Shivering in Shanghai

Now that we're in Shanghai, things have slowed down again. Perhaps that shouldn't be the case. I wouldn't be surprised to learn there are lots of monuments and parks and museums and god knows what elses we should be seeing, but we aren't. That's just the way it is. So, fewer posts.

I last wrote about our Saturday adventures. On Sunday Nancy and Amy went shopping after which I went to dinner with Ben. Monday began with more shopping as Nancy, Amy, and I headed toward the river and the old part of town. We came first to this street. You can't read the sign, but it says it's an antique market.

The first stall had these t-shirts showing Obama in a Mao outfit, which didn't seem very antique to me. Soon, however, the old stuff appeared.

Amy had other things to do, but Nancy and I kept walking east through little streets, past laundry

and grocery.

Gradually, things began getting bigger and busier

until we found ourselves at a huge shopping complex.

Here we met Chen Shen.

He asked about my camera. We chatted and asked him where the famous dumpling place was. He said he would take us there, and we ended up having lunch together.

He has a brother and a sister living in the U.S. He has to stay in China to care for their aging parents. As the oldest child, that's his job. Meeting him was great as we had been told about the dumpling place, but had no idea how to find it.

Chen ordered the lunch. This photo shows the appetizer, soup, and dessert.

Unfortunately, I forgot to take a photo of the dumplings. I got a photo of them being made.

They really are delicious. There are several kinds, pork, mushroom, etc., and they share the quality of making delicious broth while they are being steamed for the half hour it takes them to cook. So you end up with this darling little dough wrapper filled with delicious filling and broth. You take the dumpling in your chopsticks, bite a little hole in the upper edge, pour the broth into your spoon, eat the dumpling and drink the broth. YUM!!

After lunch we dove back into the crowds.

Chen told us he ran a tea shop. We told him we'd love to see it. As we walked he showed us a couple of things.

This bridge, for instance, is jagged because evil spirits can't turn corners. Good to know. Actually, I guess we knew that, having already learned the spirits in Bali are similarly challenged.

These devices made it possible for people to see pictures. You can see the illustration above them.

Here's a closeup of the illustration.

Soon we were at Chen's shop. Up the stairs we went.

Turns out his "Tea Shop" is mostly a "Pearl Shop".

But there was certainly tea. We got to see made, and taste, four different kinds.

The first kind was the most fun. This was the little ball that expands in hot water into a beautiful flower.

Here we go.

It's a bit hard to see in these little photos. If you want to see it better just come to our house, because we not only bought the tea but also, of course, the little glass pot. We also learned about, and tasted, a special Oolong tea that is naturally sweet, green tea, and black tea. It was both fun and instructive. Turns out Chen also had some fun tea cups that not only strained out the tea leaves but magically transformed themselves. These dragons became the Great Wall,

and these Chinese characters

magically became pandas.

Finally, this mass of Chinese writing

became the Buddha herself. Imagine that, a lady Buddha! Shows you how far China has come.

We actually managed to avoid buying that one. You see in the photos Chen's lovely Vanna White equivalent, saying little but demonstrating much.

There were pearls as well. These are fresh water pearl oysters.

This one paid the ultimate sacrifice that we might see how it works.

Turns out they're filled with pearls, although I gather they're not usually of high quality.

Again, it's hard to see, but there must have been 30 or 40 in there.

The pearls were lovely

but we continued to resist temptation and let Chen show us the way to the Yuyuan Garden -- a four hundred year old treasure. Every turn revealed a new vista. It was glorious, seeming to go on forever. I'll just post a few photos without comment.

Eventually, it had to end. We found ourselves back at the pond with the jagged, spirit free bridge.

We walked out under the shopping area entry arch

and back to our home in Shanghai. It was a quiet evening. Amy spent time with a friend and Nancy stayed home to watch a movie while Ben and I ate dinner at his bar.

The whole next day was quiet as well. We were, as I began this post by saying, just not very motivated to get out and see stuff. By way of compensation, last evening Ben took us and some other friends to dinner at Shintori, an ultra-modern, stunning Japanese restaurant. I only had my iPhone, alas. The space is a large, concrete lined room which used to be a theater. The chefs are high above the main dining space on what used to be the stage and there is a surrounding balcony higher still. I really couldn't photograph the place although I tried.

I did a bit better with the food which was, predictably, extraordinary.

Even that good thing eventually came to an end and it was back to the apartment for sated sleep and delicious dreams.

Now it's almost noon on Wednesday. The sun is finally shining, no doubt because we're on our way to Xian. Still a few adventures in store before we leave for Seattle from Beijing in a week.