29 March 2012
Welcome to Shanghai the city that means rain. It is day 1 in China after a grueling 24 hours of traveling from Wisconsin, USA. I woke to find a gray and rainy day somewhere around 17 celcius.
I traveled Asiana airlines from Chicago to Seoul to Shanghai. The seat next to my window seat was vacant which was nice to stretch out a bit. After takeoff passangers were serviced with cabin slippers and a hot towel. Enduring 13.5 hours I caught some new movies including Tower Heist, In Time (terrible), and Puss N Boots. Our route took north over Canada-Arctic Ocean-Bering Sea-Siberia to land in Seoul, Korea.
Arriving in Shanghai 9:00PM I was greeted by my business manager Mr. Liu and collegue Sera. They put me in a taxi and we headed to my host persons home. Sera spoke to me in broken English and said I was very brave to come to China and not know any Chinese or friends. Mr. Liu does not know English. I had no idea the address or location we arrived but I went in to meet my host. Mrs. Ren welcomed us in and found I do not speak Chinese and she does not speak English. Quite the suprise to say the least.
My Chinese language tutor, Dora came to the home in the morning and delivered materials for an orientation. We went out in the area for a walk and metro ride. I got set with a metro card, bought a mobile phone(FYI Iphone4 USA does NOT work in China)and also located my internship company. Go Abroad China Foundation that organized my stay switched my internship company two days before I arrived. I will be working at Hercules Industry & Trade Co. Ltd. Shanghai as an assistant sourcing fabric and developing American business trade.
After a metro ride north to find Hercules company Dora and I headed back to Paris Springs mall by my home stay to get lunch. We had Shanghai's famous fried dumplings(soup dumpling)and wonton soup. The restaurant stop did not serve beverages and as a rule of thumb I observed one must always carry tissues on them for napkins and other purposes.
I had an afternoon nap before taking a walking tour with Mrs. Ren to find supermarkets. Family Mart is said to be a good convenience stop. I was shown to a Japanese market and then the wonderful Walmart(China style of course). It will take a while to adapt to the exchange prices or what I buy in Yuan and what it actually costs me in USD. I spent Y57 at Walmart which cost me $8.77USD. Excellent for a bag of salad, kiwis, apple, 2 water, 2 sprites, 5pack ramen, cookies, and bag of popcorn. I may get away cheap but i've already spent $90 my first day in Shanghai.
Jet lag is definitely a fighting factor as it is 8PM Shanghai/7AM Wisconsin and I am exhausted.
Wan Shang hao-Good night,
Niko
