Transportation, Touch, Translation, Transactions

August 9, 2009 day 2 in Shanghai. I arrived on the evening on Friday and Saturday consisted of going to the school I will be working at, meeting up with another teacher and trying to purchase some basis. I live on a street called Hong Mei Road in the suburb HongMei Lu. There are a lot of people in the streets so it does not feel like a suburb but is a lot quieter after being into the center in Shanghai. I still do not have hot water, it is not soo bad to deal with since it is 30 degrees C and 75% humidity.
This morning I decided that I would go to Carrefour, a french chain store with house hold things and many shops in it. I went down the street to the right instead of the left. I walked to an area with only Chinese signs (on my street most of the signs have some english as well) and most people were staring at me on the street.
did not find the store so went back and met a woman from school to explore Shanghai center. She is a French woman who is moving from Australia so it makes her accent rather interesting. She wanted to try to get to the center using public transportation. We just got on a bus as we were not sure which one and tried to ride it until we got to a metro stop. We got off too early and had to get a cab to the station. Luckily the driver had a phrase book and that is how we finally communicated with him. Then we got on the metro to People’s square at the top of the main pedestrian shopping street, Nanjing. We walked through the streets and I definitely stuck out so much that an elderly man came up to me grabbed me on the arm and said “nee how” which means ‘Hello” then gave me a huge smile and a thumbs up. About 40 minutes later on a different street a woman in her 60’s came up to me, touched my arm and started laughing and saying “Nee how”, big smile and a thumbs up. Then asked my colleague if she was my mother and touched my arm giggled then rubbed her head on my arm., perhaps for good luck I am not sure. Either way I gave her a good laugh, I guess being blonde and 5’9’’ prompts that reaction, never worked in Norway.
We continued to wander, found the Bund with a lot of construction and strange/foul smells. We were trying to head to the French concession and it ended up being further by foot than we thought so caught a little scooter there. Basically is it tricycle with a bench that you sit on backwards. We saw some 4 Chinese girls pile out of one. I was super nervous about this and hung on as the guy speeded between traffic, over pot holes, over construction areas. We were going backwards which is probably better so we could not see what was in front of us. We got some funny looks and one woman in a car was laughing hard at my nervous face, and waved. I waited for the thumbs up but did not get it. After about 15 minutes in this things we got to the Fuxing Park in the French Concession. There were so many people sitting around (even in the main street people were just sitting around) playing cars, board games, kids catching fish and women standing around and singing. After walking around the park and lunch we headed back to Hong Me Lu to get some supplies.
At the store there were people in every aisle to help with your selections. I went to find laundry detergent and one of the ladies went on and on about it in Mandarin I am sure explaining how great it was. She kept pointing and to the Chinese Characters as if that would convince me to purchase this product. The only English on the whole thing was “Mite Laundry detergent”. I was unsure if that was against Mites? If I need to be concerned about these bugs so much that I need to wash my clothes with this detergent? Or if the translator really meant ‘This detergent MIGHT work”. I did not take it, so she grabs another bottle that has NO English on it and again points to the Chinese Characters and goes off in Mandarin. I guess to younger people I do not prompt the touch-thumps-up approach.