What Have I Been Up To

So, my New Year's resolution to keep up on my blog has only partially been realized, and obviously not on this blog.  I've been pretty good about updating BiCoastalBites, so there's that.

Anyway, let's get down to it, what have I been up to?  Lots of things!

Online Computer Classes - Thanks to my friend Amanda I discovered I could take a ton of different classes about computer programming online via Skillshare.  I took the HTML/CSS course and am now in the middle of a Javascript course.  I'm going to be a freakin' computer genius.  Really I signed up for these classes so that I can have more control over my blogs, and things I post online.  It's nice to kind of have a base for what's going on.  I'm working on a website to help market myself as a contractor for office work in the Bay Area.  Once my site is done I'll definitely let everyone know.

Cooking Classes - I discovered an awesome new cooking school in San Francisco that offers fun beginner courses, SF Cooking School.  I'm loving it so far and anticipate signing up for more classes in the future.  You can read more about my experience at the cooking classes here.

Blorpy: My friend Emad started a fun site that shares real life stories, and he asked me to help find and post them.  So every day I look around online, reading people's comments and shared stories and then help filter them on Blorpy. 

Visitors - My sister, Melinda, and her friend, Joel, just came to visit for Melinda's 23rd birthday.  We made sure to drink too much, eat too much, and get lots of sleep.  In other words, we had a good time.  Bob and I took them up to Napa for wine tastings at Cuvaison and Domaine Carneros.  It was a gorgeous day for drinking wine and relaxing.

We also went to an Electric Six concert at The Independent.  This was my first concert at this venue, and I'm glad I saved myself for this concert in particular.  I had an absolutely fantastic time!  If you ever have the chance to see Electric Six in concert, do it!  

And on a sad note, my grandfather, Milton E. Wadsworth passed away on January 31st.  Everyone in the family knew it was coming but you can never prepare for the death of someone you love.  I was able to make it home for the funeral and it was really great to be surrounded by the family and share our stories about Grandpa, and what an awesome and influential guy he was to all of us.  It also gave me a chance to really see all my cousins in a different light.  I'm related to so many talented and wonderful people and it's nice that we all have each other.

I'll try to keep up on this blog more often, especially because I have a big event coming up.  March 23rd marks my 30th birthday, and we're doing it up right with a big party!

Loves and kisses,

:)M

Naked In LA For My Birthday

(Yes, this is a month old, but that's okay!)This year as an early birthday gift my friend Suzanne (Zan) planned a trip LA for us so we could visit a Korean spa.  That's right, I flew from San Francisco to LA to hit K-town and have an awesome time.  It also happened that we were there for St. Patrick's Day, which was an added bonus.  Zan knew that I loved my spa experience in Shanghai and she's visited WiSpa in LA enough times to know I'd also love it.  We flew down to LA on Thursday, March 15th so that we could spend all Friday at the Spa lounging about and wallowing in the hot pools.  Zan's awesome friend, and my new awesome friend, Michelle picked us up at LAX and we arrived at the Westin Bonaventure at about midnight.  Silly us, we had booked a weekend in LA during the LA marathon, who knew? (Not us.)  The hotel was packed but we still had a really nice room on the 14th floor with a great view.  We grabbed a drink in the hotel bar, and went to bed soon after so we could be well rested for our day of relaxation.

And what a relaxing day it was!  If you ever have the chance to go to a "banya" or Korean Spa, do it!  Lounge about in the nice warm pools and sign up to get a "buff."  A buff is when you get a full exfoliating body scrub, you'll feel sparkly and clean when all is said and done.  Zan and Michelle and I chose to also add a seaweed wrap.  I'd never had a seaweed wrap before but it's awesome and you get to feel like a giant sushi roll!  They slather you down with a seaweed paste and wrap you in tin foil to bake the seaweed paste onto your body.  I was so smooth and shiny afterward and felt ridiculously clean.   We pretty much spent all day at the spa relaxing in different saunas and pools.  Plus Wi Spa has an awesome Korean cafe where you can order great tasting food.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 After our day of relaxing we went back to the hotel and lounged about working up an appetite for dinner, and I'm so glad we did.  We went to a Korean BBQ called ChoSun Galbee and it was absolutely mouth-wateringly delicious!  We ordered way too much food, and stuffed our faces like there was no tomorrow, but we loved every minute of it.  Go here, order the pork,  "daeji bulgogi" it is absolutely heavenly.  Go with a couple of friends so you can order more and try a whole variety of food.  If you've never had Korean BBQ, you need to remedy that immediately, you'll be pleased you did.

The next day was St. Patricks Day, and we played it low key.  Michelle had a wedding to attend, and Zan and I were prepared to be lazy all day.  We succeeded in leaps and bounds.  We shopped about in the hotel, there are some excellent quirky little shops in the Westin.  We checked out the revolving restaurant/bar/lounge at the the top of the hotel, that was fun.  And then we relaxed, because our day had been so hard so far, with a couples massage at the Spa in the Westin, the Bonaventure Club and Spa.  I had an amazing massage, and the woman actually walked on my back.  If you go there, ask for Daisy, she rocked!  

