Onto Shanghai
Shanghai Journal - Part 1
A farewell to Hong Kong last Tuesday took me back to Shenzhen in China for the first time in nearly two years. There, I met a couple of friends for a short visit before dragging Peter to Shanghai with me last Thursday.
Our flight to Shanghai was quite amusing, although it could have also been classified as scary. Travelling by China Eastern, we took the very basic state-owned Airbus airliner to the 'new' Pudong Airport in Shanghai. Basic is the right word for it. The seats in the plane were more reminiscent of flights I had taken in the 1980s than more recently (the seats still had ashtrays for example), rather than the swish airliners I've taken recently like Virgin and even lo-cost easyJet. Oh, how some things need to catch up in China.
Towards the end of the short two hour flight, we encountered some turbulance. Nothing special about that, almost all flights encounter turbulance. However, the cabin assistant felt it had to be necessary to announce that the seat belt sign was now on and everyone should return to the seats. It's okay to do that once. She decided to do it five times, every five minutes or so. No one had been standing. Not surprising, as you'd think we'd all have got the message by then.
Arriving at Pudong with a very big bump, it seemed our airline couldn't pay for a proper gate since we hadn't paid enough for the tickets, so we had to endure the bus journey to the terminal. As we were coming down the steps from the plane, it was noticable that there was a large rattling noise. Looking left, the engine cover was open with two bemused men looking closely at the innards of the jet engine. Interesting. As we got on the bus and drove away, I couldn't help but notice next to the plane two new tyres for the front nosewheel. The old ones on the plane were completely worn out. Must have been our bump...
But we all arrived in one piece and I can't say that any of what we saw had impacted the safety of our flight, but I do have to say that travelling by this particular airline provided a little more excitement than the usual.
Zoom into Shanghai
We decided to be a bit snobbish and took the Maglev train into Shanghai. 19 miles in length, it reaches the outskirts of the Shanghai Metro network and cost RMB 10bn (US$ 1.2bn, c. £700m) to build. Reaching up to 430 km/h (267mph) (but 300km/h in off-peak times), it only takes 7-8 mins to cover the distance between the two stops. Impressive, if not overblown!
The only problem is that the Maglev terminal for Shanghai is in the middle of nowhere (okay, well Pudong, as a matter of fact). It does mean that you still need to take a twenty minute Metro journey to get into central Shanghai, which Peter and I did. Whilst initially, this was okay, as we approached People's Square station, the carriages got very full. At least in London, the Tube only gets "full", in Shanghai, the last remaining person on the platform will push with all their might to get onto the train. I've been in scrums, rucks and mauls as a kid, but this was tough, particularly when towing a suitcase. Shame I had a suitcase. with Peter, a prop in his rugby playing days, I wouldn't have minded being a wing-forward and joining in with a rolling maul.
Above ground, Shanghai is a beautiful and amazing city. My own experiences are that you'll either grow to love or hate a city within the first few minutes of seeing it. With Shanghai, it was almost love at first sight in terms of a city. Its beauty is a Eurasian combination of the old and the new, architecture from an era gone by intermingled with the prowess of skyscrapers all around. Unlike New York, none of it is overwhelming, in fact, it drives curiosity. A curiosity of how the city became like it is now...
More:
Shanghai Journal: Part 1 | 2 | 3
A farewell to Hong Kong last Tuesday took me back to Shenzhen in China for the first time in nearly two years. There, I met a couple of friends for a short visit before dragging Peter to Shanghai with me last Thursday.
Our flight to Shanghai was quite amusing, although it could have also been classified as scary. Travelling by China Eastern, we took the very basic state-owned Airbus airliner to the 'new' Pudong Airport in Shanghai. Basic is the right word for it. The seats in the plane were more reminiscent of flights I had taken in the 1980s than more recently (the seats still had ashtrays for example), rather than the swish airliners I've taken recently like Virgin and even lo-cost easyJet. Oh, how some things need to catch up in China.
Towards the end of the short two hour flight, we encountered some turbulance. Nothing special about that, almost all flights encounter turbulance. However, the cabin assistant felt it had to be necessary to announce that the seat belt sign was now on and everyone should return to the seats. It's okay to do that once. She decided to do it five times, every five minutes or so. No one had been standing. Not surprising, as you'd think we'd all have got the message by then.
Arriving at Pudong with a very big bump, it seemed our airline couldn't pay for a proper gate since we hadn't paid enough for the tickets, so we had to endure the bus journey to the terminal. As we were coming down the steps from the plane, it was noticable that there was a large rattling noise. Looking left, the engine cover was open with two bemused men looking closely at the innards of the jet engine. Interesting. As we got on the bus and drove away, I couldn't help but notice next to the plane two new tyres for the front nosewheel. The old ones on the plane were completely worn out. Must have been our bump...
But we all arrived in one piece and I can't say that any of what we saw had impacted the safety of our flight, but I do have to say that travelling by this particular airline provided a little more excitement than the usual.
Zoom into Shanghai
We decided to be a bit snobbish and took the Maglev train into Shanghai. 19 miles in length, it reaches the outskirts of the Shanghai Metro network and cost RMB 10bn (US$ 1.2bn, c. £700m) to build. Reaching up to 430 km/h (267mph) (but 300km/h in off-peak times), it only takes 7-8 mins to cover the distance between the two stops. Impressive, if not overblown!
The only problem is that the Maglev terminal for Shanghai is in the middle of nowhere (okay, well Pudong, as a matter of fact). It does mean that you still need to take a twenty minute Metro journey to get into central Shanghai, which Peter and I did. Whilst initially, this was okay, as we approached People's Square station, the carriages got very full. At least in London, the Tube only gets "full", in Shanghai, the last remaining person on the platform will push with all their might to get onto the train. I've been in scrums, rucks and mauls as a kid, but this was tough, particularly when towing a suitcase. Shame I had a suitcase. with Peter, a prop in his rugby playing days, I wouldn't have minded being a wing-forward and joining in with a rolling maul.
Above ground, Shanghai is a beautiful and amazing city. My own experiences are that you'll either grow to love or hate a city within the first few minutes of seeing it. With Shanghai, it was almost love at first sight in terms of a city. Its beauty is a Eurasian combination of the old and the new, architecture from an era gone by intermingled with the prowess of skyscrapers all around. Unlike New York, none of it is overwhelming, in fact, it drives curiosity. A curiosity of how the city became like it is now...
More:
Shanghai Journal: Part 1 | 2 | 3
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home