Shanghai trip, part II

(Sorry this post took a little longer than usual to get out, I had a very busy couple of weeks setting up for our first Virtual Open Day on campus- now that it’s over, I can get back to posting!)

On our second trip to Shanghai over the holiday, we had an appointment to go notarize documents at the Embassy in Shanghai- just in case the notarize.com documents were rejected.  The day before we we’re going to leave though, we got the news that the documents were accepted and we could just go and enjoy the trip.

We stayed in a different part of Shanghai for this trip, closer to the embassy, but also closer to metro stops and a really neat area.  We stayed in the Jing’an Temple area, and loved it. As soon as we got off the metro, there was a relaxed fun atmosphere.

Surrounding the temple are lots of restaurants and shopping and hipster coffee joints.  We found a hipster place at the bottom of our hotel and right across the street from the temple to hang out until our room was ready.

We were all so excited about what we wanted to do first.  After tons of research, and much missing of our cat (that was rehomed to my sister-in-law and family) we were going to go hang out in a cat cafe and make some cat friends.  We hopped in a cab and they took us to the address we gave them…. that was closed down (and a while ago too). So we looked up the next cat cafe and it was within a long walking distance but doable. And off we went.  After walking to the next cat cafe, we were in a little neighborhood of apartments, most with no numbers on them, and no way to figure out which one of these was or could be a cafe. We circled an entire section of the apartment block before we had to give up.

Completely dejected, we started walking in no particular direction hoping to find a cafe of some sort to sit and rest and plan our next move.

We walked into the first one we came across and were surrounded by books, all in English. We had stumbled into an english bookstore cafe (with fantastic “after eight” mint gelato). Alex had some gelato, which mostly made up for the lack of cats.  Everyone got to look at some books and we all relaxed. After that we decided to keep walking around and actually found the cat cafe , well, one of them anyway.  It was in a small neighborhood of apartments, with different block numbers.  We knocked on the door, so excited to have finally found it….. and then don’t let kids in. No one under the age of 15.  Alex was crushed.

After that we decided to go to dinner, and we had found an Indian place on our first trip but hadn’t gotten a chance to go to it.  So back on the metro we went.  The restaurant was in a great old town area called Tianzifang.  The dinner was fantastic (Indian food is some of my favorite) and Alex even picked something that we wouldn’t have gotten other wise that was terrific.   We walked around, looked at every store and decided that when people come to visit, this will be another must do.

The next morning we got up, checked out of our hotel and headed back on the metro to get another dose of jianbing and green twisties.  Unfortunately  this time they were both closed. But we did find another bagel shop to try out instead.

After we ate, we found a Starbucks across the street to hang out at and play a few games.

And then we decided to head back to the YuYuan Garden area. I had enjoyed that so much, and we had all had a good time wandering around there and looking at things. The difference was, this time was after the main holiday days. It was so much busier and more crowded (which honestly I thought it was pretty crowded the first time we went).

We saw some kids wearing crowns, and Alex decided he needed one too. So to join in the festivities we got him a antennae crown. 

Aside from the fact that I don’t know how someone hasn’t lost an eye due to the antenae,  Alex loved his crown and he got a lot of attention for wearing it.  Especially older people stopped us to smile and coo at Alex in his crown. And he loved all the attention.

When we were there the first time, there was a guy in a grey coat who was taking pictures of the square and the people,  and while I was trying to get a picture of Mark and Alex by the lion people kept crossing in front of us and walking right into my shot. By the third time one guy had walked into it I made a face at him, and grey coat took a picture of me making that face as I took a picture of Mark and Alex. Mark and I laughed about it saying he’s going to be showing pictures to his friends of the crazy foreign lady making faces.

So this time when we went, I was surprised to see him again, same grey coat, and he recognized us too.  He took a ton of pictures of Alex and followed us around for a bit to see what else Alex would to that he could take pictures of.  I think he may have worked for the YuYuan gardens, or he’s just really enthusiastic about taking pictures of tourists.

Mark has found a new favorite treat in China (pictured above with Alex). We find them lots of places, especially touristy places.  They’re strawberries, but you can find and get other fruit as well,  glazed with a simple sugar glaze.

There were giant displays set up in the river in the middle of the area for the Spring festival, and people were all waiting to get onto the bridge to see them. We decided not to wait in the line because I was getting a little too crowded out to get jostled on a bridge. But it was impressive to see the number of people waiting to see the displays. 

We had a fantastic time in Shanghai, we will absolutely go back again for more adventures.

I’m going to add some random pictures that didn’t really fit anywhere but that I wanted to share.