
There was a lot of confusion about. It was clear that some people rarely travelled and didn't understand where they should be or what they should do. There were others who were clearly meeting people at the station, who were frantically looking for them at the gate. The gates opened 15 mins before the train departed, but people started queueing 30 mins before that. If two trains were departing from the same gate within half an hour of each other, the two queues became blended, causing absolute confusion at boarding time, with people trying to go through with invalid tickets, then panicking that they were going to miss their train. Somehow it all got sorted.
One advantage of being early was that we up knew exactly what to do when it came to our turn. We boarded as smooth as silk. The train was really comfortable. The trips have been great as I've been able to write up my blog entries.
At the other end I followed Graham's lead. I remember our first trip, when neither of us knew what we were doing. This was so much less stressful, as Graham has travelled by train in China so many times now he's become an old hand at it. Even my last train trip, from Guangzhou to Hong Kong, wasn't this easy. We made our way along with the crowd, out of the station, and walked into apparent bedlam. Graham told me that Trudy was waiting nearby, led me straight to her, and I was safely ensconced in the car in no time.
Every time I see Trudy I am struck by how tiny she is. I feel like a giant beside her. Her 11 year old daughter, Christina, is as tall as she is. Trudy is like a pocket dynamo, full of energy. I met Christina for the first time as well as Trudy's five month old son. He doesn't have an English name yet. His Chinese name means happy and improving each day.
We dropped our bags at the hotel and then headed off to the Silk Market. There were so many beautiful things there. It was like I had given my eyes a gift, by showing the, so much beauty. I didn't realise that there would be ready made clothes there. I had expected dressing gowns, scarves and shawls, but just hadn't thought about tops, skirts, dresses and underwear. I will be better prepared next time. I just wasn't in the right frame of mind for trying on clothes with an entourage of people who were just there because I wanted to see the silk market.
I did buy two shawls for one of my sisters, a warm one and a lighter one. One thing that was really helpful when doing that was that Trudy told me that I should end up paying about 70% of the asking price. When I found the shawls, I added the ticket prices together, 178 yuan, but the shop keeper started at 140 yuan. I offered 60 yuan, thinking 2/3 of 180 was 120 so we might end up there. They stopped talking to me and started talking to Trudy. She was frowning and I thought I'd completely blown it. I was all ready to walk away and start again in another shop, but the offer came back at 100 yuan. Woohoo! I had done even better than I had hoped, even though I had help.
When we negotiated at the fabric market, we did a really bad job of it. I find it hard to start the bargaining and Graham starts too high, so it's almost not worth the effort. We will have to learn from this experience. I am going to practise at the Yiwu night markets. If I end up with nothing, that will be fine.
I did see some scarves I would have loved for myself, and waited patiently to be served, after I'd worked out which ones I wanted. Finally I managed to get starting prices for two of the four scarves I wanted (250 and 160) then the lady went back to her conversation. I waited a while longer for my other prices but was ignored. I figure bad service is bad service in any culture, so I put the scarves away, told Trudy that I would have bought all four if I'd been served and went outside to where Graham was waiting. Trudy came back to me after talking to the ladies in the shop with a price of four scarves for 400 yuan. I don't know how good a price it was, but I was over the buying impulse by then and decided I would do without.
We headed off towards another place Graham had told me about - a pedestrian street which was near a restaurant street and night markets. We decided to have dinner first. I was given the job of choosing a restaurant, so I picked one at random. It ended up being a great choice. We got there before the rush and then observed the place completely fill up, en turn tables over quickly. I don't know if it was popular or simply because of the holiday, but the food was delicious, the service was good and the prices were reasonable.
Oh, I discovered what the black stuff that I thought might be cabbage is. I asked Trudy as it was in one of the dishes we ordered. It's dried greens. So, now I know.
I really enjoyed dinner. It was a great opportunity to catch up with Trudy and to see her with her children. She told me that we were friends and so she'd brought the baby with her. If we were just business acquaintances the baby would have been left at home. I thought that was a lovely compliment to us. I loved seeing him. When I last saw Trudy she confided in me that she was pregnant. She always wanted a second child but it is only recently that she has been allowed to have one. It's great to see her with him.
