18 July

Good-bye, China!

Hopped a cab for what we had been told was a one-hour ride to the Pudong airport. (we had arrived in Shnaghai's other airport, about a ten minute ride from the Galaxy in west Shanghai. Pudong is way across the city in eastern Shanghai.) Cab driver, bless him as were leaving about an hour later than we had wanted, flew: Got there in a little more than half an hour. Lack of traffic -- we beat morning rush leaving the hotel at 6:00?? -- helped as did often going -- well, well over the speed limit....

Girls flew to San Francisco, starting point for two weeks in and around central California.

First, the twin nightmares of starting to finish packing at 4:00 for a prospective 5:00 departure (blown big time). Then I went online where the Shanghai-Beijing appeared to maybe (or maybe not) have been cancelled. Called Air-China, travel agent, no clear answers, decided to continue anyway.

Getting to Beijing was again a nightmare albeit a much lesser one than the prior trip to. Landing initially delayed "because of weather", then we were to land at airport 90 miles away to tank up; that was cancelled and we instead continued on where we landed so late that I pretty much had to rush for my connection. According to "plan", I would have had a little downtime with the girls before boarding. Instead, by the time we got luggage, got checked in, got through customs and got to the gate, my flight was boarding.

Nearing landing in Beijing, we did a little arts and crafts with air sickness bags. I drew a bio-hazard symbol, wrote a warning re: toxic contents and drew a skull and bones. I then filled it with air, sealed, the bag, and gave it to Shayna who gave it to one of the stewardesses on disembarking. I do believe she smiled and got a joke if not the joke....

Otherwise, Beijing to JFK was OK; sold out enough to request people to volunteer to be bumped yet the middle seat in my three-across (on the wing, where there's no seat in front!) was empty; go figure; then again, it is Air-China.

Flight otherwise OK, ditto, the girls' flight.

I bussed to Grand Central then Metro-Northed and cabbed home. Shayna called while I was on the train and they were in a cab en route to their hotel, malready missing her dad....

And Lucy was ever-so-slightly happy to see her dad....

17 July

The end of the road, as it were, a day trip with Sandi to Hangzhou, a small city with a tourist destination of a beautiful lake, mostly surrounded by beautiful hills (albeit not on the level of Guilin), with things to do and buy. We walked two causeways going about one-third across the lake. Donna, Shayna and I took a grossly underpowered boat onto a restricted area of the lake for half an hour, giving Shayna another opportunity to skipper a ship (last being when we busted loose in Peoples' Park in Chengdu).

Ended up at an early dinner in the Hyatt, which had a restaurant where Sandi wanted to eat but which did not open that early. We then tried to shlep back to the train station, Donna stopped to buy food for two little child-beggars and their "responsible adult". Couldn't quite find and make it to the station, ended up cabbing about six blocks... but we were fried....

Returned to the Galaxy and Donna went online to make reservations for San Francisco and even managed to get a few hours of sleep....

Donna Writes the Group....

Hi All,

Shay and I are in CA enjoying the dry cool San francisco days. I really enjoyed traveling with all of you and I miss you. We're out and about all day so it's difficult to find the time to write cos I'm beat at the end of the day. Also, my email account is messed up at the moment awaiting the IT department to straighten it out. We should be home in about 10 days, at which time I will begin to plan the reunion!!!! It's late, so I'm heading to sleep. Just wanted all of you to know that you made our travels so much fun. In fact, the best part of the trip was each of you.

Lots of love,

donna

p.s. to Phil, I'm singing a lullaby to you as I write. hahahhahahaha

Letter from Tibet

One of the parents on our tour, Ron Hollander, writes:

Hi, All.

Because so many expressed envy at Mei Ming's and my Tibet trip, I
thought I'd share some of it with you. In a word, it was stupendous!
I've been all over the world, but nothing compares to the "exoticness"
(I know that's a colonial construct, but there it is) of Lhasa (and we
didn't even take any of the many day trips out of the city). I felt I
could have been confined to one block, and never tired of the scene, nor
never stopped shooting and taping: The stream of Buddhist pilgrims
making pilgrimage to the temple; many of them advancing two steps, then
prostrating themselves on the pavement to the four points of the
compass, then taking two more steps and repeating; push carts of
vegetables and fruits, with hawkers holding hand scales to weigh their
sales; motor scooters with cool kids weaving through the throng; porters
bent under bales of produce; holy men sitting on the street, reciting
page after page of prayers; souvenir booths lining the street; monks in
saffron and maroon robes--some with yellow hoods--posing proudly for me;
the cacophony of hawkers, prayers, bike bells, honking horns...you begin
to get the picture.

The Potola Palace was stunning not merely in its size, looming over the
city, and in its storiedness (remember Shangrila) but in the wealth of
its interior (what happened to ascetic, non-materialistic Buddhism?).
The towering, gold coffins of prior dalai lamas put what I saw in King
Tut's tomb to shame. The city was a fascinating meld of bustling
commerce and intense religiosity. Very friendly; people had the most
stunning smiles, and their faces were so, so different from what we had
seen on our tour. Oddly, many more people spoke English (mostly
Tibetans, not Hans) than I found in most parts of rural China. Bing and
I stayed in a really gorgeous Tibetan hotel that was a converted
merchant's courtyard home ($90/day, though there are many far cheaper).
We slept on kangs, the furniture was all authentic, the walls were stone
and orange rough plaster, and the food (lots of yak) was delicious. So
different from most of our soulless, overly glitzy Chinese hotels.

