What was unlucky was that we had a mosquito in the room last night! Even Lisa and Michael had the same predicament. Five-star hotels aren't immune to pests. I had hid under the covers; my mom got bit on the face several times. The room was decorated in such dark hues that any attempt to flush it out would be impossible, even with expert mosquito hunting skills I had acquired during childhood. "Sucks" to be sweet.
We had breakfast at the hotel buffet, and it was so good. In fact, it was the best meal of the entire tour, which was sad. My friend Karen gave me a list of restaurants to try in Shanghai and we wanted to go to one last night, but when we asked the local tour guide about it, he said that none of them were good. Sometimes I wonder if he had never gone to those restaurants but feigned expertise since he was supposed to be our tour guide. There is no way that Karen, a fellow foodie, would recommend a place that was not yummy. I'll try again next time I'm in Shanghai. My Chinese visa is good for one year, so I'll be open to mileage running!
Back to describing the best meal on the tour...I'd have considered the buffet to be more like brunch than breakfast. There was just so much food to choose from. Unfortunately I didn't take any pictures as it seemed a bit out of place (for me at least) to whip out a camera in the middle of a 5-star buffet. I will do my best to describe each of the food stations to you.
- Western breakfast - they had the usual scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage buffet trays. Omelettes and eggs could be made to order. Bread and bagels were available to be toasted.
- Noodle soup and congee - everything was freshly made so the cooks would tell you to come back to the station after a few minutes. They'd boil the noodles, then put them in a bowl, pour broth, and garnish with vegetables, yum! They also made congee too: you could choose different kinds like preserved egg and salty pork, pork liver (they'd fry the liver right there), beef slices, etc. A variety of savory toppings were available to sprinkle onto your selection.
- Dim sum - there would be 3-4 types to choose from, in bamboo steamers. They'd have items like phoenix feet, vegetable dumplings, and sweet steamed buns. They'd stack them right on top of each other on a plate and hand them to you. There was a station where they pan-fried pot stickers, turnip cakes, and sweets like lotus seed cake. To display baked dim sum such as egg tarts and BBQ pork pastries, they used a rotisserie normally found in concession stands selling hot dogs, which was a great way to keep them warm. At first, I was grabbing the items while the rotisserie was spinning, but thankfully an employee showed me the button to stop the rotation. I'm sure I looked silly, timing my attempts to fish out pastries like trying to hop into a jumping rope.
- Antipasto - there was a tray with several different types of cheese (hard and soft) along with the usual accompaniments like crackers, olives, cured meats.
- Salad and fruit bar - the usual spread for salad, and lots of freshly cut fruit, ripe and sweet.
- Donuts and pastries - they were displayed like how you'd see them at the grocery store or neighborhood donut shop - trays behind glass. You just lift up the glass door and select whatever you want. Unfortunately, I would always be full by the time I remembered there were donuts.
- Dessert bar - there would be at least six kinds of desserts available. I thought this was only breakfast!? Individually portioned cakes, pies, tarts, and mousses were just the right amount and not too sweet. There were also baskets of different cookies.
A lot of the time, the lines into the pavilions would be hours long. There would be announcements made periodically over the speaker system informing us of the wait times. For some countries, the wait would be 4 hours, another handful with 5 hour waits, and a few pavilions with 6-7 hour waits. 6-7 hours?!?! Do people go to the bathroom? My longest wait was 4 hours and no one let anyone cut back in line, so I doubt people took a bathroom break. I have held it for 10 hours on a plane, but I wasn't standing and was sleeping for most of it. But standing in line for 7 hours? The advice my mom had gotten from her friend who had been there for 6 days was not to wait in line too long for anything...just go see what you can.
Pavilions that we managed to get into:
- Hungary - We waited a little while to get into Hungary. The theme was harmony. I wasn't sure what the wooden sticks meant. They moved with music, and had lights at the ends. There were also interesting sculptures. The steel thing in the middle is a new geometric shape called a "gomboc".
- Turkey - Once we got in, it was way too dark to take pictures. The pavilion talked about the rise of civilization. It was okay. Near the exit to the pavilion, there was a stand selling Turkish ice cream. Not sure what flavor it was, but it looked like vanilla. The server would make all sorts of noise with the metal paddles he was using to scoop the frozen dessert. Most amusing was seeing people all excited to get in line for ice cream because they thought it was free! Once they found out it cost some 20 yuan, they hurried out of there.
- Shanghai Corporate Pavilion - Companies could also sponsor pavilions. (In fact, one of the 7 hour pavilions was the Oil Pavilion. I have no idea what was in there that was so popular.) While waiting in line to get into the Shanghai Corporate Pavilion, there were TV's scattered around like in Disney World. There would be a short clip playing, telling people to clap their hands to show how much power we collectively have, that we could change the color of the fiber optic lights that surrounded the building. Ooh. Once inside, there was an exhibit showing the highlights of Shanghai, and a 360 "Circlevision" movie.
- Caribbean Community Pavilion - As I mentioned earlier, there was no line here as this pavilion hardly had anything in it. In fact, some of the island countries weren't even manned with anyone to stamp people's passports. (the main purpose of most of the people who entered this building)
- SAIC/GM Pavilion - Another company pavilion. We waited a while for this one. Since we had been running around all day and catching Expo shuttles and ferries, it got so tiring standing in line that I succumbed to whipping out a folding stool. About 20% of the people had folding chairs of some sort. I highly recommend having one of these to endure long hours of queuing. They're not too heavy, and fit into a backpack. My parents bought some in Hong Kong, but sturdier folding chairs could be found in stores near the Expo for 10-15 yuan. Chairs were also sold inside the Expo, but for 35 yuan (still affordable!). The piece de resistance of this pavilion was the motion simulator movie. The audience sat in egg-shaped seats with seat belts. When the movie played, the seats would move accordingly. The movie was set in the year 2030, and society is now using smart vehicles that automatically drive, park themselves, can be loaded onto bigger vehicles to travel long distances, etc. Great idea, but not sure if it will really happen in 20 years. After the movie was over, the screen slid out of sight and revealed a stage where the automatic cars were demo'ed. The cars are small-sized.
- "Case" Pavilions - Cities could also have their own pavilions. Not sure why they were named "case pavilions". The pavilions usually featured city highlights. An interesting one was Shenzhen, China; they used art and architecture to show how their city blossomed. A huge mural of Mona Lisa on the side of the pavilion was made by different people assigned to paint individual rectangles and were all put together. There was also this artistic stairway with tons of textures, prints, and images on the walls. There was no one around when we reached this exhibit; just as I was about to get a picture on the stairs, people start coming in and running up the stairs, thinking there was a door or passageway at the top. Hello, it's art! (albeit public-friendly) And I'm taking a picture here!
- Outsides of Pavilions - We didn't get a chance to go into these due to closure or long lines, but they were interesting enough to photograph: Ukraine, Norway, Germany, Pavilion of Footprint (one of five Expo theme pavilions), Oil, Vanke (some Chinese developer), Canada, Coke Pavilion, spiky England, and the jewel of the Expo, the China Pavilion.
Admission to the China Pavilion required tickets. 30,000 tickets are handed out each operating day at the gates at opening time (9am). Our local tour guide told us people are lined up by 4 or 5am, and all the tickets would be gone 5 minutes after opening. Crazy! I wasn't going to line up for hours to get a ticket, and then line up again for 90 minutes to enter the pavilion! Signs outside of the pavilion said something along the lines of "This pavilion will still be here after Expo is over!!!!", attempting to make people feel better about not being to get in. We saw people trying to talk their way into the line, however, this was the most secured line out of all the pavilions. The entrance to the line was manned by at least 6 military officers plus Expo workers. If you insist to see the China Pavilion during official Expo days, here are some tips on TripAdvisor. I think I will wait until my next visit to Shanghai, after the Expo is over. It'd be also an opportunity to try out Karen's restaurant list!
- See how cool the weather was? (in Celsius)
We could not find any decent food. Thank goodness I had eaten a ton for breakfast. My parents had a newspaper insert that listed all sorts of good restaurants, but we couldn't seem to find them. Expo was way too big. For lunch, we found a cafeteria-style sit-down restaurant and I had a curry pork plate. Bleh. We went to a Chinese restaurant for dinner and had a bowl of noodles and xiao long bao. Nothing was worth taking a picture of. The meals weren't cheap by Chinese standards either, around 35 yuan each entree. The cheapest meal I saw was bowls of ramen for 10 yuan. They even provided the hot water. There were lots of people slurping it down. At least there were lots of free purified water stations so you could fill up a water bottle.
The return shuttle left too early for us (7pm), so we had to grab a taxi at the end of the night. There was a long queue, and yet even though we were all exhausted, people still tried to fight their way up the line, even with officers policing the queue. Why can't people wait with manners? Eventually it'll be your turn. We saw people stealing taxis and others trying to smash more people than allowed into a taxi. There is a law that taxi drivers cannot transport more than the stated number of passengers on the side of the car, usually 4. It was a relief to see that the taxi driver refused to provide service to the people who smashed into his car. Said large party eventually broke up into two taxis. We finally get to the head of the line and secure a taxi. You can guess the rest; the taxi driver was unfamiliar with the hotel's location since it was so new. After being up for 15 hours and feet aching, getting lost in a taxi cab was torture. We had to call Tammy (our tour leader) to give directions to the driver. We eventually find the hotel and take a refreshing shower. I was not looking forward to another day at Expo after today's adventure. Please let there not be a mosquito in the room tonight!
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