Tag Archives: shanghai

Forbes: Shanghai, Beijing as world’s top emerging business centers

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It was not surprising to see Forbes suggest that Shanghai and Beijing ranked highest in their recent survey measuring which cities are poised to become major global business capitals.

They used a neat picture from Shanghai’s World Financial Center – under construction when I was there in April and basically the opposite of my picture from below the Jin Mao tower:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/joeduck/2419944285/in/set-72157604613298418/

http://www.forbes.com/2008/10/23/cities-world-ten-forbeslife-cx_mw_1023cities_slide_11.html?thisSpeed=15000

Jin Mao remains one of the top ten tallest buildings in the world but is still dwarfed by the Shanghai World Trade Center with the massive square opening to stabilize the building in high winds.    The opening was originally designed as a huge circle but after initial approval of that spectacular design, Chinese officials decided it looked too much like the symbolism of the flag of Japan and insisted on a new design.

World’s Tallest Buildings from Wikipedia

Shanghai Pork Ball Makers

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Shanghai Pork Ball Makers 542

Originally uploaded by JoeDuck

In Shanghai near the Bund we had fried pork balls in dough as a tasty treat at a small place on the street that seemed to be very popular with local folks.

The pork was wrapped in dough and then fried on one side and served – if I’m remembering right – with soy sauce and maybe some other choices. At about .75 for 6 they were a tasty bargain as well.

Yu Yuan Gardens, Shanghai

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Yu Yuan Gardens, Shanghai

Originally uploaded by JoeDuck

Shanghai’s Yu Yuan Gardens were one of my favorite China attractions. The surrounding area is filled with shops, restaurants, and is very crowded but the Gardens were quiet and very beautiful. Unlike European gardens most of this area was buildings and walkways with some trees and vegetation that were very carefully landscaped.

Pork Ball Restaurant, Shanghai Near Bund

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Pork Ball Restaurant, Shanghai Near Bund 596

Originally uploaded by JoeDuck

On the China trip I enjoyed the Shanghai street food more than that of Beijing but not sure if that really represnted differences in the cities of just where I happened to go.

These Shanghai dough balls had a rolled pork ball in the middle and were then steamed and fried on one side. Yum! However my favorite dish during the 14 day trip was the simple, but simply perfect Wonton Soup served near our hotel in Shanghai.

World’s largest cities

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Largest city is hard to define, but I think metro area population is the best measure and according to Wikipedia these are the top ten:

1 Tokyo Japan 32,450,000 8,014 4,049
2 Seoul South Korea 20,550,000 5,076 4,048
3 Mexico City[2] Mexico 20,450,000 7,346 2,784
4 New York City[3] United States 19,750,000 17,884 1,104
5 Mumbai India 19,200,000 2,350 8,170
6 Jakarta Indonesia 18,900,000 5,100 3,706
7 Sao Paulo Brazil 18,850,000 8,479 2,223
8 Delhi India 18,600,000 3,182 5,845
9 Osaka-Kobe-Kyoto Japan 17,375,000 6,930 2,507
10 Shanghai China 16,650,000 5,177 3,216

Surprising to me was that Shanghai and Hong Kong are both larger than Beijing which was in 16th place, and all three are smaller than New York City. (Where do all our billion+ Chinese friends live, anyway?)

Hey, I’ll be in two of the top ten over the next week! Hong Kong and Shanghai. Cool.

Hong Kong to Shanghai by Train

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With less than a week to go on the China trip I’m trying to pin down some trip details.   We have our China Visas Passport attachments, which my friend picked up for us at the Chinese Embassy in San Francisco.   We’ve got our Medford to Hong Kong Plane Tickets, and we are booked at the Island Pacific Hotel on the harbor in the western part of Hong Kong.    The hotel appears to be excellent quality and appeared to be a very good deal at Hotels.com’s $87 per night.

From Hong Kong International I understand we take a metro or bus that will deliver us to the Metro station at the Macau ferry terminal .   Update:  There is an express train to downtown hong kong from the Airport leaving every 12 minutes that costs about $15 US, but we’ll take the Island Pacific hotel shuttle for about $19 that departs from A02 every 30 minutes and will deliver us to the Island Pacific Hotel = cool!.   which is within a mile of the hotel.   I think the hotels have pickups but not at the airport which is some 60 miles away by road on Lantau Island.  Hong Kong is the major city on the Island of Hong Kong, but there are many other big cities and activity on many other islands in the area, all connected by a massive ferry system that centers on docks along the Hong Kong  Waterfront or Victoria Harbor, one of the world’s busiest ports and most spectacular waterfront skylines.    We’ll be able to see this from our hotel.

We’ve heard some criticism from folks who have travelled in China about the plan to take a 20 hour overnight train to Shanghai, but I’m pretty sure we’ll be just fine and will see more of the countryside this way.  The train system is huge and there are many classes of travel.   We’ll probably try to get the “soft sleeper” which looks great from pictures on non-official websites.   Some have said that travelling in the seats will hurt backs, but I have a hunch many of the bad rumors are from China’s pre-capitalist days when travel was a lot more spartan. 

From the excellent (and I hope very accurate) train travel website www.Seat61.com :  HK to Shanghai runs on odd dates in Jan, March, June, July 2008, & even dates in Feb, April, May 2008

We need to remember this:

 The station in Hong Kong is in Kowloon and called ‘Hung Hom’ …. the Chinese refer to Hong Kong/Kowloon as ‘Jiulong’

So it looks like we’ll shoot for the April 4th train to Shanghai!    Cost should be about $120 per person for a really nice sleeper.

 I’m a little concerned about trying to buy tickets there just a few days before but that gives us some flexibility and also I’m hearing it can be more expensive and complicated to reserve them here or online.