What follows are photos from my 2010 trip to Shanghai. Shanghai is quite a lovely city, compact and convenient, and by far the most international and comfortable city in mainland China. Shanghai hosts very good restaurants at a great price, and has many beautiful buildings which are relics of past colonialism. This year Shanghai also hosted the World Expo (or World's Fair) which is mainly a collection of buildings where every country shows displays of their culture and technology.
Shanghai Pudong International Airport (Bright and Clean for the World Expo)
Tescos is in China!
A street view of Shanghai.
Another view of Shanghai with its clear blue skies.
Lily flower seeds are on sale now, these are the remains of the big lilies you see on the lake.
View of the Bund, a big shopping street in Shanghai with European Architecture.
Another example of European Architecture
The Bund again.
Walking down the the Harbor view. 很多人。
Toward the Shanghai skyline with its (sometimes tragic) art deco style.
The Shanghai coast.
The Shanghai skyline again.
There are many European style buildings on this side of the harbor.
People on an escalator to the sky in Shanghai.
Within a garden temple in Shanghai.
The dragon wall.
Another view.
The God of Wealth.
A temple employee productively passing the time.
At the Shanghai expo, every country has their own design, which is often extravagant, sleek, or both.
Solar car at the Dutch Pavilion.
The Zimbabwe Pavilion, my childhood nation, an information display on the inside stated that pottery fragments from China dating back to 1000 years ago were found at Great Zimbabwe and this finding suggests Chinese-Zimbabwe relations started long ago.
Each pavilion had a token stamp (or visa) that could be placed into a Expo Passport. Chinese people lined up in droves to get these visas, perhaps after generations of difficulties with being able to obtain them otherwise.
Brunei Darussalam, my favorite country of the expo and one of the richest in East Asia after discovering oil in Borneo.
The China Pavilion which requires waiting in line at 5 a.m. to get a pass to wait in line for hours to even enter. As a result, I did not go.
The Lebanon Pavilion which focused on Lebanon's Phoenecian origins and presented the many sleek and beautiful things that are Lebanese.
Don't forget about Tajikistan!
The seed garden exhibit at the British Pavilion which housed thousands of seeds.
The Shanghai Oriental Pearl Tower
View from the top with a glass floor.
Cathedral in Shanghai.
Waiting area for China's new fast rail service, which still sells standing tickets.
After Shanghai we traveled to Suzhou a town home to many UNESCO world heritage sites and the subject of the next post.
