FEBRUARY 28, 2008

Our dear Aussie friend, Ali, is to celebrate her 60th birthday in March, but as she was departing in less than a week for a six week tour of Europe, it was decided that we simply must honor her before she commenced the journey. Arrangements were made for an evening at Club Shanghai, an establishment with which we were unfamiliar. There were to be 4 couples ... Mike and Ali, Margaret and Tom, Toni and Simon, and Randy and me. Ali had informed us that Club Shanghai was on the 4th floor of the Shanghai Concert Hall, and was a lovely, upscale dining establishment which included live music for dancing. Sounded intriguing, so we confirmed our intention to join them.

Both Randy and Simon had been struggling with some sort of virus most of that week .... fever, headache, body aches, and general malaise were the symptoms. But Randy was feeling better by Saturday, the day planned for the celebration, and he decided he could attend (he hates to miss a party!). But Simon, however, was still feeling rough, so we asked Toni to share our taxi that evening, and Simon stayed home.

Our taxi driver seemed to know the place and dropped us off in front of a large, four story building that had Grecian columns across the front. It looked like a museum or a large library .... something of a monument-type building like you'd see in Washington DC. It was impressive enough, but it appeared to be dark and locked up for the evening. We tried the door and it opened. A young Chinese woman directed us around to the other side of the building when we inquired about Club Shanghai. As we came out to head around to the other side, Margaret and Tom were approaching.

As we found a path around to the front of the building, it was apparent we'd tried to enter from the back. The trees and garden areas which decorated the front lawn were peppered with little white twinkling lights, and the chandeliers glowed invitingly through the tall windows from within the handsome concert hall. We were curious about the lack of other visitors, but continued to the 4th floor up to Club Shanghai.

Our coats and wraps were taken by tuxedo'd Chinese gentlemen, and we were invited to be seated in the massive dining area. Fresh flowers cascaded from large vases, linen cloths and napkins adorned lovely candlelit tables. The dining area was two floors with the second floor being a beautiful balcony overlooking the main dining area accessible by a sleek marble staircase. We were somewhat taken aback by the beauty and elegance of our surroundings.

Beyond the dining room was a warm, darkly paneled bar area with overstuffed leather chairs and sofas surrounding glass coffee tables. As Mike and Ali had yet to arrive, we decided we'd wait for them in there. Celebration calls for something special, so we ordered a bottle of champagne knowing this was something Ali would enjoy.

Shortly after our bubbly was poured into crystal stemware, Mike and Ali arrived. Margaret had recently returned from a visit to their native Australia, and was laden with gifts from Ali's family back home. Ali was truly touched that Margaret had gone to the bother of not only transporting gifts from home, but had also taken the time to beautifully wrap each one. Unfortunately, I'd had a specific gift in mind, but when Randy and I arrived at the store the previous day, it was no longer available. We informed Ali that we'd have to continue the celebration upon her return from Europe.

Our drinks were placed upon silver trays and we moved to the dining area where a truly remarkable culinary experience was awaiting us. The menu was printed in English, but the menu selections were of French origin .... yum!! I appreciated the simplicity of it .... appetizers on one side of the menu, and main courses on the other. At my recommendation, Mike ordered a lovely Bertrand Syrah that Randy and I had enjoyed at our favorite French restaurant, Cafe Montmarte, and everyone agreed that it was delightful, and several bottles were enjoyed. Our waiter recommended the sea bass as the catch of the day, and many of us did indeed decide upon the fish.

We were presented with a sampling of special appetizers to start and a gorgeous bread basket that seem to never deplete. It appeared that we each had a waiter to attend to our every desire. If a crumb fell from our bread to the linen tablecloth, it was discreetly brushed away before we had a chance to notice. The crystal water goblets were filled with sparking water and fresh lime slices, and again, were never allowed to be emptied.

