From Hangzhou to Shanghai

Ms Waterman
(teacher)

Today was a bittersweet day as we left Hangzhou after one full month and traveled to Shanghai for the last leg of our two-month adventure. We traveled by fast train just after noon, so the girls spent the morning with their host families. When all of the host families met at HangGao to say goodbye, our friends Sunny (a member of the Exchange from 2016!) and Dana (the Exchange teacher from 2017) were there, too. We were thrilled to meet Dana’s son, Happy, because we have heard so much about him, but we were so sad to say goodbye to our wonderfully generous and fun-loving host families.

We arrived at the Hangzhou East train station with plenty of time before our train, and I can say confidently that our experience there was the smoothest thus far! We had no ticket problems, we knew exactly where to go to board our train (unlike Chengdu), we made it down the stairs/escalator without people pushing and shoving (unlike Xi’an and Kunming), and we boarded our train car without any problems. Even though everything was smooth, it must have been very funny to watch the four of us trying to wrangle our now-enormous suitcases through the train station. Liz, Iona, and Kelby all have a small rolling suitcase in addition to their large suitcases, and I have a small duffel bag which I had mostly balanced on top of my rolling suitcase. Kelby got some funny videos of us, so we were able to laugh at ourselves after we boarded the train and stowed our bags.

We met our driver in the train station after a brief search and we made it to the car... only to discover that there was a huge lock on the car wheel! Apparently our driver had parked in a non-parking spot, so while he went to the train station office to sort out the payment, we rested in the car. Our drive to our hotel was slow due to traffic, but we were so happy to arrive at our final destination.

After a short break, we met to explore our dinner options. Ms. Viz had told us that there were many hot pot restaurants around the corner from our hotel, and we chose one of the many options for our dinner. Since we hadn’t eaten a large lunch, we ordered many different dishes. Everything was delicious in both the normal and spicy broth (which Kelby and I thought was awesome but quite spicy!), but we especially loved the quail eggs and lotus root. Dinner tired us out, so we went directly back to the hotel to relax for the evening before our two days of exploring the city. Shanghai, here we come!