After dinner we ventured into the pedestrian street around the corner. It was a combination of stalls on the street and shops along the sides. All sorts of bits and pieces. More silk, as Hangzhou is famous for its silk. Tea everywhere. The tea festival is on at the moment, with the early Spring tea now available. lots of souvenirs, feng shui, antiques, musical instruments. All sorts of snack food. There were small bakeries making traditional dishes. At several places there were two men swinging large wooden mallets, with people standing around looking. I wasn't tall enough to see past the crowd but Trudy told me it was a traditional dish that consisted of something sweet with crushed biscuits. They were flattening it into layers. Basically it looked like it was having the cr*p beaten out of it.
I went into a building that had been operating as a shop since 1649. It was selling a herb that is famous in China as a general tonic. It's supposed to fix back problems, upset tummies, etc. lots of people were drinking some sort of tea coloured water and buying the herb. I decided discretion was the better part of valour and didn't try it.
We bought some CDs with traditional Chinese music - Chinese bamboo flute and a stringed instrument that you often see buskers playing. This music will fit right in with Graham's pan pipes collection. We're planning to listen to it as we cruise along the Yangtze.
The night markets were more like a general market than a tourist market. We wandered around them and then it was time to go home. Trudy took us back to our hotel, where we found another street market! I had thought I was too tired to walk another step, but I revived. We dropped our purchases off in our hotel room and headed back into the fray.
This market had a lot of clothes, belts, shoes, hair accessories, etc. it was extremely crowded. I was pushed and shoved but I survived. I think it was good for me, as I'm not used to having people so close to me. I managed better at the train station the next day, just for having had that experience.
Finally we made it back to our hotel room. We sat up for a little while, chatting and listening to our new traditional cd before going to bed. The bed in this hotel really was like a board, but I was so tired that I slept quite well. In fact, I was so tired that I didn't brush my teeth, a really unusual occurrence for me. I think I was asleep before my head hit the pillow!
All in all it was a very full day.
Sunday, 1st April - Shanghai
Last night we headed down the street for dinner. To our left was a long line of western restaurants, Italian, British, Irish, American, even a place called the funky chicken. No way were we having western food for our first dinner in China! We headed to the right, and came across a Chinese restaurant. They were making dumplings in the window. We headed in - no English menu, no English speakers, no pictures of the food ... Just the sort of adventure we were looking for. On my first visit to China a few years ago I would given it a miss, but I am a lot braver now. Besides, Graham has a translation app on his iPad and he'd just loaded it up with phrases for various dumplings back at the hotel.
Asking for pork dumplings caused consternation, but the word dumplings by itself resulted in heads being nodded and smiles all around. We asked for dumplings for two. It cost a grand total of 14 yuan for the two of us, which is a little over $2. Our dumplings arrived in a steamer and they were delicious. It was really only enough food for an appetizer. Instead of trying to work our way through the menu, we decided to go to another restaurant for our main course.
We found another small restaurant across the road. It had pictures on the wall so we thought we'd give it a go. When we got inside we realised that we didn't recognise some of the food in the pictures. Graham saw some food on a bench and had a sticky beak to check that there was something we would eat, while I figured out that there was enough food on the plate that I did recognise to be willing to give it a go. We chose our dishes. I tried for pork again, but it wasn't available. We ordered, expecting to get tofu, rice, green vegetables, something black that looked like vegetables, chicken and a round white thing that looked like it could be gluggy porridge. Each meal cost 11 yuan, less than $2.
Our meals were dished up quickly onto a divided plate. We got an enormous mound of rice, that took up the large section of the plate. Cabbage filled another section and the black stuff was some sort of pickled cabbage. The tofu was on top of the white gluggy thing. To Graham's delight it was a fried egg. As I don't eat them, he had mine too. Our chicken was basically a small Maryland. Before it was served to us, one of the staff took a cleaver to it, cutting it into chopstick size pieces.
The cabbage was delicious, the pickled cabbage was tasty and the tofu was quite edible. I managed to resist eating too much rice. It was so tempting but I really must change the way that I eat. I managed the chicken quite well with my chopsticks.
As I'm describing it, I realise that I should have taken a photo of dinner. I'll try to think of it next time. We did go back and take photos of the restaurants from outside this morning.