I'd ordered a lobster bisque for my appetizer, and I dare say it might be the finest thing I have ever tasted .... pure heaven!! Randy had asparagus soup that must have been just as fine as my bisque because he didn't offer me a single bite! When it came time to serve our main courses (I'd opted for the sea bass and Randy ordered a beef tenderloin), placed before each of us was a platter with a silver domed lid. A signal was given and the domed covers were removed precisely "ensemble," quite ceremoniously with a grand flourish ..... voila!!! The presentation of the food was exquisite, and everything tasted as lovely as it appeared.

As we could hear the musicians tuning up, we decided to take our desserts and after dinner drinks in the ballroom. I have never been to the Rainbow Room in New York City, but this ballroom is exactly what I imagine it might look like. The large hardwood dance floor was polished to a gleam, and was flanked on three sides by more linen covered and candlelit tables. The fourth side of the room was a large stage upon which stood four violinists near a pianist at a grand piano. The women wore long black gowns and the men black tuxes. As we were seated, they commenced playing a lilting waltz, and the disco ball at the ceiling sent sparkling, playful splashes of light around the room in time with the music.

As the music played, our desserts were presented accompanied by silver trays heaped with homemade chocolates and candies. It was almost sensory overload ..... gorgeous surroundings, beautiful music, excellent food, over attentive service, and all this experienced with our terrific friends! I felt like Cinderella at the ball!! And it wasn't even MY birthday!

The violin quartet played for about 20 minutes or so, and then were replaced by a truly accomplished stage orchestra that could have, once again, come straight from the Rainbow Room. Again, the band had donned tuxes of black with the lead singer choosing black pants and a white tux jacket. The music was really fun .... Cole Porter, Gershwin, Sinatra, Bobby Darin, Dean Martin. Just what you'd expect in a fancy ballroom. And the singer not only had the voice, but he also had the moves!! He grinned like a Cheshire cat, snapped his fingers in time to the music, winked and blew kisses to the ladies. If you closed your eyes, you'd never imagine he was Chinese. The orchestra played for a half hour or so, then the violin quartet came out for another set, to be followed once again by the orchestra.

The only thing that was even remotely "off" the entire evening was the fact that we were the only patrons they had all evening. We jokingly asked Mike if he'd booked the entire place just for the occasion, but no. It was a shame, really. The beautiful dining room and gleaming ballroom just begged to filled with people eating, drinking, dancing, having a wonderful time!! We all wondered aloud how they could remain open with so few customers, and suggestions were made that it might be some kind of money laundering business for illegal activity which I hated to consider. Well, the case could be made that Club Shanghai is probably cost prohibitive for many (yes, this evening set us back a bit financially), but it was certainly one of those once in a lifetime events for which we didn't mind paying the extra. And certainly the fact that the wait staff had only us to serve made it seem that much more special. We seem to keep having those "once in a lifetime" experiences over here, but I guess that is what makes this an adventure!

Ali embarked on her European adventure a few days later (to be joined by Mike in a few weeks), and I await her return anticipating the planning of further adventures. In the meantime, we are having more visitors from Scotland this week and next who will be working at the plant. The weather is improving almost daily, and spring, while not settled in permanently, is definitely knocking at the door. The daily temps this week are mid 50's, but with a chilly breeze. So it appears we have survived the worst Chinese winter in 50 years.

FEBRUARY 18, 2008

Randy had decided to take the afternoon of February 1 off so that we could go to the airport together to pick up Judy and Neal. I was concerned about transporting the luggage back to our apartment. I've traveled quite a bit with Judy (that's a completely different blog ... someday). The terms "packing light" and "Judy" don't usually show up in the same sentence, so I was happy to have Randy and his extra muscle. As luck would have it, Lifeng called Randy from the plant to ask if he could call on one of the clients here in the city in the morning, so he didn't have to go out to the plant anyway.