 

We had grand plans to get our drink on that evening but it was raining ridiculously hard so we partied at the hotel in their club, Suede.  It wasn't too bad - tiny, and some weird videos to go with the music.  But it was convenient and we had a great time dancing our butts off all night long.  (Maybe too much fun, but we won't go into that.)

The next day Zan and I had to head back to San Francisco.  We stopped at Hodori for some more korean food before heading to the airport.  (Hodori means tiger in Korean, AND it was the name of  the 1986 Olympic mascot - just in case you wanted to know.)  We had bibimbop and other yummy things, like kimchi.  I love kimchi!  

It was a short trip but I had an awesome time!  I cannot wait to go back to LA to have fun with Zan and Michelle again!

 

Pub Quiz!

Before I get to Pub Quiz.....I've taken to going into the office in the afternoon on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.  I show up at lunch time and we get a bite to eat and then I go into the office for the rest of the day.  It's nice because I definitely am better about working at the office than I am at home, but I don't have to get up early :)  We've designated Mondays as "Master Kong" Day.  It's an excellent noodle bar, and we order the spiciest dish, although this week we branched out and tried something new...but it wasn't as good.  It wasn't bad, but I think we'll stick with #116, it's delicious.

This is what it looks like when I ride the metro into work:

I was able to work pretty swiftly through the support queue, and had time to mess around and play some games.  I went in search of educational games, sadly most of the ones submitted to the system that are called educational are actually coloring games.  I did find a typing game I liked as well as a math game, but that was pretty much it.  And then, time flew by and it was time to go home and get ready for.....dinner and Pub Quiz!!!!

We went to a Teppanyaki place just around the corner from the Pub, called Natural Point, and it was very good.  We did set courses because we'd never been before but I think we're going to go back and order whatever we want off the menu next time.   We mostly don't want to do the set again because there are things we could do with out, everything was good, but some things are always better than others, for instance....I didn't really need miso soup or a small dinner salad.  We at a lot of food, I got mushroom and asparagus beef wraps, and Bob had two different kinds of steak, one with bone still attached and the other delicious, yes that means that the bone in weren't as good.  :)  There was a small sushi plate, and it was good, it had some salmon, tuna and I'm not sure what the third was, but it was lemony and good.

Our Chef:

The sushi plate:

My yummy beef rolls, with garlic covered bok choy..mmmmm garlic bok choy:

Dinner was really filling and pretty cheap considering how much food we had.  It worked out being about $20USD a piece and we each had: a dinner salad, miso soup, a sushi plate, a main course with veggies, and fried rice plus a beer and green tea.  And the portions were excellent, we'll definitely be going back.  We thought about having dessert, but were too full to even consider it, so we headed off to the Pub to grab a good table for the quiz.

The run-down on the quiz -

We have "our" table at Bulldog now for Pub Quiz, it's in a pretty good spot so we can see everything easily.  I call it our table because we've sat at it every time for the last 4 Pub Quizzes.  So, Monday was the first time in a while that Bob and I had been on our own at Pub Quiz and we really wanted to do Jay proud so we'd actually read through CNN earlier that day at work so we could catch up on the news.  Sadly, that did not help us with the current affairs section of the Quiz.  Did you know that in Mumbai, India they removed all the coconuts from the tress for Obama's visit?  Neither did I, and if you did know that, why?  We apparently suck at getting updated when it comes to current affairs.

The second round was a little better, it was all about famous horses.  Everyone will be pleased to know that we were able to identify Mr. Ed, however, that was the only one, so we 1 of 6 points in that round.  Terrible, I know.  We did get a little better in the next round.  The Quiz Master would show us a picture from a movie and we had to say who the movie star was, the artist they were portraying and the name of the film.  We were able to get most of those, thank goodness I like movies and art.

And then we sucked terribly with the next category, we officially cannot identify the flags of Central America to save our lives.  We didn't get a single one right. But we made up for it in the next round when we had to identify mythical creatures.  Thank you Mamacita and my recent reading of The Percy Jackson Series.  (Which I highly recommend by the way if you haven't read it.)

The next section kicked our butt's hard!  It was "Political Leaders."  We had to name the leader and the country they were from, and we were terrible at this.  We got the guy from Mexico right because Bob recognized the flag, and Daddy, you'll be so proud because I got Mugabe from Zimbabwe right!  To be completely fair and not at all politically correct, I figured it was worth guessing Mugabe and Zimbabwe because I didn't know anyone else.  But hey, that was 2 points for us!  WOO-HOO!

And I totally rocked the "Guess Who/What I Am,"  even Bob was impressed with my deductive reasoning.  So the first clue was "I was re-discovered in 1799 by a frenchman." (We had no idea what it was at this point.)  The second clue was, "I'm displayed at the British Museum."  (I thought, okay, statue or something.)  Third clue was, "I'm carved out of black granite, (and then there were it's dimensions)." And I said, Rosetta Stone!  But Bob made me wait for the next clue which was about Egypt.  :)  So we got 6 points, but 1 point wouldn't have made much of a difference, but I did feel like a genius.

