In search of cooking goods, GP and I went to Shanghai this past weekend. An enjoyable trip, it resulted in fond memories, anger, and kitchen goods.
We left early Saturday morning and took the new fast train to Shanghai. It's not maglev, but we did the trip in 30 minutes (2 hours by car) and hit at least 247km/hr (68 meters/sec? how useful is that? Stupid google. 153mph) that I saw. And it was clean and comfortable. What a nice change.
The line to buy a subway ticket was long. Well, it wasn't a line, it was a mass of 100 people or so waiting to use a ticket machine. For $2US, I'll take the taxi.
I splurged Marriott points to stay at the
JW Marriott on Nanjing Road. This is arguably the best/most expensive hotel in Shanghai. It was quite nice and even the $23 buffet breakfast was included. And we got a suite! A bargain at $0 - thanks to my job for giving me 60 nights in Marriotts last year.
The skyline leaves something to be desired due to pollution.
You know it's in a nice part of town when it is connected to a Ferrari and Maserati dealer. I thought I would have to peel GP off the Ferrari convertable.
There were some Jaguars and a RR Bently in the parking lot, but I didn't get a picture. There were also 3 Starbucks and 2 Haagen Dazs within 3 blocks and we visited one of each.
Saturday we went to
Ikea where I found actual kitchen goodies: measuring cups, a pizza pan (no cookie sheets), a spatula, a whisk, you know, wacky foreign stuff. GP picked up a plastic, frog-shaped bib/cup/plate set for her nephew and slippers for the house. And, best of all, I bought a meat thermometer :) So happy.
Almost all of the items were the same as the Ikea in Philadelphia. Similar young, hipsters were also seen shopping. And the cafeteria had Swedish meatballs, but no mac & cheese for me :( I need to start making my own here. The Swedish market, unlike PA, also had
Akvavit, an Akvavit sampler pack and multiple flavors of Swedish vodka.
Back to the hotel and time for a nap. Then a little shopping, a snack and change of clothes - time to go to
Hong Mei! This is an area of foreign restaurants and bars and we were heading to Las Tapas for some Spanish food and then
Blue Frog for some drinks.
We found it after a long, slow taxi ride and found outdoor seating with nice heaters to keep you comfortable. The sangria was good on the US scale and delicious on the China scale, the tapas were also good and GP's hot chocolate was "hao he" (as reported by her).
Blue Frog was nice and I hope to go there again to eat. I had a "Blue Frogerita" and GP had hot tea (she's a wild one). I couldn't resist picking up souvenirs, so she and I got Blue Frog t-shirts. They were buy-2-get-1-free . . I wonder who I should give the other one to?
BTW, it's GP's Samsung mobile phone that takes better photos than my Nokia.
After eat and drink, it was time for a foot massage and then back to the hotel. Sleep, wake, breakfast, pack, then shopping. Or, an attempt at shopping. Most things are a little too small for me (XL is a little too small, cry, cry) and a little to big for GP (smalls, but few XS for her). Oh well, save more money for shopping in Thailand :)
We caught a taxi back to the train station and boarded a slower train (but still less than driving) back to Suzhou. We fought the taxi line - there was actually one fist fight over a taxi; not me - and made it home to unpack and relax.
If anyone is heading to Shanghai, check out these places:
