Susan's Shanghai Blog - Week 31

Back in Shanghai for another week. So, there is really no theme for this week, it is really just a mish-mash of pictures that we've taken this week.

Several weeks back, we ended up with a set of vouchers for a bakery called Ichido that we could use for anything we wanted. So Tom and I headed over to one of the stores near us, in the Super Brand mall. The desserts got wrapped up in this really cute box that kinda looks like a little purse. The desserts were really good, and reminded us of French desserts.

We've been watching the construction of a new entrance to the Lujiazui metro stop. This one is right on the South side of the IFC mall (you can see the Lv logo of the Louis Vuitton store. It's been at about this far along for a month or so, and it doesn't seem like much has been going on ... hopefully they are doing work downstairs. We are still not sure exactly where it is going to hook into the metro station, which is on the other side of the IFC mall. Right now, most of the time we walk through the mall to get to the metro stop instead of walking around it. We are hoping this is a little shortcut.

More construction, this one across the street from the Shanghai Tower that they are building. It is interesting to see the difference in the construction. The Shanghai Tower has this core of concrete and then metal supports around the outside. This one seems to have more open space in the middle with concrete pillars.

A set of us from work went out to lunch one day, and they brought us this little pre-lunch drink made of different fruit juices. The unique thing about it was the presentation. They came out 4 to a "vase" and they looked like flowers in a vase. You can see the little beads in the bottom like sometimes you see in flower vases to keep the flowers from moving around. Also, they had something that formed smoke/mist that you can see in the picture at the top. Kinda cool!

As you know, we have this little artifical pond in the middle of the complex that had ducks and fish. Well, it seems that when the temperatures became really cold, the fish all seemed to congregate in one little corner of the pond, right next to the plexiglass corner. Not sure why ... you would think that the middle of the pond would be warmer than right next to glass exposed to the open cold air. But, sure enough, there they all are, huddled in the corner. They sort of look "frozen" ... but they aren't.

The IFC Mall had a display of Bovey Lee cut paper, sponsored by Hugo Boss. They have these really good pictures .. they look etched in glass but I believe they are cut paper inside glass.

The Shanghai Museum was also this week, since it was really cold and we decided it best to find an indoor activity. First was the Chinese money section. These are all forms of Chinese money dating back through the ages. They started with things that looked like shovels or knives, with different sizes being different amounts. They then moved to round shapes with square holes in the middle, which made them easy to "string together". I also captured pictures of a couple bills, some of which were printed for different banks, such as the Chartered Bank of India, Australia, and China.

There was also a section with furniture. Some of the chairs and tables were quite interesting.

This is an interesting-shaped stool, and we've seen this same shape stool in alot of different places.

We also went through a section with Jade. This one is interlocked dragons from the Warring States period from 475-221 BC.

A Deer and a Dog, both from the Song Dynasty from 960-1279 AD.

There was also an entire area that contained traditional dress from various area or provinces in China. Some were from hundreds of years ago, and some were from as recent as the 1970's.

There were these really nice looking boats as well.

And a set of tibetan masks. Tom was trying to make the same face ... Twins I think!

They had a section with art as well, both fans and watercolor paintings.

Huai Su (725-785) was a native of the Changsha Hunan province. He became a monk when he was young and adopted the Buddhist name Zangzhen. Huai Su was famous for his running script calligraphy.

More little statues and pottery.

This is a food vessel (Li) with an animal mask from the mid Shang dynasty (mid 15th - 13th centuries BC). There are also wine vessels and a pot that has these bronze animals in the main bowl section.

These are the Bells of Marquis Su of Jin and date from the mid 9th century BC.

This is a Cowrie-container with 8 yaks, from the Western Han, dating 206 BC - 8 AD. The top has yaks while the handles are these tiger/cat looking creatures.

A few interesting sculptures as well...

The museum itself had an interesting open-center design.

Next week we will take a break from Shanghai and jet off to Paris for the week. A little bit of business for a few days and then a few days of vacation.