Month: November 2005

i’ll explain two of the main reasons i love living in shanghai, imagine it’s 7pm, you’ve been working all day (or rather your flat mate enya has been working all day) and you’re hungry. just flick though a restaurant listing, or think of one you already know, text your mates and walk out the door. for us it’s a 22 floor ride in an elevator and a 50m walk to the road where at that time in the evening i can usually hail a taxi before i’ve reached the curb. a taxi will cost around 60p providing you can say “wo men qu julu lu mao ming nan lu lukou” correctly. sit around a table with a bunch of mates eating and drinking good food and beer till you’re stuffed. pay maybe £5, then go rent a video, blockbusters in shanghai is a little more basic and requires looking though a suitcase or wooden box of fresh out the cinema movies on the side of the street – they’re 50p for keeps! you could however jump in taxi across town to another bar, or maybe taxi to a mates house to watch your new dvd. it doesn’t matter because unlike any where else i’ve ever lived, when you want to go home at 2 am, you just walk out the door, stick your hand out and a taxi is there. they’re always there, they’re brilliant, shanghai taxis you make my world go round.

well i suppose this could have happened to me in any city but i feel the need to share my first stage experience. i’ve always been scared at shows with audience participation, scared that i may have to get up on stage naked or something. and last night i went one of shanghai expensive and fancy bars to see a caberet singer who’s name was meow meow, she is completely insane, sings nonsense in 7 languages and was possibly the most entertaining 2 hours i’ve ever had sitting down. except for the part where i wasn’t sitting down and was stood on the albeit small stage. i was some sort of prop in the performance and still have a bruise to prove it. brilliant. 5 stars.