Huangpu: Downtown Shanghai (part 1)

If you're having trouble imagining what Shanghai is like, or how the city is set up. Think of Boston for a minute. I live in an area much like the North End, small, quieter, good international cuisine and in a great location to everything else in the city. The main downtown area is in a section called Huangpu, this is also the name of the main river that flows through Shanghai.  This area is like Government Center in Boston. There are some touristy areas Hong Kong Shopping Mall and The Dragon Gate Mall (Faneuil Hall & Downtown Crossing), parks - People's Park is very similar to the Boston Common/Garden area, and there are plenty of museums, hotels, restaurants, businesses, bums & peddlers.

One of the noticeable differences between Huangpu and Boston is the visual clutter and the light pollution. Everywhere you look there are big screen TVs spewing out advertisements, neon lights that adorn EVERY building in the area, and signs directing traffic & pedestrians every which way. On one hand it is helpful that everything is labeled but on the other hand it is hard to weed out what is necessary information and what you can ignore because EVERYTHING is labeled.

I did manage to navigate my way to the Shanghai Museum. (See me in front of it above) This museum is a treasure trove of Chinese art, culture and history. It holds more than 120,000 artifacts, representing almost 5 millenia of continuous civilization. (Or so the guidebook says) It is four stories high and has about a dozen exhibits. The building itself is inspired by the da ke ding - an ancient, three-legged bronze cooking vessel. It took me 2 and a half hours to go through the museum and I was losing steam by the end. Some of the exhibits I saw include: jade, bronze, ceramics, calligraphy, painting, currency and furniture. This was a great overview of the history of China through art.

Once out of the museum I made my way down to the Dragon Gate Mall. This is not a mall like we think of at home, it is more like Downtown Crossing or Faneuil Hall. (See last image above) Here, East meets West. Traditional style buildings with modern shops. Most of the shops are filled with pearls, silk, jade or other materials native to China. Here you can bargain with the shopkeepers to try to get the best bang for your buck. I'm sure this is one of many places to get traditional items and souvenirs for friends and family back home!