Instead of going to the hotel buffet this morning we went back to the dumplings restaurant for breakfast. Then we headed off for a walk around the area. While I enjoyed the dumplings, it may have been better to go for the walk first as there was so much interesting street food. There were things that looked like they might be donuts, cooked on lots of oil. I would have loved to taste one to see if it was sweet or savoury. People were cooking up thin pancakes with some vegetable ingredients. There were buns and dumplings as well all within a block from where we'd eaten.
A few blocks later, I was really sorry we had eaten breakfast when we stumbled across a local market that had a myriad of food stalls. So many things that it would have been fun to taste. We will go back there when we get back to Shanghai. I think we would have been tempted to try some but we were both conscious that we were having a buffet lunch and didn't want to spoil it.
We made our way back towards the hotel. We could have kept walking but I suggested a break for a coffee before we headed off to the Oriental Pearl TV Tower. I've learned that it is a good idea to (a) pace yourself when sight seeing and (b) take the opportunity when it arises to go to a nice clean western toilet when you can. Not that I've had time to have any bad experiences on this trip, but I'm expecting at least one.
We caught the metro to the TV tower. It was much more crowded this time, but we didn't have any luggage and managed really well. I think it helps that Graham is so tall and strong. I know it gives me confidence in a crowded situation.
The TV Tower was amazing. I am so glad we went. Just seeing it from ground level was awe inspiring. There was a great walkway over a roundabout to get across to it, which gave the opportunity for photos on the way. We were both looking forward to taking photos. The TV Tower is such a feature of the Shanghai skyline and is in so many of our photos from Shanghai, that we were keen to see what the rest of Shanghai looked like from the vantage point of the tower.
We got to the observation deck and I was enthralled. I love visiting the Telstra Tower in Canberra, so I knew I would enjoy this. The viewing platform is on the middle ball, at about 260m from the ground. Every direction we looked there were skyscrapers, river views, and buildings. I snapped away happily as did Graham, until we got back to our starting point and then we looked for the restaurant. We ended up getting lost and found ourselves on another sightseeing level. This one had the glass bottomed floor and floor to ceiling windows.
It was so exciting. I managed to summon up the courage to walk onto the glass and ended up getting some magnificent photos. I had tried to capture the roundabout walkway from the previous viewing platform but I was able to take a photo from directly over it. It was so cool. I could feel the expression of delight on my face as I beamed at Graham after taking the photo. It got a bit windy up there, and I've been feeling the cold, so we went in and looked for the restaurant again. We finally worked out how to get ourselves there.
The restaurant was just lovely, attractively furnished, attentively staffed, and with amazing views. There were people everywhere enjoying the buffet. We were seated, ordered drinks, collected our meals and settled back to enjoy the experience. The food was delicious. We managed to resist the temptation to eat until we burst. I think knowing that we would be back in a little over a week for dinner made that a bit easier.
I am not sure what part of lunch I enjoyed the most. I had a taste of some wonderful Thai curries, and enjoyed a mixture of European cuisines with tastes of beef, fish, chicken and pork dishes. There were options where they would cook the food you'd chosen, so perhaps I will try those when we go back for dinner. I didn't check out the dessert table either, so that's on the menu too.
After lunch we queued for the lift again. The journey takes just 40 seconds. Back on ground level we looked up and saw the sightseeing platform and the restaurant in the middle ball. It seemed so high!
From the tower we'd seen a boulevard along the river so we headed there to take some ground level photos. We had great fun snapping away. It was less crowded than the Bund, and the people selling photos and souvenirs weren't all over us, which made it a more pleasant experience. When we reached the end we had the option of going back to the metro or walking home. I voted for walking. It gave me the opportunity to take more photos along the way. I'm now the proud owner of a series of extremely ordinary photos of skyscrapers. :-)
We got back to the hotel and took the opportunity to rest, as we were going out with one of Graham's Chinese contacts for a drink that evening. Thank goodness for the Internet, as Jack's contact details were safely stored in Canberra. I did wonder how we would find a phone number for the right Jack Tsu in Shanghai, but we managed to track him down with some lateral thinking. Graham tried the number we found and it was the right Jack.
