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Monday, December 31st On this date last year... "First impressions..."
In general -- there was an awful LOT to absorb. DANG. I was here a few years ago but either my memory SUCKS or this place has changed dramatically or both. I felt like I had never been to Shanghai before! So strange! Some notes:
If I were to compare them to locals in Taiwan, I'd say that those I've seen so far in Shanghai (both men and women) are more AGGRESSIVE, even perhaps a bit rough, in personality. People in Shanghai are also bigger -- in height and in width -- than the folks in Taipei. Locals in Taiwan strike me as being more TENDER. Even um... meek? This must sound awfully retarded. LOL! I often hear about how tall and beautiful the women are in Shanghai, and that's very true. But what I also noticed (but rarely hear about) is that the men are also much more MANLY-looking! They're taller, and bigger, and less ANDROGINOUS, compared with the men in Taiwan. Know what I mean? During my first day here, I couldn't stop gawking! It was an unexpected surprise but yeah. Some of the more cosmopolitan men here in the city are very, very, attractive. Many were over 5'10", 6 feet tall. Getting a cup of coffee at Starbucks takes on a whole new meaning here in Shanghai... wink wink. LOL! It's been said that Shanghainese women love to date Taiwanese business men because they have money AND because they're easy to CHI-FU. Dunno if that's true, but I can see why someone would say that. Jim had heard that one of the more eloquent affairs was to be held at the M on the Bund, but because we couldn't get reservations beforehand (too late), we decided to wing it and just show up and see if there were any seats available. Derrick and Tanya whom we met the night before from Hong Kong were there along with their friends, as well as Chin-Chin and her group. Jim's old college buddy Ulysses was also in town along with his wife Amy and his mother (who is apparently a famous art collector in Hong Kong and who got them reservations with NO PROBLEMO), and they were supposed to meet us there. To make a long story short, Jim LIED at the front door and said that we were part of ULY's party (they had not yet arrived) and somehow managed to get the restaurant to expand their table to accomodate to all of us while Flora and I sat at Uly's table trying to fend off the waiter who kept wanting to pour us wine. "Oh no, please hold off on the wine, really! We're waiting for other people!" Jim is quite the creative MANIPULATOR! LOL! So there you have it. We stayed for quite awhile and enjoyed the moment together, and took some rather SILLY pictures! The Russian salad was PARTICULARLY yummy, and the restaurant itself was quite impressive. My pencam of course didn't work in the dim light, but both Jim and Flora had their cameras so hopefully I can get some from them. We also joined Flora in celebrating her Tibetan Buddhist tradition of eating a red-dyed egg and walking 99 steps to cast away the spirits of the new year, and that in itself was quite interesting! There's a whole story about the three of us running around Shanghai earlier in the evening looking desperately for that darn RED DYE, but unfortunately I've run out of time to go into details on that. Suffice it say that it was FUNNY!
Anyway, from there we went BAR HOPPING WITH MRS. HUI for the rest of the evening -- that woman has a lot of energy I tell you -- and hit two popular bars called "Face" and "Park97" until 4 in the morning. 'Twas a lot of fun, but needless to say, I was wiped long before the others were from all the jetlag. Oh well!
LOL!
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