For ‘Western New Years’ some friends and I decided to celebrate in the most western city in the country – Shanghai! If you want to learn about some of the differences between Shanghai and the rest of China, or what kind of party spots we went to, read on.

To properly celebrate a non-chinese holiday, we went to Shanghai with the intention of seeing some Shanghai sights and partying with some other foreigners.

December 30th

The night before I didn’t sleep whatsoever, so the train ride from Nanjing to Shanghai was an exercise in trying to fall asleep against the window. A friend and his girlfriend soon arrived on the train from Suzhou and we got on the subway together once we reached Shanghai. They have an app that links with Alipay (metro大都会) instead of buying cards with cash at the machines which was pretty convenient.

After we arrived at the hostel, we took a walk trying to find the French Concession. There was a map on the wall of the hostel that said we should be going north, so we walked north of People’s Park and asked around (“嘿，你知道吗，法租界在哪里？”）Surprisingly enough, most people didn’t know where it was, led us in the wrong direction, or simply didn’t understand Mandarin! After a while of walking we figured out the top of this map was actually south, contrary to any map-making standards and common sense.

Instead we got some fried dumplings, then decided to go to my friend’s old university (Shanghai University) to take a look at his old stomping grounds. We saw his old shops, streets, resturants, and his old dorm. There was a lot of anti-drug propaganda on the entryway of his old dorm, which made sense according to him since a lot of people smoked weed in there.

After this I took a nap, then met with some friends for noodles for dinner. After this we went to another place familiar to this friend that spent time in Shanghai, Windows Scoreboard. This is an American-style bar on the 11th floor of a building in Huangpu with cheap drinks (~15元 per beer), darts, pool, and plenty of kids that would be illegally drinking if this was the United States.

These sorts of bars are pretty familiar to anyone who has been in China for more than a few months, especially around colleges. It’s usually full of people that are pretty young and looking to drink on the cheap, usually funded by scholarships or their English teacher salary.

We spent the rest of the night here downing cheap beers and catching up – The full crew was a French friend and his girlfriend plus his old french roommate, a couple from Poland, and a couple from the Czech Republic. We met some other people that night, including someone from Milwaukee!

December 31st

That morning we headed to Wei Xiang Zai (味香斋) which is a semi-famous noodle shop with a fantastic Ma Jiang Mian (麻酱面 or “Sesame Sauce Noodles”). It was really crowded inside so we were ushered through the kitchen and into the cold alleyway in the back. The Ma Jiang Mian noodles were fantastic, but the second item on the menu La Jiang Mian (辣酱面 or “Spicy Sauce Noodles”) was nothing special. Portions were small but the taste was worth the cheap price (11元 for the Ma Jiang Mian). At one point we saw a rat running across the alleyway, but that’s to be expected in China.

After this we made it to M50 Art District, which is your usual refurbished-warehouse art district that most cities will have. On the way, my shoe started falling apart so we stopped at a roadside clothing repair stall where they practically robbed me in broad daylight – 10元 for a bit of superglue! But it was my mistake for not asking the price first.

The art district itself had some beautiful art, but nothing I could take pictures of.

Afterwards we walked around to some tourist spots, through the French Concession, and then got food at a tasty Hong Kong restaurant. We then went to some random bar a bit west and met with friends of my friend’s friend who didn’t know us and frankly didn’t really care to talk to us. So we celebrated the countdown, then took a 30 minute walk to Found 158. We tried taking a taxi but they would always give us crazy prices (100元 for a ride that would be less than 10 minutes!!) so we took the walk.

Found 158 is a recently constructed concrete pit of foreigners and bars. In my opinion it’s an attempt by the government to move all the foreigner bars into one place with easily controlled entrances and exits, perfect for cops to do spot drug tests and isolate drunk foreigners from the rest of the Chinese populace. It’s the polar opposite of “authentic china” but for those of us that have been in a tier-2 city like Nanjing it’s a nice break from Chinese life. There wasn’t a single foreigner that I met there that spoke better than HSK2 Chinese, and most people I met were European students or workers. Beers were pretty cheap for such a place (25元 at some French-themed bar), music was good (funk!), and there was plenty of chances to chat with Chinese and foreigners. We stuck around for a few hours and then walked back home.

