Day One in Shanghai

Today was the first day of our six month adventure in Shanghai. We are living in a furnished 1BR apartment on the 25th floor of one of the city's tallest buildings.

We spent most of the day today wandering around our new neighborhood, getting the lay of the land and attempting to pick up some 'essentials' (tea, soy milk, fruit).

Here are some surprising 'facts & figures' from today's tour of our new neighborhood:

number people per square meter of sidewalk: >1

number of times we almost got run over while crossing a crosswalk on a walk sign: >0

number of couples spotted wearing matching shirts: >3 in 5 minutes pausing in People's Square

number of Starbuck's: same as home

Here is the view out of our apartment looking South East. The flat roofed building in the foreground is the Shanghai Museum or Art and the round reddish one with parks surrounding it is the Shanghai Museum.

Chana has already found her 'perch' in the new apartment so she can keep the pulse of the city.

Before our first dinner we asked "Jacky" the concierge, who promises to be our consummate saviour, if he would write us a note. We explained that Chana is vegetarian and asked if he would write this down so there would be no confusion when ordering. He wrote a long sentence, handed it to me, and explained it said: "My wife is vegetarian"... Awesome.


We walked 1/2 a block from our hotel and entered the first place that looked half decent. Turns out we had walked into one of the only restaurants in Shanghai where the note was not needed. It was a famous, completely vegetarian place called "Godly". Takeaways: sesame vegetable are tasty, steer clear of chilied gluten prawns.