We did okay on the usual Film Quote rounds, and the finish the lyrics rounds, and then the music round kicked our butts.  It was very sad.  Finally we got to the jeopardy round where we could bet points and we bet all our points except one, just in case everyone did the same and we all got it wrong.  The category for the evening was "Fashion and History."  The question was " Which Fashion and Lifestyle House created the Nazi uniforms?"  We had no idea, but we will now never forget that it was Hugo Boss.  In the end we ranked 5th place out of 9 teams.  Sad for us, but there's always next week!

We're getting smarter every time we attend Pub Quiz!  Woot!

Loves and kisses,

Margaret and Bob

 

Date Night (To be followed by the post about Pub Quiz)

On Saturday (November 6th) Bob took me out for date night.  There's a place down the street that I'd been wanting to try.  It's called, Yakexi, and I had thought from the exterior decor that it was an Indian restaurant.  It looks like a mini Taj Mahal, and there's always yummy things being cooked out front over a little burner.  It turns out it's really a Xinjiang cuisine, which is a regional thing, like Shanghai-nese, Hunan, or Sichuan.  It was really good, we're definitely going back.  We had yummy lamb in curry spices with toasted chunks of bread, it was definitely our favorite dish.  We've also discovered a wonderful dish that we love soooo much, it's a potato dish that's comprised of shredded potatoes in a kind of vinegar and chili sauce.  We could eat it for every meal.  We also had an awesome caramelized banana dish at the end of the meal, and it was sooo yummy, it would have been even better if there had been ice cream.  :)

Lamb Curry Dish:

The inside of the restaurant:

Yummy Potato Dish:

The Delicious Caramelized Banana Dish:

After dinner we walked to a Pirate Bar I'd read about.  It's called Rhumerie Bounty, and it was opened by some French guys this summer and is a Nautical/Pirate Themed Bar.  It's pretty rad, it's like walking into an old ship, and all the drinks are rum based, there was even one called  Bobojito, sadly we didn't try it.  I did have a really great cocktail called a Shanghai Breeze, and Bob tried a couple of the coffee and rum concoctions they have.  We'll definitely be going back because it's so close to the house and reasonably price, plus, it's a pirate bar!

Behind the Bar at Rhumerie:

The next day we slept in, because it was Sunday, and that's what we do :P  and headed off to the Boxing Cat Brewery for brunch.  We had thought that because Boxing Cat has such an excellent dinner menu, and the food is so good that their brunch would be the same.  Sadly, we were mistaken and brunch was only okay.  Bob had the eggs benedict and I had the breakfast burrito, both were only so-so.  We'd really gotten our hopes up about how awesome it was going to be, so it was sad that it was no where near what we'd been expecting.  We did enjoy a lovely walk towards home afterward, which is where I got this excellent picture of Bob:

And a picture of me conquering a small fountain area:

We stopped by the big Jing'An mall area on the way home for groceries, and banking fun, and then spent the rest of the day lounging about and taking care of some work.  For some reason I had a terrible headache so I really did some lounging.  Bob was awesome and eventually ordered us a yummy dinner.  He takes excellent care of me when I don't feel good. :)  We went to bed pretty early because the next day we knew we'd be up late for....Pub Quiz!!!!  Yes, even though Jay departed we are still participating in Pub Quiz, we have to keep the dream alive.

Pub Quiz Night Post Coming Soon!!!

Loves and kisses,

Margaret

 

The rest of October was a blur...

After our trip to Beijing, Staci had to abandon us for lovely San Francisco.  I tried to convince her to stay and be my professional best friend here, but alas she had to go home.  We still had a lot of fun, but I think it would have been even more fun had she been able to stay the whole time Jay was here.  (Not to say that I didn't love having Jay, because I did.)

Anyway, we started off right by winning the Pub Quiz at our new favorite English Pub, The BullDog.  We rocked it and won 1,000RMB worth of drink tickets.  Sadly our luck didn't keep up and we progressively got worse on the following Mondays.  I need to read the news more, maybe that would help.

There was a lot of eating and drinking and staying up for all hours of the night.  We hit our main favorite places:  Gourmet Cafe, Pizza Marzano, Nepali Kitchen, 131, Boxing Cat, and even had a chance to check out New Heights.  I'd been wanting to check out New Heights for dinner because we always take people there for drinks and a beautiful view of the city.  The food was good but the service was crap, so we will likely not go back.  I guess we'll have to try one of the other restaurants in the Bund.  I was going to post about it on the food blog, but it just wasn't worth a write up, but I'm going to try to get back into updating the food blog and linking it here.  :)

We did have a couple of stand out nights.  We went to Muse on the Park, which is a club located in the middle of a park, to see the fake Lady GaGa show.  I got all dolled up in my best crazy lady outfit that I could put together which was more rock-a-billy than anything else.  I even bought the weird giant doll eyes contact lenses, which are crazy awesome!  I don't wear contacts so it was awkward putting them in, but I managed it.  I ended up not wearing the doll contacts to the show because I was afraid my eyes would be sad the next day.  The show itself was only so-so, not nearly what I had been expecting but I still had a good time.  We played some liar's dice, and ordered a bunch of whiskey and green tea, and danced our butts off.  That night ended at 4:30am, and then Bob and Jay stayed up to watch the sun come up on the balcony while I went to bed.  They're so in love.

