Muhlheim Adventures in Shanghai: September 2008

Lupu Bridge Climb

This past Saturday Eric and I went on an AWC tour of the Lupu Bridge and Urban Planning Museum. The Lupu bridge is one of the 4 bridges that link Pudong (the east side of Shanghai in which we live) with the rest of Shanghai or Puxi. It crosses the Huangpu River. The Lupu bridge is the bridge that we use to get into the city. We were able to climb up the stairs onto the top of the arch for a fabulous view of the city. Our tour guide said it was the clearest day he had ever been up there.

This is the view from the Puxi side toward Pudong.

This is the base of the bridge.

Here we are posing with Haibo, the mascot for the World Expo which will take place in Shanghai in 2010.

View of the Huangpu underneath us. Most of the river traffic is barges carrying coal, actually floating upstream.

Eric with the skyscrapers of Pudong behind him. The Pearl Tower is on the left. To the right of that is the JinMao Tower. The Shanghai World Financial Center (now the second tallest building in the world) is the newest skyscraper just left of Eric's shoulder.

Some photos of Allison and her friends

Heading off to school.

Allison and Alexa.

Allison, Martina, and Taytum.

Brad (at his birthday party).

Learning to bake challah with the Chabad of Pudong

Our first Chabad event of the year was learning to make challah (which is very handy in Shanghai where there is only one professional baker - an Israeli - selling Challah). Here is our rabbi's wife, Nechamie, demonstrating.

I'm very proud to report that I successfully made challah on my own this past Friday using Nechamie's recipe. Everyone agreed it was even better than Haya's!

The traffic is getting worse

But Xiao Hu doesn't let it get it our way. This is the view behind us of cars merging onto the Lupu bridge in morning traffic. Xiao Hu's strategy is to say in the right lane and then cut in front of all the cars already in the bridge lane at the last moment, just like that white car you see at a 45 degree angle in the middle of the screen.

He's also started driving in the bike lane (or sidewalk, we're not sure which!).

Bike ride into the local neighborhood

On Sundays, there's a group from the Emerald that explores the local neighborhoods by bicycle. Eric and I joined them for a fascinating 45 km bike ride through rural farm villages (just a few blocks away from the area in which we live).

We spotted this girl wearing a Mickey Mouse shirt that was spelled Miueky Mcesk!

We stopped for the best Xiao Long Baos we've ever tasted. Eric is going to start riding with the group every Sunday (I'll be escorting the kids to Sunday School).

Some of Lauren's new activities

This season I've started two new activites: tennnis lessons with the Malaysian coach, Louis (it's nice to be playing again) and some Chinese cooking classes.

I'm taking a 4-session wok-cooking class at the Chinese Cooking Workshop.

My friends Danielle and Denise (from the Chabad of Pudong) have joined me.

Some photos from the first week of school

The boys next door: The triplets (Ethan, Patrick, and Aidan - I'm still trying to learn to tell them apart) who live next door to us have started preschool. Their youngest brother (Owen) just goes along for the ride in their train.

Henry and Austin

Allison, so proudly arriving on her bike (sans training wheels).

Playing at school and home

Some photos of the kids playing on the school play structure at the open house

Henry with his two buddies, Ola (from Sweden) and Austin (from America).

Henry with Jumble.

The First Day of School

The kids started school on August 25th (Henry - 5th, Rebecca - 4th, Allison - 1st). Shanghai received it's heaviest rainfall in 130 years. It was pouring and thundering and lightening as they headed off to school in the most violent storm I've ever seen. The water was again up to our front walk and we were completely drenched by the time we got into the car from our front door. (We - really Xiao Hu - drove the kids to school on our way to work!)

The Olympics

We were very fortunate to be able to get tickets to see the Olympic soccer games that were held in Shanghai. We saw both the women's and the men's semi-finals. In the women's we saw Brazil versus Germany and in the men's we saw Nigeria versus Belgium. Both matches were pretty exciting.

Typhoons and Flooding

The rainy season continues with typhoons and flash floods. Our street (and garage) floods in heavy rain. This is the view of our street. Rebecca and Jumble enjoyed a romp following a heavy rainfall in August. (All pictures shot by me standing on our threshold looking out at the street and the house directly across from us.)