Shanghai Pudong Airport.

I’ve safely landed in Shanghai! I made it to my hotel room and am EXHAUSTED. Luckily it’s only 10pm here so fingers crossed I wake up in the morning fresh and ready to see this city!

A few fun things from today:

1. On the flight, they served my meal with both western utensils and chopsticks…..but the meal was a tiny pizza. Not sure how you’re supposed to eat a tiny pizza with chopsticks, but there were many people trying and failing hilariously around me. I opted to use my hands.

2. There is a KFC at the Shanghai airport. Gross. What a horrible representation of America to see right as I got off the plane.

3. I don’t speak Chinese, though I am really good at smiling and saying hi and thank you over and over again, because those are the only two phrases I know. So far that has got me from the airport to the train station to the hotel in hilarious fashion with a lot of playing phrases on my Google translate and making wild hand gestures.

4. I rode the Maglev train from Shanghai airport to Longyang Station near my hotel. Maglev is short for magnetic levitation, which means, you guessed it, the train hovers over the track and is propelled by magnets instead of wheels. It was a pretty smooth ride. The journey took about 7 minutes and we went about 18 miles….which is pretty awesome. Can’t wait to do this on my last day here when it’s light outside to really get to see how fast I’m going!

Maglev Train.

5. I already wish I hadn’t packed as much as I did….lugging these bags around by myself isn’t going to get any easier. I do enjoy the giggles from the Chinese people watching me struggle with all my shit though.

Off to bed!