Sidsel (Danish), Janan (Turkish but lived in the UK the past 5 years), Jon, Boots, me, and Lara (German).

The girls are all teaching English in a “village” of 1 million people about 5 hours from Shanghai.  They said they’re the only foreigners in the town and are practically celebrities there.

These girls were creative with the photo booth!  I love the first one.

Getting there and back was a bit of a hassle.  On the way, we took a taxi almost the whole way.  It took 1 hour and 34 minutes to get there, and cost 178 RMB.

On the way back, we took a taxi to the nearest subway station (She Shan) which took 38 minutes and cost 68 RMB, and then took the subway back into town.  I think that the subway also took well over an hour (but only cost 6 RMB.)

Tours online start at about $100 per person, so I guess it was good to do on our own!  The only annoyance was that at lunch they tried to keep us from ordering off of the local menu… they wanted us to order all of the expensive stuff (which was the only food translated into English.)

Eva and Josh stayed with us one night, after flying in from Denmark, then left for their new home in Xia’men the next day.  We tried to keep them awake until 10 to fight their jet lag and I fed them coffee in the morning.  They’ve invited us to their home and we’ll definitely take them up on that in a few months.

Eva has a job leading Danes on tours of China and spent a few days in Shanghai with a group recently.  She stayed an extra night with us after they left.  We took the sidecar out to eat, then played some Wii Fit the next morning.

Boots is always a popular photography subject.

Lucy is a photographer too.  Gotta watch out for that paparazzi!

Kelly and Ellie are both from Florida and on an around the world trip.  They work and save up money, then go traveling again!  They are both vegetarian so one night we went to Vegetarian Lifestyle, a Chinese vegetarian restaurant where the food is made to look and taste just like meat.  The “spareribs” were delicious and very real.  So real that Kelly stopped chewing and said, “I think this is meat! It has a bone!” (it was really a radish) and so delicious we ordered seconds!

The food was so good that we’ll probably go back, even though we aren’t vegetarians.  :-)

Melissa and Matt are an American couple who’ve lived in Japan for the past 4 years, teaching English.  They surfed our couch for a few days and we had a great time.  They are traveling around the world on their way home, and have joined the Peace Corp and will most likely be stationed in China next year! We’re hoping to see them again.  We’ve had such great experiences with our Couch Surfers.

This was my first time going to hot pot, which is pretty unbelievable since we’ve lived here for over two years.  It was really good.

Marion and George, from the Netherlands.  They gave us the guest book as a gift.  We’ll definitely see them again the next time we make it to Europe.  We have quite a few Dutch friends.

Melissa and Matt, Americans who’ve been teaching English in Japan for the past four years.  They have joined the Peace Corp and most likely will be stationed in China next year!  We’ll definitely go visit.

Kelly and Ellie, from Florida.  Kelly fell off the stool….  we had a blast with them.  We’re thinking of visiting Florida in the middle of a South Dakota winter sometime way in the future!

The Bund is all torn up. You can no longer walk along the river (which I didn’t know. Oops.) Normally, you’d see crowds of people here, all taking a photo of their self with the Pearl Tower in the background.

This is a view of the IFC and Jin Mao that you don’t see often.