Wind.

Didn’t update on Friday because I was out for the whole day. Woke up very early in the morning to go to Fudan University for the NUS Enterprise Day. It’s not as if the Enterprise Day was held there, but because they were having some live webcast debate between the NOC students from Shanghai, Silicon Valley, Bio Valley and Singapore. In the end SV won (even though some of us had pretty different opinions about the final results – we still think our Shanghai team was the best), but I guess it was an interesting event for us here in Shanghai anyway – at least the lot of us from NCS3 and NCS2 managed to have a nice time interacting.

Inside the Fudan University campus – this is what an ideal university campus should look like.

With lots of space, and few tall buildings.

With such a serene environment, it is definitely a place to study in.

Went back to office for work after the debates, and went to some restaurant in the evening for the official NCS2/NCS3 dinner hosted by Gabriel. I think the meal was pretty good, and thank God we weren’t paying for it cos I think it would cost us a couple of bombs. After dinner some of us went for a walkaround from Shimen No.1 Road to People’s Square, where we then go for a night out in a karaoke. The thing about Shanghaiese karaoke is that it costs horribly cheap after midnight. I think our total bill was about 400 RMB for 12 people, which worked out to roughly about 35 RMB per person – and that’s 7 SGD! And another fascinating thing is that the songs are so updated it brings places like Party World and K-Box in Singapore to shame! We all had a great time there and if not for the fact that we woke up too early in the morning, I think I really could have stayed until 4.30.

Taken at Mei Long Zhen Restaurant 梅龙镇酒家 – it seems that this restaurant is awarded some youth commendation from the Chinese Communist Party. In China, it perhaps is one of the best commendations you can get.

Went to office in the morning to copy out some stuffs before going to get my hair done. My soft spot against salespersons came back to haunt me again as I somehow agreed to do a treatment and apply for the membership card, which cost me 500 RMB. Well, the good thing is the card is transferrable, so whoever wants to get his or her hair done in Shanghai at this chain of hairdressers call Wenfeng please give me a call at the usual number!

Had a walkabout in Qipu Road and Xiangyang Market and some of them went for a bargaining hunt. They spent quite a lot of time doing the bargaining and while obviously it worked (they managed to bring the price of a scarf from 120 RMB to 20 RMB), I reckon it was slightly too time-consuming. I bought myself a bag in double quick time and with bargain as well! Here’s what happened:

Me: How much is this bag?
Shopkeeper: 70 RMB.
Me: That’s horribly expensive.
Shopkeeper: I reduce it to 60 RMB for you. It’s quite cheap already.
Me: 60 RMB? No way. 30 RMB.
Shopkeeper: 50 RMB.
Me: 30.
Shopkeeper: 45 RMB. I can’t lower it further.
Me: 30.
Shopkeeper: 40.
Me: 30. (beginning to walk away)
Shopekeeper: OK, OK. 30 RMB then.

The whole process took less than a minute and I got what I want with bargain. That was effectiveness.

One of the banners hung at Xiangyang Market 襄阳市场 – it roughly means that those illegal sellers (ie counterfeit product sellers) must be stamped out. The strange thing (or maybe it wasn’t so strange after all) was that I think everyone was selling counterfeit goods there. Oh well.

Went to Xin Tian Di after dinner for another walkabout. Xin Tian Di is this place in which there are a lot of nice pubs with some live performances by singers and bands. The closest you can have in Singapore would probably be Clarke Quay, but I don’t think it even comes close to comparing with Xin Tian Di.

The sad thing about today was that it was incredibly windy, and with it blowing the wind from the north, it just made for a very cold and unbearable night.

Xin Tian Di 新天地 – A very nicely furnished place.

Here’s some of the pics that I didn’t maanged to put up that night regarding the restaurant in which the waiters and waitresses sing while serving:

Nicely dressed waitress.

Dumplings in different colours, but they all tasted great.

Maybe my camera wasn’t good, but this fish was on fire when it was served.

This waiter sang us all a song after he served us the fish that was on fire.

Beginning to realise a couple of things after these couple of days in Shanghai. I figure sometimes it’s not a nice thing to fight with someone over something, even though you may want it very much. Learning to accept and to let go may be a good idea sometimes.