To my delight, he took us back to the Riverside, where we had seen a number of bars and restaurants earlier that afternoon. It was lovely to see the location at night time. I'd even commented on one establishment as wed walked along, saying that it must be beautiful lit up at night time. It was. We ended up at the Lavazza restaurant/bar. I have no idea of its Chinese name but I recognised the branding. :-) The thing that struck me as strange after being there for a couple of hours was that there was absolutely no smell of coffee there.
I love spending time with Graham's business contacts, as it is such an opportunity to learn about life in China. Because he wants to build a business relationship with Graham he was telling us about himself, so I heard when he came to Shanghai, what jobs he'd done over the years, about his wife and son, his home and his future plans. We met him in Sydney in February, and he also told us what he'd enjoyed about that trip. In return, he was learning about us. There was some talk of business, of course, but in a very relaxed way. Graham and he will progress those discussions at a later date.
On the way back to the hotel I realised that Jack was driving us through the roundabout I'd photographed from the tower. I wish I'd had my camera ready. Oh well, another time. It was great to see I from a different perspective.
Asking for pork dumplings caused consternation, but the word dumplings by itself resulted in heads being nodded and smiles all around. We asked for dumplings for two. It cost a grand total of 14 yuan for the two of us, which is a little over $2. Our dumplings arrived in a steamer and they were delicious. It was really only enough food for an appetizer. Instead of trying to work our way through the menu, we decided to go to another restaurant for our main course.
We found another small restaurant across the road. It had pictures on the wall so we thought we'd give it a go. When we got inside we realised that we didn't recognise some of the food in the pictures. Graham saw some food on a bench and had a sticky beak to check that there was something we would eat, while I figured out that there was enough food on the plate that I did recognise to be willing to give it a go. We chose our dishes. I tried for pork again, but it wasn't available. We ordered, expecting to get tofu, rice, green vegetables, something black that looked like vegetables, chicken and a round white thing that looked like it could be gluggy porridge. Each meal cost 11 yuan, less than $2.
Our meals were dished up quickly onto a divided plate. We got an enormous mound of rice, that took up the large section of the plate. Cabbage filled another section and the black stuff was some sort of pickled cabbage. The tofu was on top of the white gluggy thing. To Graham's delight it was a fried egg. As I don't eat them, he had mine too. Our chicken was basically a small Maryland. Before it was served to us, one of the staff took a cleaver to it, cutting it into chopstick size pieces.
The cabbage was delicious, the pickled cabbage was tasty and the tofu was quite edible. I managed to resist eating too much rice. It was so tempting but I really must change the way that I eat. I managed the chicken quite well with my chopsticks.
As I'm describing it, I realise that I should have taken a photo of dinner. I'll try to think of it next time. We did go back and take photos of the restaurants from outside this morning.
Instead of going to the hotel buffet this morning we went back to the dumplings restaurant for breakfast. Then we headed off for a walk around the area. While I enjoyed the dumplings, it may have been better to go for the walk first as there was so much interesting street food. There were things that looked like they might be donuts, cooked on lots of oil. I would have loved to taste one to see if it was sweet or savoury. People were cooking up thin pancakes with some vegetable ingredients. There were buns and dumplings as well all within a block from where we'd eaten.
A few blocks later, I was really sorry we had eaten breakfast when we stumbled across a local market that had a myriad of food stalls. So many things that it would have been fun to taste. We will go back there when we get back to Shanghai. I think we would have been tempted to try some but we were both conscious that we were having a buffet lunch and didn't want to spoil it.
We made our way back towards the hotel. We could have kept walking but I suggested a break for a coffee before we headed off to the Oriental Pearl TV Tower. I've learned that it is a good idea to (a) pace yourself when sight seeing and (b) take the opportunity when it arises to go to a nice clean western toilet when you can. Not that I've had time to have any bad experiences on this trip, but I'm expecting at least one.
We caught the metro to the TV tower. It was much more crowded this time, but we didn't have any luggage and managed really well. I think it helps that Graham is so tall and strong. I know it gives me confidence in a crowded situation.
The TV Tower was amazing. I am so glad we went. Just seeing it from ground level was awe inspiring. There was a great walkway over a roundabout to get across to it, which gave the opportunity for photos on the way. We were both looking forward to taking photos. The TV Tower is such a feature of the Shanghai skyline and is in so many of our photos from Shanghai, that we were keen to see what the rest of Shanghai looked like from the vantage point of the tower.
