adventure shoes.: Hello Asia; Hello Shanghai

Note: sporadic internet access (and laziness) prevented me from posting these in real time, but maybe we can just pretend they were posted throughout the trip and not six weeks after the fact. Apologies in advance as most of these will be very photo heavy posts; much of the photo credit belongs to J.

你好 (Hello). We're in China! We booked last minute tickets and a week later, we were Shanghai-bound to spend Chinese New Years with J's family. So far, we've spent our first few days in Shanghai recovering from jet lag (16-hour time difference) and eating our weight in delicious food (lucky for us, and unluckily for our respective BMIs, J's uncle is a chef).

A Temple in downtown Shanghai (old world meets new world), which we visited during one of our first days in Shanghai

Contrast between modern skyscrapers and old Temple

After a few days of recovery we spent the weekend exploring Shanghai and surrounding area with J's family. On Saturday, we headed to 西塘古镇 (Xitang city), the "Venice" of Zhejiang province, built around a canal. Here, we explored the sights, a few museums, and meandered along the canal, weaving in and out of the many trinket shops and stops.

On Sunday, we spent the day getting lost in the masses in downtown Shanghai at the 城隍庙 (Chenhuang Temple), which is now surrounded by shops and stalls where you can buy traditional Shanghai food (notably, the Shanghai steamed pork bun) and souvenirs. We ate at a typical Shanghai restaurant, devouring all of the dishes that are well-known in Shanghai. Cuisine is such a big (huge) part of Chinese culture, and each region is well known for a specific type of cuisine: Shanghai - sweet, Beijing - salty, Guangzhou - light and fresh, Szechuan - spicy, etc. Needless to say, we did our fair share of eating on this trip; it was great.

Chenhuang Temple

The Temple and the people

Next day it was off to Beijing for J and me (where I'm writing this blog post and) where we're spending a few days exploring. We arrived yesterday and successfully navigated the subway from the airport to the downtown hotel in rush hour ("successfully navigating" meaning J held onto me, leading me between subway lines, and making sure not to lose me in the mass crowds, while I, like a 5 year old, gaped wide-eyed at the sheer number of people).

We found our hotel and checked in, before heading back out to find some grub. After eating, we walked out of the restaurant and straight into what we thought was a night market, stalls and stalls of street food lining the busy road. J somehow convinced me that we should try cicadia larvae, as it was the most "unique and interesting" food we could find. The taste was, well...unique and interesting (can't say I'll be rushing back for more anytime soon) and I officially became the world's worst vegetarian.

Deciding to meander a little further, we inadvertently stumbled on the real night market; one of the most well known in Beijing (and the original we had set out to find in the beginning). It was lined with red Chinese lanterns and more unique street meat (snake, anyone? OK, snake's not your thing, perhaps starfish then?). The market was surrounded with the hustle and bustle of people scurrying about, some selling food and others buying it. We were of the latter group, and not to be outdone, promptly bought a kebab of fried scorpion (when in Rome...). Although skeptical at the idea of eating something that could kill us, we lived to tell the tale (shocking, I know - the food being sold at the food market doesn't actually kill you). Surprisingly, unlike the larvae, the taste wasn't bad either; they were so small and fried so crispy, you couldn't really taste much of anything. I guess, if you're going to [potentially] die from eating something, it might as well be deep fried.