Here's a close up of the crazy contacts:

And my rock-a-billy hair:

The other night that stands out in my mind was when we all went out to KTV with Patrick, Yoko, Key, Agnes, Eric and Sean.  KTV is the karaoke place, it's actually called CashBox/PartyWorld and we had our own room and sang our butts off.  I have videos of the evening; however, I've been threatened with death if I post them.  Here are a couple of pictures of the night though.

That evening ended at about 4am as well, when we were asked to leave because they were closing for the night.  Here's the damage we inflicted:

Sadly we didn't dress up for Halloween.  Bob and Jay will tell you they both told me they'd dress up but I had to get costumes, and to be honest that's not as fun.  I wanted them to be more excited about Halloween.  We ended up just having a lazy day instead because the night before had been the karaoke crazy night.  There's always next year I guess.

We had Jay for the rest of the week and we'd started to slow down on our nights out because we were exhausted.  Having Jay, and Staci was awesome because we just kept going and going and trying new things, plus I think Bob has more fun when his boyfriend is in town. :)

 

Jay and Staci come to Shanghai (Part 2) The Shopping Day

The next morning Jay and I needed to get some work done so we turned on "Mama Mia" the movie musical for Staci to watch while we worked.  If you've never seen this, you should be happy, if you have seen this, I'm sorry.  We all love Abba, but that was terrible, the movie went for star power over quality of voice.  Meryl Streep and Pierce Brosnon cannot sing, at all.  We did all burst into song every time one of the songs came on, so that was entertaining.  Imagine us all sitting in the living room on the couch and then bursting into song while Jay and I are on our computers. Magical.

We headed out to lunch after everything was squared away.  I took Jay and Staci to my favorite burger place, Gourmet Cafe.  I can't help myself it's just so good, and Staci loves burgers so it seemed like the right thing to do.  We had waffle fries with bacon bits and jalapenos on them, yummy!  Staci ordered the cutest little slider burgers, we each had one and split a regular burger, it was like eating 3/4 of a burger, it was perfect.  I could eat there all the time, it's so good.

After stuffing our faces, it was time to wander and shop!!!!  We headed to the "Old Town" area of Shanghai, which is really like China Town in China.  It's full of every novelty item and Chinese knick-knack you could ever want.  I bought a beautiful jewelry box after haggling with a lady on the street.  I'm very pleased with my purchase, it's lovely.  We wandered around the small crowded streets and bought a pack of uno cards, because really what else would you buy in China other than a Spanish named card game?

So Old Town Shanghai is known as YuYuan (you can read about it by clicking on the name).  The architecture is beautiful and there's a lake in the middle everything and a nice square where most people congregate.  Now there's a Starbucks in the middle :P  And the Expo mascot.  Don't worry, Staci and I had our picture taken with the Mascot, I know you were hoping that would happen.  After striking a pose in front of the statue a bunch of other Chinese ladies did the same thing, they apparently thought Staci and I were geniuses, which we are.

After the wander about we decided it was time to go somewhere a little less touristy.  We hailed a cab and headed over to Taikang Lu which is a back ally labyrinth of sorts in the French Concession.  The area use to be a small factory but after it closed it was turned into many many many tiny shops, cafes and restaurants.  I love the area because I feel like every time I go there I find something new.  We stopped at Kommune, an Australian Cafe, for coffee before starting to look around.  I had a BOWL of Mocha, it was delicious, one of the best mochas I've ever had.  I can't wait to go back and have more.

We did some wandering in the back alleys and touched pretty much everything we could.  I even found a pair of gold boots!  I totally wanted to get them, but I refrained, because I don't need gold boots, when I already own a pair in storage.  It was about time for dinner and it was starting to rain so we again hailed a cab and headed off to a restaurant Staci had been told about called "South Beauty."

The entrance to the place was amazing.  It was kind of like walking a plank, it was a narrow walk way with a small fish pond on either side and there was a sliding door on the other end that was a mirror, so while you're walking this plank all you can see is yourself.  It was weird, but awesome.  We ordered yummy pork ribs, shrimp salad, fried eggplant, and minced meat lettuce wraps.  I tried to burn my hand off on the sauce for the eggplant sauce, don't worry I still have a hand, and it wasn't as bad as I had whined about at the dinner table.  Thank goodness.  Sadly Bob couldn't join us for dinner because he had a dinner meeting.

After dinner we walked down the block to O'Malley's Irish Pub to wait for Bob.  He was able to join us shortly after we got there and thus began the Uno game that would never end.  We seriously played Uno for 4 hours, it was ridiculous!  The game would not end and at the end Staci and I started to team up just so the game would end and we could go home and go to bed.  It was actually really nice sitting out on the patio in the run under a nice big umbrella.

 

We made it home at around 1:30am, we were all beat, and poor Bob had to get up super early the next morning for more work.

More to come!!!

Loves and kisses,

Margaret

Jay and Staci Come To China! (Part 1)

Hoorays! Jay and Staci arrived in Shanghai!!!!  They got in really late on Sunday the 10th, and they brought me red vines, because they're the best!  I had their room all ready for them, and everything in the house was picked up, well except for my bedroom because that's where I stashed everything I hadn't been able to put away before they arrived.  I think we're all guilty of doing such things when guests are on their way.   Anyway, Bob and I got them all situated and tucked in for the night so they could get a good rest and be ready to party with me the next day.  (Unfortunately Bob wasn't really able to party with us because there was a big meeting at Shanda that he had to go to.)

