dulemba: Shanghai!

Shanghai looks different even before you land.

The buildings lie in a very distinctive grid that goes on and on and on and on!
I had heard correctly - there are English "subtitles" on most signage, but the not-quite-rightness of that English was a hint that the language barrier might be a little higher than I orginally suspected. This one read "Best airport experience for centuries."

I was able to navigate the airport and getting a taxi to my hotel, it just takes time when you're having to figure out the process and the language. The hotel was worth the wait. I stayed at The Kerry at a colleague's recommendation. Here was my view.

And while this isn't a great photo, it gives you an idea of how high up I was - the view gave me a bit of vertigo!

I stayed at two hotels between Shanghai and Hangzhou, and can happily report that all the hotel bathrooms (all two) were this nice! (Public bathrooms, on the other hand, were holes in the floor. They were ceramic and flushed, but my knees weren't used to that style toilet!)

But my favorite part about China was the food. They had me at breakfast!

The Kerry is obviously a popular international conference destination, so they serve a traditional American breakfast, but also a traditional English, Chinese, and ... fill in the blank breakfast too. I just went down the buffet putting little bits of all the things I didn't recognize and wow, was that awesome! From the upper left is congee (a rice porridge with all manner of savory toppings to choose from - my fave was a marinated tofu the color of beets with a decidedly alchoholic kick to it. Going clockwise from the congee is a spicy potato salad, salami with a cornichon, lotus root with rice stuffing, pork and greens stuffed bun, pickled cucumger, pickled ginger, turnip pastry (also one of my faves!), pork dumpling, and kimchee. Oh, and grapefruit juice. One of the best things was the Dragon Fruit.