These kinds of places are common in nearly any Tier 1-2 city – A section of the city for all clubbing and bar activities. The government is typically keen to the complaints of neighbors and tries to find a solution to the loud noise and drunken foreigners and will construct a “Foreigner Street” and let the foreigners celebrate their western drinking traditions away from the average chinese family. I usually stay away from them (the Nanjing equivalent is 1912酒吧街) since they’re usually pretty boring and you end up wasting too much money on alcohol. One of those 25元 beers could pay for a meal at a noodle shop for two!

January 1st

The next day we ended up at 南京东路 where my friend’s girlfriend wanted to buy some sausage for her family. This is the largest tourist street in Shanghai and leads directly to the bund. We went through some malls and made our way to the bund, which at this point I’ve been to 5 times or so. After this I remembered that there was a Taco Bell in Shanghai somewhere, and I really wanted to show off this American delicacy to my foreign friends.

Taco Bell compared to ones in the US is a fancy resturant and cost about 50元 for a meal. The soft shells are more like pita bread, the tomatoes are fresher, and it’s all served in a basket. The soda fountains are a tap style where you press a button to choose the soda, then pull the handle. And there’s free refills, and alcohol!

From here we went back to Windows Scoreboard for some burgers which were buy one get one free, then got home by 11pm.

January 2nd

This was my first day to myself. On these kinds of days, I like to take a subway to a place, then walk around the surrounding area to get a feel for it and find some interesting spots. I started off by heading to Fudan University’s Handan Campus. Fudan is a very prestigious university in China (more so than Nanjing University…) and has a campus that reminds me a lot of Nanjing University.

I walked through the campus and past a hospital to another subway stop which I took to Pudong Avenue. I wanted to see the first place I ever slept in China: Shanghai Hidden Garden Hostel. It was a fantastic place with a welcoming circular gate, a heated tent in the main courtyard to hang out in during cold nights, walls with graffiti and well wishes from travellers, a husky in a doghouse near the front gate, and a walk through an interesting alleyway from the main road.

But I was surprised to find that they adopted an entirely new look in the two years since my time there – A bleak, “minimalistic” white painted place with oddly placed pathways and walls. This white-concrete minimalistic aesthetic is certainly in fashion right now, but this particular instance gave me the familiar feeling of Shanghai’s quick development that’s quick to brush aside a worn feeling of warmth for something stylish. I think it’s still under renovations and the now sketchy alleyway will be turned into a small park, so maybe it’ll be worth a look in another year.

After this I booked my train ticket to leave at 6pm, got some gifts for friends, then headed to the train station and took the slow train back home.

Impressions of Shanghai

I was originally going to stay for a few more days, but most people I knew from Shanghai were escaping the city for new years. I’ve been in this city quite a few times (probably in total a month and a half?) and have seen all the usual tourist spots, so nowadays I’m looking for someone that lives there that can show me places that are interesting to them as residents.

I’ve talked to foreigners in many cities around China, and my impression of Shanghai is a ‘foreigner’s China’ which is hardly a hot take or bold claim. It’s easy to live in Shanghai without speaking Chinese, and plenty of shopkeepers speak English. This is compared to Guangzhou which is a global city but more about commerce and import/export compared to Shanghai’s finance, shipping, and design, or Beijing’s more governmental sector, or Shenzhen’s tech and industrial sectors. This makes sense considering its roots with its different white/western sections. In terms of immigration, Shanghai’s expat population looks to be more western and white, while Guangzhou’s is Indian or African.

Because there’s so many foreigners, there are many inter-city media resources that cater to them. Some examples are SmartShanghai or Shanghaist for new and events, or a Youtube channel called Mamahuhu that parodies the expat life in the city.

As for dialect, some of the older shopkeepers on less populated streets didn’t speak Mandarin too well and instead spoke a version of Wu. In Nanjing, their dialect is close enough to Mandarin so it isn’t a problem. This dialect problem will likely disappear with the disappearance of the dialect as the city becomes more and more modern, for better or worse.

Everything was a bit more expensive than Nanjing. Even outside foreigner establishments like bars, restaurant food was maybe 10-20% more expensive in most cases.