Eight Airplanes in Six Days: A Whirlwind Preview Tour, Part I

Modified from email sent Monday, August 14, 2006
Shanghai Grand Hyatt

We got to the hotel by about six pm local time yesterday (Sunday, August 13). The plane landed at 3:30, but we were an hour getting through immigration. All the signs were in English and Chinese, but we were so far back in line that we couldn't see even how long the line was, much less what was waiting at the front. I thought for awhile that, being Sunday, perhaps Immigration was not fully staffed, but once we got closer we saw that there were 40 lanes - all of which were occupied. There just that many people trying to get into the country.

After that, Customs was a breeze - just handed our Nothing to Declare card as we passed through the Baggage Claim exit. On the other side, we had to snake through was a long, twisty, roped off corridor that lined on all sides with people meeting arrivals. There was all kinds of shoving behind the ropes, agents of various hotels and touring companies vying for position to make their signs visible to those of use coming through the corridor.

We saw the Grand Hyatt sign right away - he'd staked out a very favorable position - and the man said to meet him at the end of the corridor. I tried to memorize his face in the two seconds before he disappeared, having no idea how long the corridor was (pretty long, it turned out), and forgetting that we were probably easy to spot. Where the corridor opened out - where the ropes ended was closed off by a semi-circle of waiting people, but he pushed his way through and waved us forward. He then passed us off to another man, who took our bags, and without a word, led us up two escalators to the pick-up level. He waved to a car waiting, and put our bags in the trunk. Thank you, was all he said. Xie xie, we said back.

The driver didn't have much English, but did tell us the ride would take about 40 minutes. Then he handed us two small bottles of water from a little cooler in the passenger's seat, which we downed in about 30 seconds.

The roadside all along the highway from the airport into Shanghai (all thirty miles of it) is meticulously landscaped. Among the predictable palms, I was also surprised to see crepe myrtles and mimosa trees, as well as several other plants I recognize but cannot name. Through the infrequent gaps, you could see a desolate industrial landscape.

Sunday is not a "day off" for everyone. There were all sorts of crews - in their wide-brimmed chinese straw hats - working on the roads, watering, grooming and pruning. Once we got into the city, you could see crews working on the many, many skyscrapers under construction.

The Grand Hyatt occupies the top 30 stories or so of the Jin Mao Tower, the tallest building in China at 88 stories. (The tallest building in the world - at 101 stories - is located in Taipei. It's called 'The 101".) The rooms are arranged on the perimeter of the building, so every one of them has a view. And inside, they've left the interior open, so you are looking up and down thirty stories of interior space. R hugs the wall as we make our way from the elevator to our rooms.

We had a wonderful meal last night at one of the hotel's five restaurants, The Canton. It was expensive, but the food was worth it. I tried the hot and sour soup, just compare to what we get at Shun Li Palace. In place of tofu, it had some kind of fish in it. It wasn't bad, but not what my mouth was expecting, so I couldn't get used to it.

We learned something about the culture here - we waited and waited for the check - they came and cleared our table, but didn't bring the check until we asked. Then they stood there and waited until we paid. That happened at every restaurant we went to during our stay.

We were so beat, we went straight from dinner and got into bed, about nine pm. Not counting couple of hours of dozing on the plane, we'd been up for 26 hours. But then by two am, we were were wide awake, our bodies programed to think it was mid-afternoon. (China is 12 hours ahead of EST.) Actually, R was awake, so he got me up. We were able to fall back asleep between four and six, when R had to get up for work.