We got to the observation deck and I was enthralled. I love visiting the Telstra Tower in Canberra, so I knew I would enjoy this. The viewing platform is on the middle ball, at about 260m from the ground. Every direction we looked there were skyscrapers, river views, and buildings. I snapped away happily as did Graham, until we got back to our starting point and then we looked for the restaurant. We ended up getting lost and found ourselves on another sightseeing level. This one had the glass bottomed floor and floor to ceiling windows.
It was so exciting. I managed to summon up the courage to walk onto the glass and ended up getting some magnificent photos. I had tried to capture the roundabout walkway from the previous viewing platform but I was able to take a photo from directly over it. It was so cool. I could feel the expression of delight on my face as I beamed at Graham after taking the photo. It got a bit windy up there, and I've been feeling the cold, so we went in and looked for the restaurant again. We finally worked out how to get ourselves there.
The restaurant was just lovely, attractively furnished, attentively staffed, and with amazing views. There were people everywhere enjoying the buffet. We were seated, ordered drinks, collected our meals and settled back to enjoy the experience. The food was delicious. We managed to resist the temptation to eat until we burst. I think knowing that we would be back in a little over a week for dinner made that a bit easier.
I am not sure what part of lunch I enjoyed the most. I had a taste of some wonderful Thai curries, and enjoyed a mixture of European cuisines with tastes of beef, fish, chicken and pork dishes. There were options where they would cook the food you'd chosen, so perhaps I will try those when we go back for dinner. I didn't check out the dessert table either, so that's on the menu too.
After lunch we queued for the lift again. The journey takes just 40 seconds. Back on ground level we looked up and saw the sightseeing platform and the restaurant in the middle ball. It seemed so high!
From the tower we'd seen a boulevard along the river so we headed there to take some ground level photos. We had great fun snapping away. It was less crowded than the Bund, and the people selling photos and souvenirs weren't all over us, which made it a more pleasant experience. When we reached the end we had the option of going back to the metro or walking home. I voted for walking. It gave me the opportunity to take more photos along the way. I'm now the proud owner of a series of extremely ordinary photos of skyscrapers. :-)
We got back to the hotel and took the opportunity to rest, as we were going out with one of Graham's Chinese contacts for a drink that evening. Thank goodness for the Internet, as Jack's contact details were safely stored in Canberra. I did wonder how we would find a phone number for the right Jack Tsu in Shanghai, but we managed to track him down with some lateral thinking. Graham tried the number we found and it was the right Jack.
To my delight, he took us back to the Riverside, where we had seen a number of bars and restaurants earlier that afternoon. It was lovely to see the location at night time. I'd even commented on one establishment as wed walked along, saying that it must be beautiful lit up at night time. It was. We ended up at the Lavazza restaurant/bar. I have no idea of its Chinese name but I recognised the branding. :-) The thing that struck me as strange after being there for a couple of hours was that there was absolutely no smell of coffee there.
I love spending time with Graham's business contacts, as it is such an opportunity to learn about life in China. Because he wants to build a business relationship with Graham he was telling us about himself, so I heard when he came to Shanghai, what jobs he'd done over the years, about his wife and son, his home and his future plans. We met him in Sydney in February, and he also told us what he'd enjoyed about that trip. In return, he was learning about us. There was some talk of business, of course, but in a very relaxed way. Graham and he will progress those discussions at a later date.
On the way back to the hotel I realised that Jack was driving us through the roundabout I'd photographed from the tower. I wish I'd had my camera ready. Oh well, another time. It was great to see I from a different perspective.
Saturday, 31st March - Clothes shopping in Shanghai
Our first day in Shanghai. Either I've gotten tougher or we've lucked out and the bed is softer than I remember Chinese beds being, as I slept really well last night. I was awake early and enjoyed having a look at the city skyline from our hotel window. We are on the 23 rd floor, so we have a good view. We can see the river from both sides of the apartment too, so the river view claim has held up well.
Out the window we can see China's tallest building. We call it the bottle opener because of its shape and we have a great view of it from front on. We have a glimpse of the Oriental Pearl TV Tower. We are going to visit it tomorrow for a buffet lunch and then have dinner there when we get back to Shanghai at the end of my trip.
