Shanghai, 4th trip for me - 1st trip for Ai Yoong

One more time, I am back in Shanghai. It has only been 2 weeks since the last trip here. This time round came with Ai Yoong for the preview trip to look for our apartment in the upcoming relo to here.

The crowd at the immigration check point was a lot compared to the last trip. However, we passed through immigration with a breeze. The immigration officer was looking at everyone's passport with keen eyes and comparing faces. I guessed it might have something to do with the recent issues in Tibet. Probably...

The relocation agent's driver, Mr Liang picked us up from the airport when we arrived around afternoon, 1.25pm. Weather was so so, bit gloomy due to after rain (so we were told). It is the change of season period of time of the year and we were to expect rain for the next few days. :-( Trip to the hotel was normal for me but should be quite interesting for Ai Yoong since this is her first trip. Stay back at the same hotel, Courtyard Marriott Shanghai. As usual, front desk told me that I would have to wait for 30mins because room is not ready. Seems like room is always not ready even though check-in is spelled out to be 2.00pm. I arrived after 2.00pm but still...

We took a short stroll near the vicinity of the hotel and had our simple dinner at one of the restaurant. Then it is time to hit and sack and get ready for the big day tomorrow.

Shanghai, 3rd time in 2 months

Once again I am back in Shanghai on business within only 2 months. In fact for this trip I have managed to secure multiple entry VISA that last me for the year until Feb 2009. I guess once we have relocated to Shanghai, would be able to provide more photos of places that we are gonna be visiting together with my darling and little son.

This trip apart from business, I have taken opportunity to familiarize myself with the surround environment of Pudong. Have also visited couple of office sites that would potentially be our new R&D office in Shanghai. Tiring and short trip of 2 days.

Colleague of mine in Shanghai took me to visit some apartments sites. I find that Shanghai mostly consist of apartments with some facilities and also landscape gardens. We went around the LianYang communities near Century Park. Quite surprised to find that Century Park is not free but requires RMB10 per entry. Of course, one could pay 1 year flat r

ate fees for multiple entries to the park. Will perhaps check out later when we are here proper. This should be lowest priority if we managed to get an apartment with full facilities.

Managed to see Sakura tree as shown above in one of the apartments that my colleague is staying. Yes, it is Sakura time this time of year. Although Sakura is much idolized in Japan, seems like it is not the case here in Shanghai, China. It's treated as just another tree.

I find that Shanghai apartments in the older first phase of Lianyang are with some landscaping and minimal facilities. They are high rise buildings. Lift conditions are tolerable.

Due to the height, the view is great and covers quite a distance of the vicinity.

Penang Butterfly Farm

Today, we brought our kid Ethan to the Penang Butterfly farm. This is the first time for Ethan to witness so many live butterflies flying within and enclosed environment. Penang Butterfly Farm is advertised to be the world's 1st tropical live butterfly sanctuary.

We were staying at the Golden Sands Hotel for 2 nights, therefore after breakfast we took off to Butterfly Farm which is only like 5 to 10 mins drive away.

There were no problem finding our way to the farm, the road is quite straight forward. Seems like it has been given a face lift since my last visit many many years ago.

Entrance fee is RM10 per adult, children below 4 years old are free. This applies to Malaysian - we have to show our MyKad. Foreigners pay double the price at RM20 per adult. We were amazed to find out that J-card member gets 20% discount. Since our J-card is still valid until end of this month, we got the discount. Digital camera is free entrance but VideoCam is charged RM5 per piece. Details of the farm can be obtained from the web page: http://www.butterfly-insect.com/index.php

Below is a scan of the brochure for this farm:

Immediately after entering the main entrance in the farm, one has the feeling of going into a magical world of butterflies flying all over surrounding you. There is a platter of aluminum netting whereby Hibiscus (or locally known as Bunga Raya) are laid out on it. Butterflies gathered around these Hibiscus as shown in the following photo shots:

Have taken quite a few photo shots of the butterflies in the farm. Posting here for the benefit and enjoyment of other bloggers.

In the middle of the farm's enclosed environment lies a carp pond with some landscaping of small waterfall, wooden bridge.

One of the interest stuffs to be found in this farm is the sort of Japanese lantern. However, the top cap of the lantern is made of coconut husk. See photo above to get a better view of what I am saying. :-)

More butterflies and butterflies and butterflies ....

Butterflies gathering on a bunch of flowers

Other than butterflies being the key showcase, there are other inserts (praying mantis, beetles), reptiles (iguana, lizards, snakes), worms, squirrels, scorpions, turtle, tarantula (spider) on display.

Left: Spot me out - don't I look kinda like a stick?
Right: Don't know what the hack flower - thought it is cute.

Lazy fellow, laze around - no danger at all.

Back to Shanghai once again!

I am back in Shanghai once again 2 weeks later. This time round the weather is colder than the last time. Lowest is -1 deg Celcius. Came prepared this time round with winter clothing, sweater and scarves.

Read the news on the plane that there is a snow storm hitting China which halted the trains in many provinces. Luckily Shanghai was not affected badly by this storm. However, according to the people I met in Shanghai, this is the first time in 17 years that Shanghai has snow on the ground for long period of time. Normally the snow will melt in the middle of the day.

Took a photo of the company we visited in Zhangjiang High Technology Park. This building is up for demolishing soon. In fact, this company will move out tomorrow to a new location.

Stayed in Grand Hyatt Shanghai again. Of course the benefit would be gaining more Gold Passport points. :-)
Took this photo from the hotel room window. The night scene in Shanghai is quite fantastic. Much given so by the fact that there are a lot of tall buildings in the city.

Shanghai - The Bund

This is the second day in Shanghai, meeting continued uneventful. After work was the great time.

After the meeting, Connie took us out for a short shopping while waiting for dinner. We went to the Bund for short sight-seeing. It was freezing cold outside with temperature of 0 deg C, therefore we did not stay too long out in the Bund. It brought back great memories for me as this is my second time to the Bund. I could still vivid recall the first time when I was here. Things did not change so much on this side of the Bund at Puxi. However, as I recalled there were some buildings across the river on Pudong that I did not remember seeing. That landmark building at sharp shape up with a sphere in the middle is still around. I wished Ai Yoong was with me. Maybe in the next trip, I would bring her along to experience the Bund together. This is a good dating spot for the couples in Shanghai for foreigners and locals alike.

A view from the Bund.

We took the subway for the first time and was supposed to go to the city museum. I was amazed to find from conversation with Connie that Shanghai does have quite a good network of subway. In fact, the subway network is still expanding, similar to their buildings which keep on mushrooming across Shanghai horizon. Indeed my impression of Shanghai changed after this trip. To me, in the past I felt that Shanghai is a rude place but this round I found that Shanghai does have more foreigners than in the past. One thing does not change though, the taxi here is damned hard to get. One would have to push his way in order to get one, guess the rudeness should still exist if this kinda situation still exist.

Too bad when we arrived, the museum was closed. We hanged around Raffles City mall for a while and then decided to head out for a Shanghai restaurant near the city stadium. Connie made a good choice as this restaurant is purposely decorated in the old Shanghai style. Tables and chairs are made like the peasants place in old Shanghai. There is even couple of musician playing the pi-pa and singing in Suzhou dialect. Of course, we did not understand a word of what was sang. Overall the food was good and atmosphere was not bad.

Connie paid for our dinner. She said that it must be her luck with us as she won RMB5 from the government lottery from the bill.