Welcome back!

Hey Mendalla, good to see you - hope you had a great trip!

Read your blog, Mendalla - thanks for sharing all the info on your trip and the places you were at.

Welcome back!

Nice to see you back here!  I will wander over to read your blog for trip details. 

Great to see you back Mendalla!

myst - great avatar

Sounds like a great trip.

Now there's a thought - Mendalla and I have both slept in the Peace Hotel in Shanghai.

Thanks ... I'm rather fond of it too .....

back to Mendalla .....

When were you there, PP? We stayed there in 1995 and while the hotel's public spaces were quite grand , the rooms were a bit shabby at that time. Had a nice drink of scotch in the bar with some German tourists, though, while listening to the Peace Hotel jazz band.

Mendalla

Welcome back, Mendalla.   Glad you had a good trip.

Mendalla,

You got to hear the famous Peace Hotel jazz band!

I was there in the late 1980's. My husband was an electrical engineer - and his team put in the very first traffic lights in Shanghai.

What do I remember about the Peace Hotel? The rooms were large and shabby but comfortable.

You couldn't drink the water - so drinking water was brought to your room every day.

But most of all I remember the showers - Shanghai didn't have much of a water and sanitation system back then - and the water from the shower was sometimes brown. When I commented on this to John he said, "Just keep your mouth closed and your eyes shut for three minutes -I know  it will be difficult."

Shanghai itself was a cultural shock. Public spitting was common - and toddlers wore pants with the bottoms cut out.  Everywhere I went I saw mothers holding toddlers over the gutter with their bottoms on show - no diapers required with this system!

In those days everyone rode bicycles. I would watch, fascinated, to see a man pedal by carrying a table. The loads they could carry was amazing.

But, most of all, I learnt that people under the surface are much the same.

Yeah, the city's come a ways since then. Except for the public spitting, alas. They stil use the bottom-less toddler pants, but with diapers underneath. The open bottom is just to facilitate changing. Water is nominally drinkable now but most hotels still supply drinking water. We stay in a place in Pudong called the Celebrity Garden Inn and they have a water dispenser (not a cooler, but it can do hot water for your tea) in every room. Main reason we use it is that it is walking distance to some of the family. Bikes are largely giving way to motor scooters but are still common. Private cars are everywhere now whereas in 1995 it was mostly cabs. Best new feature: the subway system is up to 12 lines (13 counting the special Expo line) and you can get to most places for 3-4 yuan (<1 Canadian dollar).

Mendalla