Before I came out to Shanghai I did some research on organisations I might join to meet some people, but I’ve been so caught up in seeing this vast city that I haven’t quite got round to seeking out any such group, other than the cooking school. I have been asked if I’m going to learn Mandarin, but as I’m only here for a year I’ve decided that the best use of my time here is going out and about and seeing the place rather than being cooped up inside with a bunch of tapes and books trying to learn a very difficult language. If we were going to be here for longer, I would make more of an effort, but being in Shanghai and not seeing as much of it as I possibly could would be a sheer waste in my book.
I had thought of arranging my own MeetUp group to go and explore the city with some other people, but my energy levels are somewhat unpredictable and I’d hate to arrange to lead a group somewhere and then fail to turn up. The American Korean couple we met a couple of weeks ago recommended the Royal Asiatic Society with a branch in Shanghai which has lectures, a book club, a film society and an art group all of which focus learnedly on China and the Chinese. There is also an organisation called the Community Center Shanghai dedicated to “making friends, helping people, and building community” amongst the international residents. They have three branches in the city, one of which is within walking distance of here, so I set out the other morning to go to their monthly Friday morning market.
The walk involved going along the Guyang Road, past the neo-classical gateway to Mingdu City and then past the florentine-inspired decorations on the tower blocks in its grounds and weaving my way past the rubbish tricycles queuing for the crusher.
Next using the pedestrian bridge with its dodgy tile work on the steps, a number of which have disappeared, making it a rather hazardous exercise, I crossed the Middle Ring Road
and down into Laowai Street – literally alien street – but more kindly meaning Westerner’s Street. The term is not used to describe other east asians, of Chinese descent or otherwise, but it does cover Latin Americans, Middle Easterners as well as whites.
Now Laowai Street is where people from Richard’s work tend to end up if they leave the hotels for a night out – we are trying to introduce them to other more inspiring places. But as it is just across the ring road from where Richard’s bosses’ boss stays when he is in town (an Icelandic viking who nominally lives in America, but who spends all his time in Australasia or in the air) this is where everyone tends to end up.
I’ve eaten in a couple of places in this street – we’ve had Thai, Tapas and a glass of whiskey after a meal and there are plenty of opportunities to get burgers, beer and pizzas if that is what you are after, or mezze at the blue and white Greek place or whatever Laowai food you want, within reason.
But the market was beyond this long forking pedestrian street and at the end of it past the Steam Engine that’s parked at the end of the street – I don’t know why it’s there, either – I turned onto Hongmei Lu. Now I’d got an address, but it took me some time to realise that I was heading in the wrong direction, as I couldn’t find any street numbers. Anyway I eventually turned round and walked back down Hongmei Lu, past Foreigners Street until I 
at last reached 3215. But that is just the start of the address, because what I was actually trying to find was No. 201 Sheng Lun Lan Building, 5B, Lane 3215 Hongmei Lu (300 meters behind City Shop, off of Cheng Jiao Qiao Zhi Lu). I’d scribbled down the map on their website before I set off to help me. So I went down Cheng Jiao Qiao Zhi Lu and I walked what I thought was 300 meters and as I went past signs for 5F but that’s the 5th Floor (4th Floor in the UK) of some other building, and I got to No. 201 which is set back from the road, walked across the largish car park and I tried the second, fifth and basement floors in an attempt to find them. To no avail. I went out of the building and back up the street, should it be building no. 5 second floor room 1, perhaps? But that didn’t compute with anything I found on the ground. I went back to the original building, but there is no way I could work out if this is the Sheng Lun Lan Building. After another attempt inside, I tried further on down Cheng Jiao Qiao Zhi Lu, just in case I hadn’t gone far enough. I walked a long way, nothing computed. Where I was looking tied in with the image I had in my head of the map on their website. I retraced my steps. By now I was starting to loathe the expression “off of”; I think the Brits left it behind it with Shakespeare, but the Americans seem to think it’s still OK to use. Did I want to be with a bunch of people who can’t spell centre correctly anyway? None of this, I’m sure, is very generous, but by now I was not feeling very happy. It had gone past midday, when the market was due to have ended but at least the rain had stopped; I don’t like not being able to do things I have built myself up to do.
at last reached 3215. But that is just the start of the address, because what I was actually trying to find was No. 201 Sheng Lun Lan Building, 5B, Lane 3215 Hongmei Lu (300 meters behind City Shop, off of Cheng Jiao Qiao Zhi Lu). I’d scribbled down the map on their website before I set off to help me. So I went down Cheng Jiao Qiao Zhi Lu and I walked what I thought was 300 meters and as I went past signs for 5F but that’s the 5th Floor (4th Floor in the UK) of some other building, and I got to No. 201 which is set back from the road, walked across the largish car park and I tried the second, fifth and basement floors in an attempt to find them. To no avail. I went out of the building and back up the street, should it be building no. 5 second floor room 1, perhaps? But that didn’t compute with anything I found on the ground. I went back to the original building, but there is no way I could work out if this is the Sheng Lun Lan Building. After another attempt inside, I tried further on down Cheng Jiao Qiao Zhi Lu, just in case I hadn’t gone far enough. I walked a long way, nothing computed. Where I was looking tied in with the image I had in my head of the map on their website. I retraced my steps. By now I was starting to loathe the expression “off of”; I think the Brits left it behind it with Shakespeare, but the Americans seem to think it’s still OK to use. Did I want to be with a bunch of people who can’t spell centre correctly anyway? None of this, I’m sure, is very generous, but by now I was not feeling very happy. It had gone past midday, when the market was due to have ended but at least the rain had stopped; I don’t like not being able to do things I have built myself up to do.
I traced my steps back up to the main road and went into City Shop. This part of Shanghai has far more westerners than where we are living. We are a short walk away, but around our apartment apart from the school children at the local international school and the odd face in Carrefour I see very few white faces. Here, on the other side of the middle ring road about 1/3 of the people are from the West. And I started to think whether we would have been better off living outside the middle ring road, rather than within it. I grabbed a couple of things from the shop – still no marmite to be found though, which strangely I am missing – and as I headed back up the road I came across a hairdresser with a French name.
Now I needed a haircut. I’d dyed my hair myself for the first time the previous week – my hairdresser had sent me out here with all the necessary kit – but my hair was starting to make me look like a shaggy dog. I’d been out the day before trying to summon up the courage to have my hair done by one of the salons near our flat, but I suspected that although they would be able to speak Chinese and probably either Korean or Japanese I was going to have trouble communicating what I wanted in English.
Lucas it turned out had been born in Korea. He had lived in Mongolia, and Moscow, and Paris and had spent 6 months at University in the UK at Leeds, before living in Beijing and now Shanghai. He had enough english to get him by in the hairdressing world and he cut my hair. I felt a little pampered and a lot better than I had done an hour beforehand. So on the way home I felt better. I had achieved something that day; even if all it was was a haircut. I won’t be able to go back to Lucas to have my hair cut, well not there at least. He was having to move into another branch of the business in the Old French Concession the very next day as his landlord had decided to boot him out in favour of knocking down the wall between the salon and the shop next door and building a large restaurant. So I won’t be able to walk over and get my next haircut in Hongmei Lu next time.
When I got home and I eventually had the will, I looked up the address on google maps. It turns out that the Shanghai Community Center Hongmei branch is in the building BEHIND the grey one above – in fact I think you can see it poking out – it must be the brown building on the left hand side. To reach it you take a small road that goes to the side of this building’s car park. None of this detail is on their own map on their website.
Next time, Miller, look at a google map before you go. Or pay more attention to what “off of” is telling you.
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