On Monday we got up at a reasonable time, and I took Jay and Staci for Yang's Fried Dumplings!  I feel like this is a staple on the tour of Shanghai now, everyone who comes to visit me must go to Yang's Fried Dumplings because they are just so delicious.  We hopped in a cab, and went to the location that Eric took me to originally because I think it's the best.  It has enough room for you to sit down and isn't super crowded.  We picked up some drinks at Family Mart next door and then ordered 4 dumplings each and we all got a soup.  Really the soup is just a little extra, and you might as well have it because how can you beat yummy soup for the equivalent of 1USD?  You can't.  Staci and I each had the hot and sour soup which was delicious and had peanuts floating in it.  It was good, but we probably should have just shared one because the portions were huge, and really we were there for the dumplings.  I was able to order all our food in Chinese.....while pointing at the menu that was in english :)   Jay and Staci agreed that those were some absolutely delish dumplings.  I feel like frying them adds and extra umph to the whole thing.  And they're soup dumplings which is even more awesome.

On a side note, I've perfected my soup dumpling eating.  I pick up the dumpling with my chopsticks and stick it on my little soup spoon and then i nibble a small corner off the dumpling.  I wait for a minute while I blow on the dumpling to cool it down and then I suck all the soup out!  That way when I bite into it all the soup doesn't explode all over the front of me.  And there's usually some soup left in the dumpling so it's a win-win situation.  I believe my t-shirts are secretly happy that I discovered this method, as they are no longer getting stained with dumpling grease.

After lunch we walked around the neighborhood and through a park.  I hadn't been to the

park before so it was nice to know there was one pretty close by.  We decided it would be good to head over the Bund so that we could walk along the river and find a place to get coffee.  We walked along the Nanjing East Walking street and stopped at a mall with a nice coffee place.  I had a really yummy green tea frappacino thing.  It was the really rich matcha green tea which I think is great because it's actually kind of bitter, but still sweet at the same time. The menus at the coffee shop were great because they had pictures of all the drinks, and the drinks actually came out looking like the pictures.  We all thought it was funny that you could order a glass boot of coffee.  Sadly none of us tried it.

After coffee we finished the walk down to the river.  The day was overcast so it wasn't as nice as usual but there where still a lot of people out and about on the boardwalk.  We wanted to jump into photos of big tour groups but managed to control ourselves.  Instead we took our own photos and walked all the way to the end of the riverside walkway.  After our afternoon walk we headed home so I could get some work done and we'd be ready for when Bob got home.

We lounged about and I got some work done and when Bob came home we (including Eric) headed out to the BullDog Pub in the French Concession.  Bob and I had scoped the place out the week before for the Pub Quiz, because Jay is a ringer for Pub Quiz and we wanted to be able to show him off.  Every Monday night the BullDog has a pub quiz, and two for one meals for dinner which is pretty awesome.  Jay had shepard's pie, and Staci, Bob and Eric had fish and chips, and I had a blue cheese burger.  The food is only okay, but it's pub food and sometimes all you want is a greasy meal and a couple of beers.  We ended up coming in 5th place out of 8 teams that night, but it's league play so we were prepared to come back and fight for a higher rank.

We were going to go for massages after the pub quiz, but I thought because Bob had to be up so early in the morning that it would be better for us to go home and go to bed, it was midnight after all.  And I figured Jay and Staci were beat after a long day of walking around.  We headed home, and I can't speak for everyone else but I was unconscious almost instantly.  Stay tuned for the next day of fun and excitement!

I stole all these photos from Staci!  You can look at her flickr account here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/girljournalist

Loves and kisses,

Margaret

Shanghai Party Animals

We've been doing a lot of work and play because 1- We have Jay and Staci coming to visit!  and 2- It's the Chinese National Holiday.  I've been cleaning up the house and catching up on laundry in preparation for our house guests, I'm super excited.  And I've also been extra busy with work because our game approver has the week off which means that her job is now my job for the time being.  I'm becoming less tolerant of game approvals due to the connectivity issue here.  Usually I don't have a problem handling the support emails I get, but loading games takes forever!  It's another job in itself.

It also seems like time has been going fasting since we got back from Beijing.  We relaxed for a little bit but the last few days have made it feel like we've been partying like rockstars, and we've been having a food adventure.

We checked out a new place called Mai Thai in the French Concession, it was only okay, but there were a bunch of places near by that I'd like to go back to.  We walked around and just kind of had a nice afternoon.  We headed home, worked for a bit and then went out to Mesa Manifesto for a really nice dinner.  We finished the evening off right with a really nice massage and headed home full, relaxed and exhausted from our "rough" day of living.

