Another weekend whizzes by

Saturday I made myself take a slow morning, which was fairly successful. The extra sleep it awarded me seemed to kick my cold, at least. Headed out around noon to the Jade Buddha Temple. Looked like a pretty easy walk from the train station, so I took the bus there and easily found a road that turned into a bridge, clearly indicating that it was the one that would take me across the river. I walked across the entire thing before realizing the street names didn't match up and I had just crossed railroad tracks, not a river.

Backtracked and found the right road and a thunderstorm. Did a combination of cowering under awnings and getting wet, and made it to the temple. It was actually a lot cooler than the other ones I'd been to...more to see, a more harmonious feel. There were a mix of Chinese and foreigners, but some of each were there to be tourists and some of each were there to worship. I may or may not have latched onto a group of American high school students and listened to their tour guide discuss the two particularly awesome Buddhas. (No photos allowed, sorry!) By then, the rain was on and off, but there was still thunder, which added a really cool effect to the hush of the temple.

Left the temple and stopped in a cheap place for lunch while it began to pour again, then willed a taxi to appear out of the mist and took it to Pudong. Paid a visit to the Shanghai Ocean Aquarium, which was really cool. Haven't been to an aquarium since the last time I went to the Shedd, which was at least a few years ago. Lots of cool and creepy animals, including the world's longest, like, tube where you ride through and are surrounded by ocean life. I also saw some penguins, which I had failed to do at the Minnesota Zoo, despite being advised to do so by multiple friends. (I don't think we have any...)

Went from there to the Jing'an Si metro stop where I was meeting Amy for dinner. Had some time to kill, so passed up the chance to check out "Email Fashion Plaza" and instead saw the Children's Palace, which is a kinda cool mansion from 1918 now used for all sorts of children's singing classes and things like that. Amy and I then went out of Japanese food, which was really good, and got a cream puff on the way out. Stopped at her apartment, then met up with some of her (our?) friends at O'Malleys. Went from their to Air, and from there to Attica, and from there back to Amy's.

Sunday we had a lazy morning and then I headed home. Made myself presentable and then went to meet up with the Chi Heng people at Pizza Express, by invitation from Chung To, our founder and chair. (He's also kind of a big deal in the AIDS-fighting world.) Got there early, so stopped in at the site of the First National Congress of the Communist Party. Not terribly exciting, but air conditioned and free. Did some eating and chatting at Pizza Express with Chung, Simon, Rose, Holly, and some volunteer-y people. They had come from the Big Event, which was a instance of Basketball without Boarders...Yao Ming, Scottie Pippen, and a few other NBA (or former NBA) players hung out with and played basketball with kids from Chi Heng and a couple of other organizations. Cool, right?? The staff were all pretty exhausted by the time I joined up with them, but it was great to get to talk to them all more. Holly is '02 from BU, and interned with Chi Heng a couple of years ago before becoming staff in Beijing. It was really nice to talk to her about the organization and being an expat.

Spent the evening on Huaihai Lu, doing some shopping and general looking around.