Justin and Jodi were late to meet us, but we survived. They met us at the MagLev station, and we took that train into the city just as fast as we possibly could. The trains list their current speed on the display, and at one point we were in excess of 300 km/hr. I have a photo that shows the speed display, but I can' figure out how to post it because of the Chinese internet filtering. More progress on that tomorrow, I hope. Justin and Jodi said that when they took the train to meet us, it reached 400 km/hr at one point (almost 250 mph.) Fast times on the Shanghai MagLev.
Our gracious hosts had a little hostel in mind for us, and walked there from the train station, our rollerboard suitcases clattering along behind us on the cobbled sidewalks. Unfortunately, the hostel felt that it was too full to accommodate foreigners, so a-searching we went for a new place to stay. After that plan ride and with the cold—it's been topping off around 5˚C—it seemed like the longest walk of our life, but we found a nice hotel chain with a couple of not-too-expensive rooms available with internet. You know how Liz loves her internet.
We found the place well enough, but we couldn't check in, because someone, or should I say two someones didn't bring their passports with them from Nanjing, and foreigners have to register everywhere they go. We even had to present our passport to convert currency. Tight reins here? Tight reign here? Both work. So, J & J trotted over to the local police station to register and have their files sent so they could check in to a hotel. We kept Jaime at the hotel with us so they wouldn't have to bother and it could be quick and easy. 90 minutes later Liz and I were still sitting in the hotel lobby with a very unhappy and hungry little girl, and were weighing our options. I mean, what does one do when one's hosts are jailed in a foreign city and you have their baby? Unknown.
Just as we were preparing to take some sort of action (don't ask what it was going to be—we didn't really have a plan) they arrived back by taxi, passport information in hand. Apparently the officers at the station couldn't find them in the computer, so it took a few extra attempts, some waiting around, an extra officer, some waiting around, a phone call to Nanjing, some waiting around, and a fax to fix things up. We were glad they cleared that up; they'll keep their passports handy from here out, methinks.
We stashed our suitcases in our rooms, then headed out for dinner and some seeing. We immediately headed to the metro and took trains to the heart of the city, but not before we grabbed a great little rice dumpling at a place right outside the hotel. Of course, by place I mean a guy standing on the street steaming giant baskets of stuff. They were little volcanoes of flavour, probably mostly MSG, but whatever, we loved them. There's a great tourist shopping market we visited, but it was mostly closed up for the evening. It looked amazing, though, so we vowed to return. We wandered back through the city and stopped in at a noodle place that was still open. It was an interesting setup, where the cook was visible through open windows, and Justin called out to her. She invited us in, and we made our way through the door that wouldn't open, past the buckets of coal that fired the stoves, and up a narrow staircase to a flat of old kitchen tables spread with baskets of chopped scallions and little cellars of salt, MSG, and chili pepper flakes in oil. I had the lamb noodles, Liz had the beef noodles. My noodles better than hers, of course, but the meat left a bit to be desired. We now know that meat can be hit and miss: Sometimes it's amazing delicious, and sometimes it's fat in broth. We got a bit of both.
We made our way back through the metro maze, but couldn't take our last train because it stopped running two or three minutes before we got to our connection. Justin grabbed us a taxi and we worried our way through almost fifteen minutes of turns, stoplights, speeding down narrow streets and generally not knowing where we going or how we were going to get there. Arrive, though, we did, and we were glad to do so; I still suspect that the good took advantage of the foreigners, but what can you do? Taxis meters in China run by the minute, not by the mile, so it's easy to gouge.
Our room was nice, but ultimately, it would have been nicer if we had noticed that the window was open. We couldn't figure out why it was so cold, but the blanket kept us pretty warm through the night. Also, maybe better if we had learned how to use the heater. Again, heavy blanket was great.
Tomorrow I'll learn to post pictures.
1 comment:
How fun. What an adventure. You failed to mention the 3:30 a.m. phone call to Dad...
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