I made reservations for us that weekend to check out a bunch place called Yi Cafe.  The restaurant is in the Shangri-la Hotel in PuDong, so we had a little morning adventure getting there.  Everywhere was packed because of the big holiday here.  People were all over the place, it was madness, absolute madness!  The brunch was really yummy though, and had soooo many choices.  There was Indian, Thai, Chinese, Japanese, European and American and the dessert and fruit bar were amazing.  Lots and lots of choices and of course we tried them all.  We were so full, as usual after lunch and we were lazy and took a cab back home.  I know, so far it doesn't sound like we've been party animals.  We headed over to a Belgian Bar called Kaibar later that evening just for a nice relaxing drink and to hang out for a bit.

The next day we headed over to the shopping area I really like in the city.  I like the area because it's a bunch of little back alleys all connected in a labyrinth sort of way, and there aren't any cars.  We went to an Australian place called Kommune and had their wonderful breakfast.  They have bowls of coffee!  I didn't have a bowl of coffee but I did enjoy one of the best mochas I've ever had.  We both had yummy eggs, and then of course out did ourselves and ordered a plate of cake.  Yes, a plate.  there were fours slices of different kinds of cake.  There was a really really good chocolate cake with coconut on top.  Mmmmm, after brunch we walked around for a bit and I bought a market cart.  Yes, I have an old woman cart so I can go to the grocery store just like all the little Chinese ladies here.

To be perfectly honest I don't even remember what we did for dinner that night, it was pretty laid back though, obviously.  The next day we decided to check out a grocery store I had read about called City Shop.  I had read that they had an excellent selection of groceries, but was disappointed when we got there.  The place was in a basement and it wasn't very well lit.  It was just blah, I won't be going back.  We did have a delicious lunch at my favorite burger place....Gourmet Cafe!!!  Wonderful as usual.

Then we headed home because Bob had a lot of work to do.  We worked for the afternoon and then I ordered in Hunan for dinner.  I love spicy green beans, and dumplings, I could eat them every day.  We caught up on fun tv and I watched one of the worst movies ever.  I made Bob buy me the DVD of "Nine" the musical off the street, here in Shanghai.  I now know why it got panned so badly at the theatre.  It was seriously terrible, I do not recommend it, even if you like the music because the music is not what you will be familiar with.  It was just bad and long and ridiculous.  Oh well.

Now this is when things pick up.  We met up with Patrick and Sean for dinner at a place called Xingu 131.  Yes, the number is part of the name, apparently that's the address for where the original restaurant was.  It was a spicy Szechuan place and it was wonderful.  We even ordered a bullfrog dish that was pretty good.  I know, ew bullfrog.  It's not too bad, but it's such a pain to eat, so many little bones.

After dinner we went to PartyWorld!  It's a karaoke place, and we got our own room.  It was Bob and Me, Patrick and his girlfriend Yoko, Sean and a couple of his friends and then later in the evening Yoko's friend Key showed up.  I love karaoking in our own private room, it's so much more fun to get to sing as many songs as you want, and the selection was pretty good.  Bob even sang a few songs.  Around 12:30 some of Sean's other friends showed up to play and things just started to get too crowded and rowdy for us.  Plus we stank of smoke.  That is one thing I definitely appreciate about places in the states banning smoking, my clothes love it too.

Anyway, Patrick had told us that he and Yoko were going to go out of town the next day to check out a near by water town.  What is a water town you ask?  It's kind of like a mini Chinese Venice.  We stayed at a hostel in the town and it had a really nice community area that we were hanging out in for most of the night.  We had a delicious dinner at one of the restaurants over looking the river and then took a boat ride around the area.  We had a wonderful time and were up so late just having fun.  The next day we did some shopping around the area and had wontons for breakast, and sweet tofu drink.  Mmmm, sweet tofu.  And we pet kitties!  The hostel had 3 pretty orange cats, and one of them loved Bob and me.

I'm going to write a separate post on the Water Town.

After we got home around 5:30pm we reorganized ourselves and prepared to go out to a concert.  Bob had read that a rap band called PuppetMastaz, from Germany, were going to be in town at a local venue.  The band is pretty cool, they actually use puppets to perform, it was a great show, and the place was packed.....with a bunch of foreigners.  :)  I recommend going to see this band if you ever have a chance, the songs are catchy and the show is really fun.

The rest of our weekend was pretty low key.  We did a lot of sleeping in, cleaning, and grocery shopping in preparation for our house guests.  They arrive later tonight!  Hoorays!

We're going to be in Shanghai for the first couple of days they're here, and then we're going to head down to Beijing because Bob has a conference and we want to take Jay and Staci to the Great Wall and a couple of other places.

I'll keep you posted on our fun.

Loves and kisses,

Margaret

 

 

 

 

Back in Shanghai - Hooray for home!

We spent Monday being lazy and doing laundry.  I feel like I write a lot about us being lazy, but after living out of a suitcase for 2 weeks I was ready to lounge about on the couch.  We had lunch at Gourmet Cafe, yum, with the delicious burgers and had our first hospital experience (not because of the burgers).  I was actually quite please with the clinic we went to.  The doctor was super nice, and my international insurance worked out great.  My doctor even wrote me a personal email to follow up with me!  Amazing!