We started the day off with breakfast at the hotel. the room has one breakfast included and the second breakfast costs 50 yuan (~$8). We didn't buy the extra breakfasts when we booked because we like to wander out and try the local restaurants. If I'm feeling really brave we may even try street food.
The breakfast was quite lovely. There was the traditional option of congee. I've never tried it. I don't like porridge or sago or tapioca or rice pudding, so I can't see that congee is going to be on my breakfast list. A couple of people were standing by to cook eggs to order. The cereal option was tucked to one side. There were pastries and toast and hot and cold food. The hot food included fried rice, steamed buns, a cabbage and noodle dish, mini-sausages, bacon, cauliflower, green vegetables, corn, and baked beans. The cold food included curly black mushrooms, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, lettuce, cold meat and fruit.
Because I've been working so hard to lose weight, I concentrated on filling my plate up with vegetables. I also had some bacon and one sausage, tried a steam bun and the cabbage and noodle dish. I really enjoyed it. Graham added an egg to his breakfast and didn't take quite so many vegetables. We both enjoyed our meal but we'll venture out tomorrow when we're feeling more rested.
We were up ridiculously early. The shops in China don't open until 10 am, so we wandered off for a walk around the area. We like exploring down the smaller streets as that's where you find the local markets. We headed off in the direction of the river, as they are doing up the Pudong side. We had hoped to walk along the river but we were met by a giant construction project. I'm sure it will be lovely this time next year. Instead, we wandered around a gated apartment complex, all electric fences above attractive fencing, with glimpses of greenery and a series of giant apartment buildings looming above us. We then worked our way around to some older style apartment buildings. To our delight we found a local market. We wandered in for a look. You could tell that they weren't interested in tourists as nobody tried to sell us anything. We were checked out quite thoroughly and politely, as we walked from stall to stall, but we're used to that. A nod and a smile to the stall holder seems to keep everyone happy.
We got back to the hotel, waited a little longer as we were still too early for the shops, then made our way by metro to Nanjing Road to get our Chinese sim cards. Once we had that organized, we headed off to the fabric market via the metro from People's Square. It would be so easy to catch a taxi, but it's so much fun to travel on the subway. It's amazingly easy to do. It also makes me feel really adventurous as we don't see many westerners on the metro.
Graham had worked out how to get us to the fabric markets by studying maps of Shanghai, and remembering where the taxi had taken us on previous visits. We got there without any trouble and then the serious part of the day began.
I shopped. And shopped. And shopped. Graham waited and waited and waited. He was so good. We got to the fabric market at around 11. We stopped for air at around 3:30. I went through my list, checking off items and working out what I still wanted to buy. We worked out that we needed more cash for deposits than we'd expected. Fortunately, we found a bank near the market that changed travellers' cheques, no small feat as we've learned in the past. It takes ages to change money, which gave us both a well needed rest, then we headed back into the fray and I shopped some more.
I ended up buying my work clothes - jackets, trousers, skirts, shirts (winter and summer), some casual tops to wear on the weekend, a beautiful top to wear out to dinner, and the leather coat that I wanted. Not only that, I spent less than my budget, so I have money left over for ready made clothes if I want to buy any, as well as accessories. If you add the cost of my flight and my clothes together I am still well ahead. :-)
To give you some idea of the savings I made, I priced a leather coat before I went away at $575. It wasn't the style I wanted and would have been too long in the arms and in length for me. I bought a leather coat, right style, right length, exact colour I wanted for $225. My work jackets averaged out to be 1/3 of the price I would have paid in Canberra, and my work shirts were less than 1/4 of the ticket price in the stores. The most expensive top I bought, which I'll wear out on special occasions, was less than $40. A casual t-shirt style top from Target is $40. I don't have to have anything taken up when I get home either.
All the hard work and preparation paid off. I am glad Graham was willing to stay there for so long. We shopped for a good six hours. I was exhausted by the time we got back to the hotel. I was also thrilled with my purchases. All that remains is to try them all on when we get back to Shanghai, then pay the balance and somehow fit them into my suitcase to get them home to Oz. I can see my old clothes being bundled into a box and shipped home via a slow boat.
Out the window we can see China's tallest building. We call it the bottle opener because of its shape and we have a great view of it from front on. We have a glimpse of the Oriental Pearl TV Tower. We are going to visit it tomorrow for a buffet lunch and then have dinner there when we get back to Shanghai at the end of my trip.
