Our first morning in Shanghai was great! We had a large breakfast with zhouk, desserts, breads, and more. Our relatives had bought quite a bit of food and snacks for our time here...my uncle bought SIX watermelons from a rural farm for us, so we were downing watermelon 24/7.
Afterwards, we went to go visit the burial ground in which my late grandfather was. I'm not going to go into too much detail about this as it is rather personal, but the area is beautiful and very scenic, and many of shanghai's most well-known people are buried or cremated there. We spent the morning paying our respects to him and then went out to lunch at anice restaurant with many of our Shanghainese relatives. It's very interesting; the way you order dishes here is different from in America or other places with a traditional menu...they put out the actual dishes, all shrink-wrapped, and you point to the ones you want so that a waitress/waiter can punch the respective codes into a little remote and order them.
The restaurant offered Indian breads, freshly made, but they'd unfortunately made a sign saying Indian Beards. Lol I was extremely amused. 😄 I'm just that mature...
The meal was wonderful; I was able to talk with a lot of family members that I hadn't seen since I was a chubby little girl, and there were great vibes all around. As usual, the food was great and we tried many dishes unique to that area of Shanghai. One of the funniest moments of lunch was when Jason and I noticed that the music playing in the restaurant was "Not Afraid" by Eminem. Yeah...let's get pumped up to feast and dine! Haha, so weird...it switched quickly after an expletive and went back to classical music. After many conversations, we packed up everything we didn't finish and said goodbye.
We then went to an old-fashioned, traditional Chinese village. They're known as 老街 （literally old streets) and offer great touristy gifts, sights, and snacks. The views there were great and you felt like you were going back in time many years, to a simple, nice lifestyle. You could also bargain everywhere here for your purchases..yay! My Shanghai relatives are much more skilled when it comes to bargaining (they're very bold and not at all afraid to set verrrry low prices), so that really came in handy. I bought some postcards, a nice wood carving, and some small paintings. We wandered through the village that afternoon, sucking on some cold Popsicles and taking photos of bridges, rivers, and street views. A very relaxing afternoon!
After we were satisfied, we started to return home. Dinner was also at a restaurant, at a very vintage-y place that had all wood everything and many interesting designs. My uncle chose it, and ordered our meal which consisted of all veggies, tofu, and fish (we wanted something light after the feast that was lunch). The restaurant had delicious food and really unique tea that we consistently got more of...and drank in our little wooden cups! My cousin, who is in her early twenties and is currently interning, joined us for dinner after work. Once we were all done, we walked back to the apartment and watched some more soap operas. A very fun first full day in Shanghai!
A shot of the cemetery area
The ordering process here: pick and choose your dishes the visual way!
Indian Beards....tehehe
The biggest bowl of fish soup I've ever seen
These are unique to this area! They're called grass-top cakes and are very yummy!
Exploring the old streets!
Traditional views..
Here, we offer a lovely table...inside a bird cage!
A really cool lit-up kite we saw on our walk home
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