On Tuesday I met up with Glen and Maggie (from our Beijing adventure) to play tour guide for the day.  The weather was total crap so we didn't go to the Expo like Glen wanted.  (I'm sorry Glen.)  We did go to the bottle cap building, to be honest I'm not sure what the real name of the building is, but it's the really tall building in Shanghai that was designed by the Japanese and originally had a giant circle cut out of the top, but the Chinese thought that looked too Japanese (which it did) and made them change it to a square.  It looks like a giant bottle opener, and you can stand on an over look that looks straight down from the 100th floor and it supposedly has a beautiful view of Pudong.  Because of the weather there wasn't much to see, so Maggie and I had donuts while Glen went up to the top.

After the bottle opener building we went to the Science and Technology Museum.  I hadn't been yet, and I am now pleased to say that I thought it was pretty nice.  There's a lot more in there than I had expected.  We only visited two sections of the building so I'll have to go back and see more, but what we did see was fun.  We wandered around the fake animal habitat and learned about animals, bugs, fish and bacteria.  (Yes a slightly weird combo.)  And then we went to the Robots section!  We got to see some dancing robots, and I say that using the word "dancing" very loosely.  There was also an archery range to show how robots can work together, the example was that one robot could hold the bow while the other would pull the arrow and they could always hit the bullseye.  People could line up and try their best at the archery area and both Maggie and Glen gave it their best shots.

After the Science and Technology museum Glen, Maggie and I headed back towards The Bund so they could see the lights come up across the river.  The boardwalk was packed!  That's what we get for going during a Chinese holiday.  We met up with Bob and Eric at New Heights, a restaurant with an awesome view, and had drinks while all the lights came on across the river.  I plan on taking everyone who comes to visit to that restaurant because it really is an amazing view.

And then for the best part, we took Maggie and Glen to HaiDiLao!  Mmmmm, best hot pot ever!  They had had some hot pot when they first arrived in China but didn't really know what it was so hadn't enjoyed it, we fixed that with a trip to the best hot top place ever.  We ordered so much food but it was delicious and Maggie was able to take home an apron from the restaurant along with a little bag of lavender.  After dinner we went to the hostess bar by our house called "The Flying Dragon" and played liar's dice and cheat until a little after midnight, when I made the call that the evening was over.  What can I say, I'm like an old woman, I love going to bed early.  We sent Maggie and Glen back to their hotel and wished them luck with the rest of their journey through China.

I'm going to have to go back to the bottle opener building when the weather is better.

Loves and kisses,

Margaret and Bob

Beijing!!!! Arrival and First Day

Okay, so we had just finished where I had been asked by security in the Tokyo airport if I had a gun in my bag.  I told them no, because I didn't and that they were welcome to look through my bag.  I couldn't think of anything I had that was at all gun-like.  When security finally found my revolver belt buckle everyone backed away because apparently revolvers come that small and bejeweled.  I laughed and started putting it back in my bag when I was told I would not be able to take the belt on the plane because "it looks like a gun."  I argued, had my passport taken away from me and all my information was recorded and then Bob and I were escorted back out through security to "check" my bag.  I threw a fit.  It was completely ridiculous.  They wanted me to check my laptop bag which had, my laptop, the ipad and my digital camera in it along with all the cords and other things I carry about.  Then they suggested that they could just check the belt by itself.  I told them absolutely no way because that's how stuff gets lost.  They finally found a box to put the belt in so it could be checked.  Needless to say I was livid.  Would they have taken away my earrings if they had looked like guns?  What if I was wearing a shirt with a gun on it?

So after the ordeal at the airport we made it to Beijing, at around 10:30pm.  we picked up our checked luggage and headed out to find a taxi.  I had to yell at a Chinese lady who tried to cut in front of us in the taxi line.  We finally got in a cab and were heading out of the airport when we made it to the toll area, and for some reason all the booths were backed up with at least ten cars, and no one was moving.  Cab drivers were getting out of their cars and taking smoke breaks and no one seemed at all fazed by the lack of movement.  About 20 minutes later everyone got back in their cars and we were on our way.

The airport is about a 45 minute taxi ride away from where we were staying in Beijing.  We stayed at the Sunworld Dynasy Hotel, because I had found a deal online and because it was fairly centrally located to things I wanted to see.  The hotel was only two blocks East of the Forbidden City, we could see the rooftops of the buildings and wall around the city from the hotel window.  The hotel was also on a major walking street for shopping which was nice because our first full day there it rained and we needed buy Bob a jacket.

Okay, so we got in late Sunday night.  The next day, Monday, Bob and I wandered around for a little bit and had lunch at a mall food court, because he had a meeting later and we didn't want to venture too far away from the hotel.  It was pretty good, we ate at a noodle place, and I only got a little great on the front of my shirt.  We stopped at Hugo Boss and bought Bob a sexy new jacket, he looks super awesome in it.  Around 3pm Bob left for a meeting way out on the North West corner of the city.  The plan was for him to meet up with Jameson and then they had meetings with a company called MacroJoy, and then I would meet up with them at 7pm and we'd go to dinner.

Because of the rain everything was really crazy.  I got a text from Bob at 4pm telling me that I would need to be in a taxi and on my way to meet them at 5:30pm in order to make it by 7pm.  Traffic was sooooo terrible.  It seriously took an hour and a half to go 20 kilometers.  Crazy! 