We started the day off with breakfast at the hotel. the room has one breakfast included and the second breakfast costs 50 yuan (~$8). We didn't buy the extra breakfasts when we booked because we like to wander out and try the local restaurants. If I'm feeling really brave we may even try street food.
The breakfast was quite lovely. There was the traditional option of congee. I've never tried it. I don't like porridge or sago or tapioca or rice pudding, so I can't see that congee is going to be on my breakfast list. A couple of people were standing by to cook eggs to order. The cereal option was tucked to one side. There were pastries and toast and hot and cold food. The hot food included fried rice, steamed buns, a cabbage and noodle dish, mini-sausages, bacon, cauliflower, green vegetables, corn, and baked beans. The cold food included curly black mushrooms, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, lettuce, cold meat and fruit.
Because I've been working so hard to lose weight, I concentrated on filling my plate up with vegetables. I also had some bacon and one sausage, tried a steam bun and the cabbage and noodle dish. I really enjoyed it. Graham added an egg to his breakfast and didn't take quite so many vegetables. We both enjoyed our meal but we'll venture out tomorrow when we're feeling more rested.
We were up ridiculously early. The shops in China don't open until 10 am, so we wandered off for a walk around the area. We like exploring down the smaller streets as that's where you find the local markets. We headed off in the direction of the river, as they are doing up the Pudong side. We had hoped to walk along the river but we were met by a giant construction project. I'm sure it will be lovely this time next year. Instead, we wandered around a gated apartment complex, all electric fences above attractive fencing, with glimpses of greenery and a series of giant apartment buildings looming above us. We then worked our way around to some older style apartment buildings. To our delight we found a local market. We wandered in for a look. You could tell that they weren't interested in tourists as nobody tried to sell us anything. We were checked out quite thoroughly and politely, as we walked from stall to stall, but we're used to that. A nod and a smile to the stall holder seems to keep everyone happy.
We got back to the hotel, waited a little longer as we were still too early for the shops, then made our way by metro to Nanjing Road to get our Chinese sim cards. Once we had that organized, we headed off to the fabric market via the metro from People's Square. It would be so easy to catch a taxi, but it's so much fun to travel on the subway. It's amazingly easy to do. It also makes me feel really adventurous as we don't see many westerners on the metro.
Graham had worked out how to get us to the fabric markets by studying maps of Shanghai, and remembering where the taxi had taken us on previous visits. We got there without any trouble and then the serious part of the day began.
I shopped. And shopped. And shopped. Graham waited and waited and waited. He was so good. We got to the fabric market at around 11. We stopped for air at around 3:30. I went through my list, checking off items and working out what I still wanted to buy. We worked out that we needed more cash for deposits than we'd expected. Fortunately, we found a bank near the market that changed travellers' cheques, no small feat as we've learned in the past. It takes ages to change money, which gave us both a well needed rest, then we headed back into the fray and I shopped some more.
I ended up buying my work clothes - jackets, trousers, skirts, shirts (winter and summer), some casual tops to wear on the weekend, a beautiful top to wear out to dinner, and the leather coat that I wanted. Not only that, I spent less than my budget, so I have money left over for ready made clothes if I want to buy any, as well as accessories. If you add the cost of my flight and my clothes together I am still well ahead. :-)
To give you some idea of the savings I made, I priced a leather coat before I went away at $575. It wasn't the style I wanted and would have been too long in the arms and in length for me. I bought a leather coat, right style, right length, exact colour I wanted for $225. My work jackets averaged out to be 1/3 of the price I would have paid in Canberra, and my work shirts were less than 1/4 of the ticket price in the stores. The most expensive top I bought, which I'll wear out on special occasions, was less than $40. A casual t-shirt style top from Target is $40. I don't have to have anything taken up when I get home either.
All the hard work and preparation paid off. I am glad Graham was willing to stay there for so long. We shopped for a good six hours. I was exhausted by the time we got back to the hotel. I was also thrilled with my purchases. All that remains is to try them all on when we get back to Shanghai, then pay the balance and somehow fit them into my suitcase to get them home to Oz. I can see my old clothes being bundled into a box and shipped home via a slow boat.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)