Yuyuan Garden, River cruise and Pudong from up high

What a wonderful and packed day on Saturday. Alex was off work and one of his colleague volunteered to show us around and boy, he did just that! The day started at Yuyuan Garden, built over 400 years ago.
The garden took about 18 years to bring to life, which is quite a contrast to the new pace of Shanghai construction that can build a skyscraper in a matter of months (if not weeks!). Despite damages done by British and French troops, the garden has been nicely restored.

I wonder who took the nose off this lion!
The park features a lot of nice water spots
And immaculate gardening/groundkeeping
The architecture is very traditional Chinese
With amazing detail and impressive handiwork everywhere you look
Most of the rooms feature old style furniture
And there is even a stage that the original residents/owners of the garden could have used to entertain guests
These fish must really love tourists that bring packets of food to create the feeding frenzy
Overall, a very enjoyable time at the garden despite the sometimes thick crowds. It was nice to hear all kinds of languages, including French and English.
Just outside of the garden is a very busy and lively bazaar
As well as quite a selection of restaurants. The one we picked claim to be the oldest restaurant in the area. We had quite a spread for only 3 people
We let our guide select the dishes and they were definitively on the exotic side. Clockwise, whole pigeon, tofu soup, bbq pork, whole shrimps, fish soup, pork and bokchoi, pickled crunchy vegetable and baby oysters in a sweet blood colored sauce.

What better way to digest than to go on a river cruise!
It gave us an alternate view of both Pudong
And Puxi
After the cruise, we went in the Oriental TV Tower (the pink bubble building!) where we were greeted by this explosive dog:
He didn't look about to explode so I didn't run away :)

The waiting area for the lift was very high tech! I think the theme is spaceport
We got some great views of Puxi and Pudong again. I will never tire of those skyscrapers

I managed enough courage to walk on the glass floor and lie down, 350m above sea level with nothing but glass between me and certain death.
Once the tower visit over, we went for a walk by the riverside
Next stop was East Nanjing Rd, a shopping district.
We walked around a bit until the time was right for a break and a well deserved drink!
With legs starting to feel the effect of such a long day, we started on our way home. Shanghai is an incredible city both during the day and at night.

Pudong SkyScrapers

My plan today was to go to the old town and find a tailor to make me some custom suits. I took the taxi to the nearest subway station and then I saw the city and decided that a new suits was no longer my priority, I needed to see the buildings!!!
Sometimes you have to follow your heart and throw the guidebook away and that is what I did today, I'm sure I missed some spots but then again I probably wandered places that the lonely planet editors never even knew existed! I am a big fan of skyscrapers and big buildings and let me tell you that Pudong has really got me moved today. You can find just about any type of building here. Let's start with the simple geometry...

Cube:
Rectangle:
Round
There's also all styles on offer from classical
To something I think is Greek inspired
This roman inspired building is currently under construction
And apparently will look like this when finished
This one is kind of gothic
And the JinMao tower (I think this is the one at least)
There's plenty of modern buildings as well

This one made me think of a world HQ for Dr. Evil, I'm not sure why. I tried to find out who was in it but apparently it is still empty
Then there's the more daring such as the Shanghai Stock Exchange with a hole in the middle
Or the World Financial Center (I think that's the name) that comes with a handle in case a giant ever wants to move it
There's also a contest in Pudong to find out which architect can build the bets UFO looking crown for its building:



This one I called the two part ice cream cone, one tower has the cone, the other the ice cream ball :)This building (opera house or theatre I believe) actually looks like a UFO!
This one looks like an antenna from Start Trek on the roof
Another thing I noticed in Pudong is that if a building is worth building once, why not build it more than once!

And sometimes even 4 times!
And the construction continues with the whole downtown looking like a construction yard.
As if all the construction on the buildings wasn't enough, they are also working on completing the maglev link before Expo 2010.
What is really amazing about downtown Pudong is that it didn't even exist 20 years ago! Here is a picture from 1993:
And here is one from 2 years ago:
Simply amazing. I want to come back once the MagLev is working and all the other construction completed!

On my return trip (I took the subway back), I found a shopping centre at the technology museum subway station and to my surprise they specialize in custom suits! So I got all my measurments done by two different tailors and ordered a suit from each of them ($80 for a custom suit, I don't think I can go wrong!).

Once Alex was done work, we walked for a long time to try to find a new restaurant. We walked in to an industrial part of town that didn't have too many restaurants and the few that we found on the way back to the hotel were either too smoky or just didn't look right. We ended up choosing one just a few steps from the hotel. It was our first bad choice in restaurants here. The food wasn't all that bad but one of the dishes that we selected came with green peppers, what we didn't know was that these peppers were the hot chili pepper variety. OUCH! We ended up eating only the meat of that dish. The two other dishes were mutt chops (pretty good if a bit overcooked and overseasoned) and some Chinese greens (acceptable).


The one main thing I heard about the blog is that everyone likes the pictures and want more. Hopefully I didn't drown everyone today with too much details. In case you actually meant pictures of me, here's one in the Lujiazui park in downtown Pudong.
You guys are not the only one requesting pictures of me :) Some Chinese tourist approached me with a camera and asked if I could take a picture. Sure, I'll help them out I thought and asked where they wanted to pose. They directed me to pose with a member of their gang and proceeded all giggling to take a picture of the foreigner. I wonder who's facebook page I will end up. This happenned twice today, no kidding. I feel like a rock star or something.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot, any overview of the Pudong skyscrapers wouldn't be complete without having a picture of the Oriental Pearl TV Tower ;)
I don't know what I'll do tomorrow. Probably a run north of the hotel, we haven't explored that area at all yet. I have to stop going places where I can shop. Everything is so cheap I will end up buying the whole store!