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I left Japan from Tokyo airport at 5pm on sat on a large plane which was mainly empty (only 2 seats taken from each row so plenty of room). Unfortunately my kindle appears to be broken and resetting it does nothing.
After arriving in shanghai airport, I waited about 50 minutes for jp's plane to arrive and gave an Aussie girl Natalie advice for her first trip abroad (she was transiting and planning to spend the night at the airport).
We then jumped onto the magnetic train (300kmph) and were guided by a Canadian (Jackson) through to the metro that got us to people's square. Again, I was greeted by more rain. We found our way to Phoenix hostel without too much trouble and checked into our pleasing twin room with tv and spacious bathroom. After doing some quick laundry we headed out for a couple of beers in chin tan dee (wrong spelling), but were not too impressed by the overly western bars so headed back after only one beer.
The next day we ventured out after a good sleepin and walked to and along the bund. Shanghai is different to what I expected (bigger, cleaner and more advanced) and I like it. We decided that it would be worth crossing the river and going to the lookout in the bottle opener shaped building so despite warnings that the tourist tunnel is lamo, we bought a return ticket for about $8. It really was lame but convenient for us at the time.
After a riverside beer we went up the bottleopener tower and battled our way to stay in front of the ukrainian (guessing) guys who thought they had to push in front of us at the counter even though no one else was there.
By the time we made it to the top the clouds had rolled in but we had reasonable views from the 492m tall lookout.
We made our way back to the hostel and after a couple of huge beers (and cheap at about $1) we headed back to the bund around 10pm, having street food on the way (good stir fry and skewers for about $2 each).
We tried a few cocktail bars on the bund and played the "are they prostitutes game". We chatted at the first place with a couple of girls from Laos, after they tried to get us to drink their 100% alcohol cocktail. Bailing on them we left and went to bar rouge and resaw a bunch of ukrainian girls/pros who quickly went to work drinking with groups of rich guys. Drinks were expensive >$9 per beer.
In the end we met a group of canadian girls who we hung out with after deciding that they were part of the minority of girls who weren't working.
A little drunk we walked home and crashed out.
The next day we checked out an electronics mall and I managed to get a replacement kindle before venturing into old town. A couple more beers and frustration with the hostel Internet we headed to captains bar on the bund.
Our best attempt at a quiet night was thwarted when we met Morgan (from georgia, USA) and jeremy zhang (IBM strategic planner). Morgan and Jeremy took us to puzzle bar in the French connection (cool bar with 6 light circle entry code and reversed hinge toilet doors).
After 2 strong long island ice teas we went to a couple of small bars (w**** bars?) and played pool til the early hours before heading home.
With hangovers, we got up just b4 midday and checked out, meeting morgan at her hostel 20 minutes late. We bought tickets to huangshan, walked around and played some cards before going to shanghai rail station.
With only 30 minutes before the departure time, Jp watched our bags while Morgan and i went in search of a refund booth to refund her other train tickets. After being directed all over the place and scaling 2 fences we found the booth, refunded the tickets and ran back, buying water and random snacks in a 30 sec shopping spree. We grabbed our bags and headed to the train with 3mins to spare but found ourselves at the wrong end of the train. With bags on our back and clutching at our food and water, we sprinted as best we could along the train and boarded it seconds before the train started.
We were impressed by our sleeper cabin but struggled to find a food or beverage cart. Settling in we ate our snacks and made ourselves at home, playing cards and watching a movie. Pleasingly when the fourth occupant arrived, he complained to the ticket officer (guessing as we don't know chinese) and was shown to another cabin.
We crashed out and woke about 6am in huangshan and had awesome dumplings near the station. We then caught a packed minibus to take us to the bottom of the yellow mountains
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