Moving house

We're moving!  Not far - just upstairs to the apartment directly above us.  Today, with some help, we moved all our possessions out and trundled them up a floor.  The new apartment will look identical, even the furniture will be exactly the same.  We gain an extra bedroom at the end of the hallway.  As a result, we're spending tonight in a very empty looking space.  Next week China marks its National Day - a three day celebration.  We're marking it by heading to Thailand to spend a week at the beach.  When we get back, we'll officially move into our new apartment.

Modern Shanghai

Major intersection in Shanghai - as viewed from a glass lift attached to an electronics mall.

And in it goes

See previous post.

Chopsticks

After picking Max up from kindy one day last week, we stopped for lunch. I opted for a sushi train in the mall attached to our local Carrefour supermarket. Max isn't too fussed on salmon and wasabi so he was treated to French fries instead. Here he is trying to fuse the american and asian cultures by stabbing a fry with a chopstick.

Dressed up

Heading out Sunday morning.

Haircut day

Only Max's second.

Kiddy graffiti

School concert

Friday morning - parents breakfast day at Zara's school.

Big building

Last week-end we ventured up the Shanghai World Financial Centre, the tallest building in Shanghai, and currently the seventh tallest building in the world.  It's iconic in design and known around town as the 'giant bottle opener' because of its shape and the trapezodial hole in the top.  The building currently holds the record for having the highest observation deck in the world, on the 100th floor.  Aside from being dizzyingly high, parts of the observation deck are glass floored, meaning you look stand and look straight down to the street, 100 floors below.  I don't have many photos to share and neither does Tanja.  We were both a little ill.  The two pictures above are taken from the internet.  The three below were taken by me shortly before having to scamper back to the lift and retire to the ground floor gift shop.

To market to market

Spotted by Max on the highway driving to Zara's school.

Pearl Tower

Pudong - the modern side of Shanghai. Zara and Max more interested in the toy for sale. Futuristic Shanghai Pearl Tower in the background.

Hair dryer

Zara gets a warm blast after swimming lesson.

Swimming lesson

Saturday morning - Zara's first swimming lesson at her school. Water is a bit chilly but all the kids seem to be having fun. Poor Max misses out as he's not 4 yet!

Street sweepers

Shanghai streets are clean. Mostly thanks to the large band of street sweepers that faithfully ply the streets each day. Zara and Max get a giggle out of the ones like this man who look like they're "cleaning with a tree"!

Admirers

These two women (in weird matching dresses) are admiring the photos they took of Max on their camera. Not that max was doing anything especially endearing or odd - just that he's not Chinese. This happens all the time.

Cool website

I wouldn't even know where to start.

Look familiar?

The perfect book

Doggy-bjorn

Shanghai street corner. A woman carrying her pooch in a baby bjorn style sling. There's a first for everything I guess!

Digger2

Digger!

A 2 year old boy's discovery on Thursday morning.

Substitute driver

Sugar hit

Just when you thought you couldn't get a breakfast cereal sweeter than Frosties (sugar coated cornflakes), the Chinese go and add chocolate to the mix!

New toy - short lived

Max got an electric bubble blowing gun - branded Discovery Kids - bought from a man who set up a table of toys for sale in a park. He quickly made friends! Unfortunately the bubble gun stopped working the next day. We're unlikely to find the same man again, so no refund for us. Lucky it is only a matter of a couple of dollars.

Local food

Monday morning.  Tanja arrived at work today to an all-staff email from a Chinese colleague with the subject: "snakes from my hometown Tianjin in the kitchen, enjoy."

Snakes ARE eaten in China... but luckily for Tanja this was a typo, the person mistook snakes for snacks.  

Surprising

Art Deco in the middle of Shanghai.

Spotted from the window of our car today

What can I say? This is China.

Hard work

Max has had a big morning. It's 9.45am and he is asleep on the couch. Mind you he was up at 5.45am, had a rushed breakfast to be out the door by 7.15am as he came with me to drop Zara at school (1 hour and a bit round trip). So when we got back just before 9 to a quiet empty house, I guess the couch, bathed in morning sun, looked quite inviting.