The next day was a Friday, so Marc went off to work again while I tried my luck at the Jade Buddha Temple. Another temple, another Buddha, more incense and praying. This time, I couldn't take pictures of the jade Buddha but I took plenty of pictures from the other buildings in the monastery:
The jade Buddha was a really pale green statute (made of real jade!) about 1/2 the size of the Buddhas above. Again, there were dozens of tour groups and the throngs of people really got on my nerves.
After my visit to the temple, I met up with Marc and some of his work colleagues for a typical Shanghainese lunch. Joe* asked me what type of food I didn't like (spicy) and then ordered about 6-8 dishes for the table to share. We had sweet pork dumplings, sticky rice sticks, garlic spinach, 2 different kinds of soup and some tiny shrimp. The shrimp were not peeled and had their heads on them! Joe said we were supposed to eat them whole, which Marc readily agreed to do. I, on the other hand, have a problem eating animal heads so I dissected mine before eating them. I'm proud to report that I did try everything (except the shrimp heads) and everything else was delicious! See, I am as adventurous as the next person when it comes to trying new food, but when the menus are in Chinese, I'm scared to order because I don't know if I'm ordering the private parts of a rhinoceros. I was so glad that we had the opportunity to have a Shanghainese Local take us out to lunch and explain what we were eating.
Next up, Marc had some more work to do so I went to Dragonfly (a famous massage spa) for a massage. Sufficiently jellified, I went back to the hotel to plan our evening activities. Even though I had been there the previous day, I knew I had to take Marc back to Old Shanghai. So, that evening, camera in hand, we went back to the old part of town to test the limits of my camera's memory chip. As suspected, Marc LOVED Old Shanghai and we spent hours wandering the alleys, taking pictures and buying local handicrafts.
At night, Old Shanghai was lit up with tiny Christmas lights and it looked absolutely magical:
For dinner, I wanted to take Marc to the Nanxiang Steamed Bun Restaurant which I had read about in Lonely Planet. It was described like this: "Take your place in the queue of regulars trailing from this place opposite the Huxinting teahouse and fill your self up with more than a dozen xiaolongbao for a mere 8 Yuan [about $1 (US)]." The line outside of the ordering window the previous day had about a dozen people and at night, it was double that! With all these Locals lining up to eat these famous steamed pork dumplings, I knew we couldn't leave Shanghai without trying them. So, we stood in line for 20 minutes, saying "these dumplings better be good!" every few minutes. We could see the women who worked at the restaurant diligently making the dumplings by hand but they weren't fast enough to satisfy the hungry salivating customers in line:
When we finally got our order, we sat on some steps nearby and ate our $2 (US) dinner. Those Locals are on to something, this restaurant has been around for over 100 years and I can see (and taste) why. If you are ever in Shangahi, you do not want to miss this cheap culinary treat and experience.
Later that night, we checked into a new hotel in Pudong (the financial district on the other side of the river) and took a cab to the Jimnao Tower which is the tallest building in Shanghai. During the day, tourists go up to the 88th floor observatory but at night, anybody who is anybody, goes to the Cloud 9 Bar on the swanky 87th floor. The view is absolutely incredible and the decor was very posh - cracked glass tables, dim lighting and floor to ceiling windows to enjoy the view. The drinks were expensive but we had saved so much on dinner that we splurged on wine and chocolate fondue. A perfect nightcap on a perfect Shanghai night.
*Names have been changed to protect the innocent.
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