The airport wasn't too terribly crowded, relatively speaking. Pudong Airport is always somewhat busy, but being that this was the start of the Chinese New Year holiday not to mention the recent traveling issues due to the weather, we expected the worst. Their flight was just a bit late, but we spotted them waiting for luggage from a walkway overlooking the arrival area. Finally they came through the international arrivals area looking happy but definitely travel weary. Judy sounded horrible. She'd been struggling through a bout of strep throat and general upper respiratory ailment. The voice was all but gone and she was coughing a lot. And fortunately, between the four of us, the luggage was quite manageable.

We brought them into Shanghai via the Maglev and the subway. It was rush hour Friday evening by the time we left the Maglev and hit the subway leg of the trip home. Being that this was their first experience in China, I'm sure it felt like baptism by fire to them!! I can't imagine what must have been going through their heads as the crush of people in the subway made even breathing near next to impossible. Luckily, more and more folks were getting off the subway the closer we got to our station on Weining Road. The bad news was that the weather had worsened considerably.

It had started to snow again around noon that day. By now, all of China was SICK of the snow and the miriade of problems it was causing. There were still major transportation tie-ups as a result of the weather, and it was becoming obvious that many folks were indeed NOT going to make it home for the holiday. This is a heartbreaker for the people of China as for a lot of people, this is their only opportunity to see their family for an entire year.

Anyway, by the time we got off the subway and schlepped the luggage up to the street level for the two block walk to our apartment, it was dark and the snow and slush were really thick and nasty. It makes no difference that luggage has wheels when it's being pulled through 6 inches of frozen slurpee crap! What a mess!! Well, we all kept our sense of humor and blazed a trail to our apartment a couple of blocks to the east of the subway station. Whew!! We finally made it!

The next several days were recuperation time for Judy. We stayed fairly close to home for a few days as mandated by the weather, our visitors' health, and jet lag which surprisingly didn't seem too awful for either Judy or Neal. I suppose when you're already feeling unwell, jet lag is the least of your worries!!

When the weather finally broke within a few days, we toured the Urban Planning Museum where there is a miniature display of the city of Shanghai (or most of it anyway) that can be viewed from two different levels and encompasses the space of maybe two thirds of a football field. It's pretty incredible to see what this city looks like in that perspective. Just what we could see was fairly mind boggling in scope, and the model doesn't go far enough west to include our compound and the remaining district beyond us. So really, the entire city is not captured in the model which makes it even more astounding! It is quite fun to locate buildings, parks, and structures with which we are now familiar after living here more than a year.

After the museum, we strolled down Nanjing Road, got a bit of lunch in our favorite Japanese noodle joint, Ajisen, and then we decided to be really decadent by ordering chocolate fondue at the Haagen Daz cafe. They were running a Valentine special of little heart shaped delights ... ice creams, fruits, cookies, and cakes which could be skewered and dipped into a fantastic warm dark chocolate dip that sets into a sort of "Magic Shell" as it envelopes the frozen pieces .... YUM!!!

We had a great time with Judy and Neal once Judy started feeling better .... took them to our favorite restaurants, showed them our neighborhood, introduced them to some of our friends that we have made here. We had reservations for Chinese New Year's Eve for the Epicure on 45 which is the 45th floor of the Radisson hotel, a restaurant that rotates for a wonderful view of the Pearl Tower, Nanjing Road, the Bund and all the sparkling lights of Shanghai. Unfortunately, due to the weather, the government mandated that all non-essential lighting be turned off to conserve energy. I suppose that they were re-routing power to some of the more severely affected areas of China. China utilizes mostly coal burning for power, and due to the fact that there was no truck or rail transportation as a result of our severe weather event, power was even gone in some areas. As a result, we decided to cancel our reservations for the 45th floor with the idea that once the city lights returned, we'd definitely make a visit there for the view. No sense in paying the big dollar when there is nothing to view!