However, it's not for everyone, and certainly should not be part of our
tour. To start with, you need a travel permit, which of course in
typical Chinese style has to be paid for in renmenbi, not credit card
(one of the reasons we arrived early in Beijing, to visit the tour
operator with our cash, about $100/person). There are no direct flights
(most through Chengdu or Xi'an), so it takes most of a day of travel.
However, we easily bought our tix in advance through our travel agent,
and had them in hand when we arrived in Beijing (about $700/person RT).
Most importantly, Lhasa is at 15,000 feet (some of the surrounding day
trips are to even higher altitudes), and it can take several days to
acclimate. I did fairly well, but Ming was still short of breath and a
little head-achy even when we left, despite her using portable oxygen
bottles commonly available. Apparently there's no predicting who will
be affected; marathoners can suffer, while smokers can feel fine; kids
can be great or not.

Even with the above hassles, it was unbelievable. If travel is to
discover the "other", to find life as different as possible from yours,
then Lhasa is a prime candidate. I want to go back. If any of you want
my email contacts--as I provided some before leaving--let me know.

[Slightly editted for publication.]

16 July

A mellow day; was supposed to go to Hangzhou with Sandi. Got to lovely new Shanghai South rail station to find out that the chosen train was apparently sold out and, perhaps more importantly, no at the station spoke any adequate amount of English.

So bought tickets for 16 July.

We then took the lovely new subway to Shanghai's Peoples' Park. Went on a few rides with Shayna (swinging boat and bumper cars; Sandi rode the carousel with her and Shayna soloed one ride). For some reason, I wasn't the only one eager to bump her on the bumper cars.... Also, again, tool copious photos -- Donna too -- including a few of a woman with a really huge lens, much larger than Professor Hollander's.

From there, went to an amusing, ineptly managed, apparently well-known dumpling restaurant in... Old Town.

From there, our mission was to find the counterfeit center of the city, where the quality merchandise was.

We failed.

Best we could do were DVDs of the brand-spanking new "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" and the relatively aged classic, "The Graduate" for a whopping 14 yuan.

We then toured the nearby Shanghai Library, possibly the largest library with the fewest actual books. (Which makes sense; think about it.)

We then split up, us to return to the hotel to begin packing and to have a mediocre, slightly overpriced dinner at the hotel, after which we went to a local equivalent of 7-11. (Dinner included spaghetti bolognese, reminiscent of '97 except this time the sauce was red but lacking cream and meat... the more things change....

15 July

A mellow day.

Breakfast, in part, with two moms from our bus on the tour, Corinne and Doris.

I stayed back while Shayna and Donna did the last round of gift shopping in Old Town.

We all did brunch with Sandi at M on the Bund. Shayna and Donna then returned to the Galaxy to chill while Sandi and I went to 50 Moganshan Road, a warren of buildings housing galleries and a number of artists' studios. (See this and this and this.)

We walked up the Bund from M, after checking out M's huge bar -- The Glamour Room and Bar -- on the floor below the rooftop restaurant. We then toured the restaurants -- M competitors (all... lacking something in comparison to M) -- next door in 3 the Bund.

We then waled up the Bund, along the river, through the Sunday crowd, towards the creek along which we walked (or tried to walk) towards 50 Moganshan Road until we wussed out and hopped a cab, me shooting the camera about every other step.

The art was generally interesting if, in its frequent derivativeness, short of engaging. (I should say most modern art is to some extent derivative; it is of course what's done with it that matters and little significant -- that is, new, unusual -- was apparent among what we saw. But still, it was an incredible "hot spot" of creativity, something lacking in N.Y.C., so many artists crammed so closely together.)

We then hopped a cab driven by a man with a wee command of English who tried and pump us for a little teaching of the language. He knew July and when Sandi told him it was 15 July, pondered, so to speak, the difference between 15 and its reverse, 51 - until Sandi got a little nervous with traffic and seemingly going the wrong way and got the driver to focus on, like, you know, driving. I, knowing Shanghai like the back of my hand, was almost certain that he was headed generally in the right direction all the way.

We were en route to KABB, home of Shanghai's best burgers (Sandi claimed) so Shayna could have a good burger, not Mickey D's sub-mediocrity. (Of course, she ordered lasagna because Donna wouldn't her to have bacon on her burger.) (Kabb is located in the hip and trendy Xin Tian Di district.)

Got to KABB almost a half-hour later than we told Donna to be there. No sign of the girls for awhile then Donna appeared sans Shayna. She told us that Shayna was playing a game of chess -- on a huge outside board with pieces 2+ feet high -- against a local 9 year old. Alas, she failed to bring honor to the U.S. (unlike at the sckool in Beijing), losing to the geeky little twerp.

After dinner -- adequate frozen Margharitas and burgers for the adults -- it was off for Haagen Dazs for S and D and then back to the Galaxy and bed.