Shanghai 2023 - The Impression

My hometown: a city with many names

Chinese like to call Shanghai 魔都, “The Magical City”. The name was first mentioned in Shōfu Muramatsu's 1924 novel Mato, which portrayed Shanghai as a dichotomic city where both light and darkness existed. It has only become popular among the young locals in recent years to express their love of the increasingly modernized city. In Chinese, the character 魔 can mean “magic” or “devil”, I never use the name because of this cunning ambiguity. In the past, Westerners also called Shanghai “The greatest city of the Far East” and “The Paris of the Orient”. Today, Shanghai is one of the 4 cities directly administered by the central government, bypassing its local provincial governing offices (similar to that of Washington D.C. here in the States). It has the third largest city proper population in the world with 25.89 million as of 2021, and is the seventh largest financial center in the world according to this 2023 data. The Yangtze River flows to the East China Sea through Shanghai, making the Port of Shanghai the world’s busiest container port. Shanghai’s city GDP ranked #1 in all China cities, until the second half of 2022 due to its ill-fated zero-Covid policy. (The #1 position was lost to Beijing by a mere $44 million.)

I am not fond of the nicknames and while I am proud of the statistics, none of it matters more to me than the simple fact: it is Shanghai, a city where I was born and lived and breathed until I was 23. To me, it is the most special city in my heart.

Morning scene outside of my hotel window, from east of the Huangpu River

Night scene at the Bund, from west of the Huangpu River

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The last time I was in Shanghai was in November of 2015, an entire eight years ago. Eight years was a very long time, so long that I forgot it would be an almost hour-long taxi ride from the Pudong airport to my hotel by the waterfront, east of the Huangpu River.

*Note: in Chinese, “dong” means east, so the name “Pudong” comes from the meaning “east of the Huangpu River”.

Although I proudly call myself a true “Shanghainese”, my life in the city in my first 23 years was pretty limited to just a few blocks around where I lived. I was fortunate enough to be living in an area that was (and still) considered one of the most sought-after districts, originally belonging to the “French Concession” after the Opium War. My schools from elementary to middle/high school and college were all within a 15-minute walk from our house. There wasn’t any need to wander outside of that square centered around my house. Since I left for the States, my trips back to Shanghai were either business trips combined with a quick indulgence of Shanghainese foods or trips to visit Mom and take care of her needs. I never truly explored Shanghai.

Eight days were too short to experience Shanghai but I had the time to observe, taste, and marvel, in my beloved home city, a city like no other place.

It is a place where the wealthy can enjoy top-notch French (or Italian, or Japanese) cuisine that costs upwards of $200 per person, while the package carriers (the locals call them the “express delivery brothers” 快递小哥) fight through traffic on their mopeds for less than a dollar per delivery. It is a place where I was intimidated by expressionless immigration at the airport, while had a genuinely kind hotel housekeeping lady who accommodated all of my requests (some of which I would never bother to raise in an American hotel) and called me “sister” 姐姐. It is a place with glittery night streets full of glittery young people (they either have high-paying jobs or rich parents or both), while street vendors on 4-wheel biking carts collecting recyclables old-fashioned way as how it was when I was a child. It is a place that has a trendy cafe serving pour-over Ethiopian coffee with innovative names like “sour apple”, and a jewelry store selling traditional 24-karat Chinese gold bracelets and jade earrings, while juxtapositioned to a Chinese Communist Party Museum with security guards and an arranged flower sign “Forever follow the party”. It is a place where I would spend $5 for a 30-minute ride in an all-electric car that still smelled like brand new leather, to an internet-famed 网红 street cart to get a $0.50 piping-hot flaky pancake packed with green scallion and smelled like heaven. It is a place where I am awed by its vibrance, excited by its diversity, and drawn to its soul-soothing foods.

Street scenes of contrast

Communism vs. Capitalism

It is the most unique place on earth. It is the place where I was born. I have now lived many more years of my life outside of it than within it. I have lived in many places I call home; but Shanghai is forever a place that always draws my heart back, a place I call my hometown.

Once a Shanghainese, always a Shanghainese (smile)!

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I was not able to tick off all the boxes on my “to-explore” list, although I have to admit that I have all but abandoned the idea of having a “must-do” or “must-see” list when going on a trip. I no longer want to be a “tourist”, I want to be an explorer, a participant in some way. So (improvised) exploring was what I did. I am back in my quiet mountain home in the PNW where the only chance for me to have authentic Chinese food is to make it myself (or sweet talk my dear husband into making it), and where the only thing that glitters are the stars in the sky at night when the Big Dark of Washington lifts. I will write and share more of my trip in future posts.

Here are Part II and Part III of my Shanghai Impression 2023

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Extra:

Some professionally taken photos of Shanghai.

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