As has become usual here, the Aussies rode to our rescue in terms of Chinese New Year's Eve plans. Toni and Simon invited us to a party at their apartment for the evening. And that same day, our neighbors across the hall, Andreas and Clare, came over to invite us to their apartment for a party. We'd already made the decision to cook instead of going out, but Toni told us to save room for dessert at their place. We laughed about the fact that Andreas and Clare had a large box of fireworks sitting in the hallway, and we surmised that they had made the decision to invite us over to preclude complaints of noise from across the hall. If we're included in the party, chances are we won't complain!! Good plan! They seem to be very nice folks. Andreas is German and Clare is English. Andreas works for a company that manufactures equipment for baked goods suppliers (seems like a handy guy to know .... you never know when you might have a craving for a cookie or cake or something!). Clare is an interior designer with an interest in starting her own freelance businsses here in Shanghai. By the looks of their apartment, I'd say she's going to have no problem!! If it weren't for the fact that I know freelance doesn't mean FREE, I'd have her give ME some advice.

We wandered over to Toni and Simon's around 9:00 for dessert. The dinner spread was still on the table and it appeared our decision to cook was ill advised. They had plenty of beautiful food still available, and I was severely chastised by Toni for not coming to eat with them. Well, I knew it was a potluck and wasn't prepared to contribute. I introduced Judy and Neal to the folks with whom we were acquainted. We met a few new folks too. One Asian woman came up to us and introduced herself as "Somebody's mother," which prompted her husband to respond, "I guess that makes me somebody's father!" They were a lovely couple visiting their kids and grandkids for the holiday who live in our compound and were attending the party.

"Somebody," as it turned out, was having a birthday. So the cakes and desserts came out, candles were lit, "Happy Birthday" was sung, then we pigged out!! Suely made some kind of chocolate flourless cake that was so good, it was obcene!!

Soon we made our good-byes and headed back to our apartment so we could make an appearance at our neighbors' party. We had specific instructions to be there by midnight as that is when the BIG fireworks go off. The fireworks had actually started around 5:30 or 6:00, as soon as it was dark. There were sporadic bursts here and there, but had increased in intensity and duration as the evening wore on. I wasn't sure they could become much more spectacular, but I was wrong!

Judy and Neal made their apologies. Between ailments (Neal was now coming down with Judy's bug) and jet lag, they were exhausted. We understood, and told them that if indeed they COULD sleep in what was becoming more and more like a warzone commotion out in the street, please feel free and rest well. So we walked across the hall to the neighbors apartment.

After spending some time getting to know Andreas and Clare and some of their guests, we all headed outside for the big shoot. We had watched some of the fireworks from their kitchen balcony. They seemed to be exploding just inches from our faces due to us being on the 24th floor. In fact, at times it was too close for comfort and I was scared enough to go back inside and watch from the safety of the kitchen window.

Once outside, the crowds had gathered to witness the amazing event. Talk about sensory overload!!! Blasting, smoke and smell, bright sparks shooting and flying, every color in the rainbow, some on the ground, but most high in the sky, and in absolutely every direction as far as the eye could see!!! Incredible! Chinese New Year Eve in Shanghai!!! It defies description! This is something every person should see once in their lifetime. You folks in the states who think you've seen spectacular fireworks displays (Bay City or Boston on July 4th perhaps), you don't have a clue. We Americans are rank amateurs in this regard .... the Chinese have the market cornered on fireworks ... period!! Fireworks were hauled in large cardboard boxes with a single wick sticking out the side of the box. Once lit, the fireworks shoot into the air continuously for ten or fifteen minutes from inside this box without ceasing!! They were rolling out the trollies from the lobbies of our apartment buildings absolutely LOADED with these boxes. Traffic was stopped in all directions as folks filled the streets with these boxes, lighting one after another. There was ash and paper residue covering everything (including us).

After a while, our necks were sore from gazing skyward, and our jaws ached from gaping, so we headed back upstairs. Once back in our apartment, we had to laugh. Judy and Neal, of course, were getting NO sleep, so had decided to venture onto our kitchen patio to witness the chaos. Judy had a coat on over her pajamas and robe, and her Bose noise reducing headset over her ears watching the streams of sparks blasting away in all directions. We have two balconies in our apartment, one off the kitchen, and one off the living room. We all kept running back and forth to check the view in each direction .... it was a toss up as to which view was better. As far as the eye could see, fireworks were shooting up into the sky between every building for miles and miles! Just amazing!

