The next morning, jetlag woke me up at 2am. A bit too early for breakfast so I just used the time to plan the day’s itinerary instead. Finally started heading out at 6:45am since the breakfast places started to open then.
The first stop, was Yang’s Dumpling to get myself some shenjianbao. Yang’s was quite well known in Shanghai for their SJBs.
Everywhere else in the world shenjianbao is just pork inside a bun. In China and Shanghai, however, they get fancy and have all types of different fillings and flavors. I got their C set menu, which included mala, shrimp and regular shenjianbao, and a bowl of wonton in chicken broth. 31 yuan. about USD$5. So cheap.
I was the second table in the restaurant. A couple of girls in their 20s were already eating. I thought that might be their post-all-night-partying meal.
Afterwards, I made my way to the Bund. Its a little odd to show up this early since nothing was open and I was one of the handful of tourists in the entire promenade.
The Bund is a historical district within the former Shanghai International Settlement, which runs along the western bank of the Huangpu River. The area along the river faces the modern commercial district of Pudong.
The Bund has a significant European influence. It has dozens of historical buildings, lining the Huangpu River, that once housed numerous banks and trading houses from Europe and the US, after China lost the Opium War. Many Western European countries grabbed land within Shanghai to build their trading settlements. These companies spared no expense to erect architecturally distinctive buildings on the Bund to signify their wealth and power.
The famous HSBC lion made an appearance. For those who cares, HSBC stands for Hong Kong and Shanghai Banking Corporation, even though they are worldwide now and is the largest bank in Europe.
Shen Da Cheng, which had various forms of addictive glutinous rice dumplings. Get them hot and freshly made for breakfast. They were very good. They also had packaged version for gifting that one could bring back home. Or, just get them on Weee! in the US.
I don’t think there are that much carb in the bao, but the dough absorbs quite a bit of grease. So 10 is certainly not easy. But they can just walk it off after a meal.
After Yuyuan Garden, I started walking towards Nanjing Road shopping street. Passed by Cheng Long Hang mitten crab specialist along the way. These guys have their own mitten crab growing supply year round. Mitten crab is a must eat in Shanghai. But alas Cheng Long Hang didn’t have a table for me. So I kept walking.
Then passed by Zhang Xiao Quan- the famed scissors and cutlery shop. Their handmade kitchen shears, which looked like the model displayed outside, but in matte black metal. was a work of art. The cutting was so precise. I couldn’t resist getting a pair to bring home. But as I found out, never get scissors on my first day of a trip. Its a no-no for high speed rail. It ended up causing me a lot of work mailing it around.
When I left Shanghai on high speed rail to Suzhou a day later, security told me I couldn’t bring the shears. There was only a few minutes left till the train departed so they told me there wasn’t enough time to have the courier take care of this, so they told me to take a photo of the box, and message the delivery courier later. I didn’t want to miss the train so I just did as told and hoped that the shears didn’t get lost in the vast station and its logistical operations.
Later I got a hold of the courier, but I didn’t want to mail it to Suzhou since I had a few HSR trips left. So I ended up just mailing it back to the Shanghai hotel that I would eventually come back to that I hadn’t even booked the return reservation yet. The courier was very responsible and told me it would get lost just sitting at the hotel for a week if he delivered then. So he offered to just keep it at his home until the day I arrived at the hotel about a week later. I didn’t quite understand why it would be lost until I found out a week later the hotel just had a random shelf outside some random, run down structure in their outdoor parking lot for all these delivery packages.
Those sjb skins are a lot thinner than I’ve encountered so far; the thick dough is usually what deters me. They all look delicious, as also the wonton soup!
Wow, it’s remarkable that the courier situation worked out given that you had to board the train immediately! Did the security guard keep the package for the courier to pick up?
The number of things that have been thrown away at airport security in the US – I’ve often wondered why they don’t have a USPS box with a stamp machine right at security so people can mail themselves small things when they’re expensive.
Would love to see the shears when you finally open the box.
I did. And it’d be a shame if that got lost or thrown away. I got the shears for myself but the shears would make a lovely gift as well. About $40 USD.
They do have some sort of system set up where security sends these items to the courier company. But normally you’ll probably write your name, phone, the delivery address and your address down so all is needed later on is to pay the courier company. I was short of time so they just told me to write my name down and take a photo of the item. I didn’t have the other three pieces of info anyway.
