We survived Shanghai: Day 2

We started our day with a breakfast at a fast food near FX Hotel.

Stewed Beef + Rice

It was a gloomy day. In fact, there was news that a typhoon will be hitting Shanghai. So we decided to go to the Urban Planning Museum, which is at the People’s Square.

near People's Square Exit

We happened to pass by Renmin Park. This is beside the Urban Planning Museum.

Top: Pull and Bear | Shorts: Thrifted

Saw Pixar Museum but the entrance fee was expensive - it was 100 CNY (about 600 pesos. Well, its expensive for us) so we just ignored it and continued walking along.

Lotus Garden at the Park…

As we walked along, I saw these labels…

Does it look familiar to you? This place seems really familiar to me until I remembered the show at TLC a year ago where they featured a place in Shanghai where parents of singles arrange for their partners. Every weekend at the park, parents (with or without their children’s consent) arrange meetings, dates and potential matches for their children. And yes, this is where the selections happen.

I was amazed at the number of parents there, with pictures and I think biodata on their hands chatting to other parents. Wow, it is true-to-life! Hehe.

This is also the place where scammers roam about, looking for tourists to swindle. Beware. Jori and I were taking shots when someone asked Jori if he could take a photo of them. He agreed. Then they introduced themselves. They told us that they were students from Beijing studying English language and they were in Shanghai as tourists as well. They befriended us, which we thought was normal because they were just honing their English. After a few minutes of schmoozing, they invited us to a ceremonial tea with them since the museum we planned on going to might be filled up with students. Jori seemed interested in joining, he was thinking of adding some new friends, and they might help us someday if we go to Beijing. I on the other hand am having doubts because I really want to tour the city and we might have not enough time if we went with them. So we declined. Luckily, they did not persuade us further.

And you know what? After that day, when we were at our hotel and I was browsing the Shanghai book when I read this:

Shanghai Scam: Hello, can you help us take a photo?  Beware at the People’s Square station near Shanghai Museum, , The Bund, and East Nanjing Road where there are youths posing as students who will engage tourists in conversation. Once the converstation begins, it will inevitably end with an invitation to a traditional tea ceremony. Intrigued? Don't be. You'll  wind up with a 100 USD bill and a private escort to the closest ATM. 

Whoah. I was shocked. All of the keywords matched: At People’s Square, youth, students, invitation to a ceremonial tea! We were fortunate we didn’t join them. So beware of this scam!

Anyway, after touring around the park, we proceeded to Urban Planning Museum. It wasn’t crowded as opposed to what those scammers told us.

Urban Planning Museum

Here, we were amazed not only with the development of Shanghai,

Progressive Photos of the Bund

But also as how they foresaw its future.

Shanghai City Plan

Closer View

Hmmm...I wonder if the Philippines have this plan.

Had lunch at Raffles City! Oh yeah, the owner of this mall is the same owner of Raffles City mall in Singapore!

Jori met some suppliers in the afternoon. Afterwards, we again passed by the Bund.

The Bund
See the dark clouds? It was just like that all day long.

The Bund Bull made for the Bund Financial Square

Then we went at Xintiandi and Huai Hai Road. I wanted to buy something from H&M so we walked along Huai Hai Middle Road where we found so many shops…

But still no H&M... so we decided to have our dinner at Pankoo, a Korean restaurant.

Cod Fish Rice Bowl

Hot Pot Noodles - (I think it's 68 CNY)
yummy soup + big serving = sulit

Free gum! Wala nito sa Singapore! Haha

After dinner, we continued our search until we finally reached H&M...

And that’s it. I became so busy browsing their items that I didn’t realize that they were already closing up for the day. Time for us to head back to the hotel.