Of course, not a lot of sleep was accomplished that night, so the next day was spent lounging and relaxing, mostly just remembering what we'd seen the night before. Randy made soup which everyone declared was going to make both Judy and Neal healthy!!

The remainder of the vacation was spent in combinations of touring the city, shopping, relaxing with DVD movies, getting massages, visiting the Jade Buddha Temple (with the two-ton Jade Buddha!!), and trying new restaurants. Our friend, Vicki, graciously offered to take us with their van and driver to Xitang which is a water village south of Shanghai. Those of you who have seen the movie Mission Impossible III may remember Tom Cruise running through the streets of a water town village in Shanghai near the end of the movie ... this is Xitang. It was a wonderful day strolling through the streets and along the canals of the village. Vicki had been there several times and was a skilled tour guide for us (even provided freshly baked muffins and bottled water for the journey which took about an hour and a half). Most of the residences of this village have steps leading straight into the canals where they utilize the water there for washing, cooking, little boats for transportation, fishing, etc. This is the "old Shanghai" that one imagines when folks speak of China .... rickshaws winding down narrow cobblestone streets, villagers hawking their wares right outside their homes in little cozy lanes, or inviting folks inside for a meal cooked over an open fire in the street. There are lots of old beautiful bridges that are being restored, and standing upon some of these bridges provides some incredible views of the canals and village.

Vicki recommended lunch upon a floating restaurant in one of the many canals of Xitang. It was a long, low, barge type boat that held no more than six tables. But the food was freshly cooked by skilled Chinese hands in their home right outside the dock. Our meal included beef, duck, bamboo, corn, green beans, soup, and tea .... all delicious! Local musicians came by to ask if we wanted live music with our lunch. The only thing that could have made the day better was the weather. It was cold enough to be uncomfortable. The cold came right up through the cobblestones and through our shoes right to our feet! The snow on the rooftops had started to melt and we dodged dripping eaves all day long. I'd really like to visit Xitang again on a nice sunny (and dry) day.

Vicki led us in and out of many musems and shops of the Xitang area where we witnessed shell button making, and saw displays of many types of local Chinese crafts .... tile making, caligraphy, furniture, wine making and wine jugs, jewelry, photographs, and LOTS of Tom and Katie posters. Apparently, Tom and Katie spent some time mingling with the locals and had actually stayed in Xitang while they were making the movie, so many people had photos and autographs displayed prominently. We even strolled the actual alley where Tom ran in the movie. We also visited an ancient Buddist temple where people still worship today. It was a delightful day.

Judy and Neal left us on Thursday afternoon with Neal in the nastiest stages of HIS turn with the bug. Poor guy! I hate to see anyone having to fly in that condition. But Randy and I were very happy to have our dear friends here to experience the Chinese New Year with us .... something none of us will ever forget!!

Chinese New Year comes to a close this coming Wednesday. The New Year holiday is a two week event (also called Spring Festival which I believe is wishful thinking). Day five of the holiday was another spectacular fireworks evening. Apparently, the fireworks at midnight on the eve of the New Year are to scare away the evil demons. Day five fireworks are to call and welcome the gods of prosperity which is obviously even more important than scaring away the demons because as incredible as the initial fireworks were, the day five show was even more intese although possibly not lasting as long in duration (again around midnight). The last night of the holiday will also provide an opportunity for fantastic firework viewing. We recalled that we'd arrived back in Shanghai after 10 days in Scotland last year just in time to see the last night's event. So we know we're in for one more good show this week.

As the weather the last week has finally hinted at the possibility of spring with sunny skies and slightly warmer temps (mid to upper 40's), I think I can safely say that we have survived the worst of the record breaking Chinese winter. With that, let me bid all of you Happy Chinese New Year (the year of the Rat), and Happy Spring Festival to everyone!