My adventure begins, when I’m made aware of the fact that I will have 10 consecutive days off for the Golden Week holiday starting April 27th and running to May 7th. If you aren’t in China, you’re probably wondering what this is all about. China, you see, has 3 weeklong national weeks peppered throughout the course of the year. It is during these so called “holidays” that all 700 million rural inhabitants descend upon the developed east coast cities to experience civilization and attempt to destroy it.

I had originally planned to go to Bangkok, in a fruitless attempt to try and escape from the bloodshed, only to find that a combination price gouging, many other Chinese people who had the same idea as me, and waiting till the day of to book the flight meant that I was an idiot for even thinking of this plan. So instead I decided that I would try to get to the most civilized city Mainland China has to offer.

Shanghai is not only the most civilized city in China, it is also the most expensive, so I would be going there only for the final weekend of the break. For the first part of the golden week, I can’t really recall much because I spent as much time as possible drinking myself into oblivion to get to Shanghai faster.

I do remember seeing this though, and I also remember feeling mighty jealous of those little bastards.

As usual I gave myself far too much time to get to the airport and check in, with the result being me waiting around at the airport. While waiting, I was entertained by watching a little girl pound as hard as she could on the glass of an aquarium, possibly traumatizing the poor fish, who were probably going to going to be eaten soon anyway. I should have known, known all along, that no one who could afford to fly into Shanghai would be flying there this weekend. Anyone who could afford to fly, would be flying the hell out. The ungodly hordes from the hinterlands would be arriving this weekend by their transport method of choice: (and only choice really) the train. As such, the airport was a graveyard and the plane was only half full, with fools like myself.

After a short one-hour flight, I arrived at Hongqiao airport in Shanghai, to be greeted by a massive lineup consisting mostly of westerners trying to get a taxi. This was followed by a fun trip downtown listening to my cab driver shout Shanghainese obscenities at the solidified traffic flow heading to Nanjing Dong Lu, the Chinese version of Times Square.

The hotel I was staying at was the Sofitel Hyland. In the future I will avoid them like I avoid other pestilent scum of the earth. They pulled the old bait-switch, not once, but twice on me. The first time they advertised available rooms on the net at 770RMB a night for the nights I wanted. Of course when I phoned them, they didn’t have that room and instead had a more expensive room available instead. I called them out on false advertising, so they gave me the room I wanted for the price. Of course now that I had got there, they give me the room, and tell me that nothing is included (no internet, no breakfast) and that each of these things would be 120RMB a day. That’s $17 for internet for one day. My monthly internet barely costs that much, and most hotels these days give you it for free. I took the cheaper room anyway and figured I would only use it for one day, and get all the info I need (I don’t like to plan till the absolute last minute). I get up to the room to find a shitty room by western hotel standards, the floor was wet with god knows what liquid, and of course, the internet is completely non-functional in the room. I can’t even pay to turn it on because it “doesn’t work”. So I gave in and switched rooms to the more expensive room, which was about $20 a night more expensive, not a whole lot more, but it gave me the free internet, and breakfast, and a much nicer room. While it was better value, the hotel uses sleazy ways to trip you to into it. And with that, I have a message to you Sofitel: FUCK YOU, and I’m never booking a hotel at your lame as shit chain again. Also, who the hell puts the lobby on the second floor? Oh right, the French do.

After this bullshit, I of course needed to unwind, so I did much unwinding by way of 6 cans of Asahi and then meeting up with a friend for some Tongren Lu bar hopping action. The only other thing I can remember from this night is the crazyier-than-normal-crazy-chinese taxi ride home with a lady driver, who rolled down her window and freaked at another taxi driver’s driving and then proceeded to run him off the road at every opportunity.

Filed under: tourist shit