Shanghai, Day 2

A little jeg-lagged.  We went to sleep around 10pm or so. I woke up and checked Joe's watch (no alarm clock in the room) and it was only midnight!  I got up and updated the blog because our VPN wasn't working earlier.  Back to sleep around 1am and I woke up at 4.  Decided that I should get up and shower, get ready, and then pack up our mess.  We called Wendell and went down to breakfast at 6am.  Wendell drove us back to their apartment.  The driving experience in China is quite something!  People just go.  If you hesitate, cars and mopeds will get in front of you.  I elected Joe to sit in the front seat.  I closed my eyes many times.  Not because Wendell's driving was bad, but because I thought people might hit us on the side, or from behind!  Many times, we were nearly side-swiped! 

Our goal today was to see The Bund area and get some shopping in before we left for Hangzhou.  We accomplished both!  We went to the Pearl Market and some other exciting shopping.  We found the Rosetta Stone Mandarin (bootleg edition) for about $8. Wendell and Amy have the same copy and said we just can't install updates.  That works for us!  We also bought some DVD's that may be bootleg, for about 50cents.  The Green Hornet and Gnomeo and Juliet.  Joe got a DVD about the Pacific War and I got Malia a Kai Lan DVD.  We'll try not to get thrown into a Chinese prison! 

We had some local, street food.  Chinese beef dumplings and some other bread, which were DELICIOUS!  Our guide (Wendell) could not guarantee our gastric outcome, but we were willing to chance it! 

We got to the train station with about a half hour to spare.  We were the only Caucasian people in the entire train station.  We received a few stares.  Actually, earlier in the day, we think people were taking pictures of the four of us.  Taking the train was super easy.  Our tickets had been delivered to our hotel and it was easy to find the train and area to go.  Once the doors were opened, we took an escalator down to the only train that was waiting.  There were a few stops on the way to Hangzhou, but they spoke in English and also had an English ticker running, to let you know what the next stop would be.  Piece of Cake! 

The sky is just a bit smog-filled!  The young man that sat next to me on the plane said that we will not see any blue skies in Shanghai or Hangzhou.  Now that we've seen both cities, we know this to be true.  A beautiful country, but I can't imagine not seeing blue skies.  SO depressing!  He said that when he studied in Ohio, he took many pictures of the sky.  I told him that Michigan skies were much better than Ohio skies!  LOL! 

In the morning, we saw many older ladies outside, doing yoga or tai chi moves.  Sometimes just a few women gathered, at other places, there were 30 or more doing their moves.  We've also seen many older couples dancing tangos and other dances, right on the street.  Very cute!  One older man we saw last night, was dancing with a younger, white woman (tourist).  You should have seen his toothless grin!  He was having the time of his life! 

We made it to Hangzhou and found our guide, Emma, quite easily.  She actually had an easy time, spotting the only white people getting off the train.  We got to our hotel, but they didn't have our reservation.  She worked it out and we went up to our room.  We were supposed to have a king bed and a non-smoking room.  Not so!  2 small double beds and definitely a smoking room-complete with an ashtray!  After calling the front desk, I was told they didn't have a king room.  I called Emma and she called us back and told us she would fix it.  We were brought to a different room, with a king size bed.  It also smelled smokey and had an ashtray.  When I said something to the bell hop, he said it was "not smoking".  A few minutes later, a maid came in, removed the ashtray, and sprayed Febreeze around.  Poof-non-smoking!  Not really happy with this hotel.  It is definitely older and less modern than the Crowne Plaza we stayed at in Shanghai.  That wouldn't be so disappointing, but we're paying about the same.  It's hard to believe that this is one of the best in Hangzhou.  And to think that the travel agency wanted us to stay at a "nicer" hotel in Shanghai!  The Crowne Plaza looks like the Ritz compared to this place.  We hate to be stuck here, with our clothes smelling like smoke, but not sure that anything can be done at this point.  I really hate the thought of bringing Malia here!  Sigh........

I e-mailed Great Wall, our adoption agency, but don't expect this to be resolved tonight.  Sigh......... Our guide will be back in a few minutes and we'll see what she says.  She's sweet as can be, but not sure she has any say in all of this.  We'll see...  We can't afford to pay additional money to move, so we will likely be stuck. 

Trying to stay positive, but I hate the thought of staying here for a week!  Well, we're off to explore a bit. 

Lindsey and Joe