And the first couple of taxis who stopped to pick me up refused to take me where I wanted to go because it was too far away.  I don't blame them, it was ridiculous.  Anyway, after wondering if I'd ever get there I made it and we all (Bob, Jameson, Michael who is the founder of MacroJoy, and his wife Emily) went to dinner at a really cool restaurant.

The restaurant was the emperor's son's Summer home long ago and has since been renovated into a large restaurant made up of different little buildings with water features all around and beautiful lanterns and outdoor tables.  All the wait staff wear the traditional garments and shoes, and every table is assigned a guide to get in and out of the restaurant so guests don't get lost amongst all the greenery.

We had our own private little room and had some of the best food I've had in China so far.

We ate some delicious duck that tasted like honey ham, and had deer that was really tender.  There was a salad made out of rose petals and other various flowers with a vinegar dressing on it that was actually quite good.  And of course as usual we had water melon juice.  Mmmmmm, water melon juice.  We ate so much food but it was all so good that we didn't mind feeling so full.

By the time we got back to the hotel after dinner it was pretty late so we called it a night and tucked ourselves into bed.  We had to get up early (not that early) the next morning because we were going to the MacroJoy office to work for the day.

 

 

 

As you can see the rooms were amazing, and we had gorgeous dish sets that we ate off of.

Let's Play Catch Up!

It's been a whirl-wind of fun while Bob and I have been hosting Richard. We've been running around like crazy people and having such a good time that I've barely been in front of my computer other then for work.

Let's start with Monday.....no not yesterday, last Monday (August 30th). We decided to check out a local Belgian Bar called Kaiba. It's only 4 blocks away from the house, so it was nice and easy to get to. We thought we'd just have a couple of beers and then move on to somewhere else to get dinner, but that didn't happen. We ended up ordering a pizza from the bar. It was okay, not bad, but not good either. It was just something to go with our yummy beers. They did have quite a nice selection. We were also able to watch a Muay Thai class while we were enjoying our cool beverages out on the patio area, the people in the class looked miserable and sweaty. We decided that we could never take a class there because after each class we'd want to go to the bar. :P

Tuesday (August 31st) was the day I went to the Expo. Afterward Richard, Bob and I met up with Patrick and Sean from Shanda for dinner at Mesa Manifesto, in the French Concession. It's kind of an italian tapas bar. Patrick and Sean were hosting a guy who is looking to work as a designer for Shanda, he seemed pretty nice and was a snappy dresser. We had yummy little steak sandwiches and an anitpasta platter. Sadly there are no pictures because it was too dark. If you click on the name of the restaurant above, you can see the website for it. I really like Mesa Manifesto though, it's laid back and has a nice balcony patio area.

After dinner Richard, Bob and I went to a little bar around the corner called Goodfellas. Bob and I had stopped there before on another night, and the woman who runs the place is super nice, and it's very laid back so we've now returned a few times. Plus the drinks are cheap, at least I think they're cheap. Again, too dark for pictures, sorry.

Wednesday night was crazy! It was raining so hard there were flood warnings. Richard, Bob, Eric and I ordered in using Sherpa, and got Nepalese food, which is like Indian food with a few other things mixed in. Whenever we eat at home I always forget to take pictures. We all relaxed on the couch and watched Anchorman while it stormed outside. It was a very nice relaxing evening.

Thursday even was AWESOME! We went to a Hot Pot Place called Hai Di Lao. It was truly an amazing experience, I'm going to write all about it on the food blog, so check there for all the awesome pictures and if I can upload the video I took, I think you'll be impressed. It was definitely the best hot pot we've had in Shanghai. Absolutely delicious and the staff was amazing. The place was super clean, and they took wonderful care of us. Eric took care of all the ordering and it was delicious.

To be competely honest I'm starting to forget what we did. I believe it was Friday night that we were going to go on the Tiger Beer Bar Crawl. There's this awesome area in the French Concession called Datong Mill and it's just a big collection of bars and restaurants set up around a fake river going under a mini eiffel tower looking thing. There's lots of neon signs and lights. We ended up not participating in the Bar Crawl because the free beer they gave us was terrible, apparently we're beer snobs now. Anyway, we ended up going to a Bar called Departure. It's shaped like a giant airplane and all the wait staff are dressed like flight attendants. They gave me a flight attendant hat! I was pumped. Sadly it was really dark inside so I don't have a good picture of my hat.

After we gave up there we went to a place called Muse, which is a KTV which is a Karaoke club! It's different than a regular club though because you get a room and there are girls you can "rent" to hang out with you and sing songs. We got a room with Richard, Sean, Patrick, Patrick's girlfriend Yoko and a couple of Yoko's friends. We ordered the traditional going out drink "whiskey and green tea, mixed." It's actually a pretty good combination, I don't really like whisky but it was good. The music selection was kind of blah, and some of the songs didn't even have the right words, which was weird. But we had a good time and rolled home in the wee hours of the morning.

After our night of Karaoke we kind of took it easy the rest of the time Richard was in town. We did some light shopping around the touristy parts of Shanghai but we were on a mission to get something for Richard's sisters so I'll have to go back for more browsing opportunities.

I'm going to go ahead and skip some things so I can catch up on what's been going on.

Loves and kisses,

Margaret and Bob