Once upon a time in Shanghai

Six zealous Norwegian hostNesses decided it was time to take a break from the Expo and see another part of China. Their chosen destination was Tsingtao(Qingdao), a beautiful seaside "town" (population 7-8 million..) in northeastern China, once occupied by Germans. Another minor, yet joyous detail is that Tsingtao is the home of China´s most infamous beer. And as it were, the six girls´chosen vacation days happened to coincide with the Tsingtao Beer Festival (What an amazing coincidence).

The six girls were naturally divided into two groups. Three of them were typical backpackers, staying in dormrooms at Youth Hostels and drinking beer from plastic bags:

The other three preferred to glam it up a bit, and their choice of residence was a (beautiful?) seaside hotel, which also happened to be a bank

So what to do in this picturesque seaside town? The first activity the girls attended to was a visit to the Tsingtao Beer Museum. They figured it was a smart idea to learn the theory before testing out the goods. A yellow-clad, english-speaking, award-winning guide was hired, and off they went.

After a very informative tour, the highlight of the museum turned out to be "the drunken house", where one could experience the sensation of being intoxicated. The backpackers trying it out on the picture below.

Coming out of the museum, the girls followed the green sign below

and the evening ended with a magnificent KTV session, where the girls were thrilled to find Norways beloved Alexander Rybak with his hit single Fairytale

Beermuseum and beerstreet, check! Now the next day was devoted to the Beerfestival

The backpackers ended up making some new best friends, having a dance performance on stage, and drawing funny tattoos on each other. All but one picture have been purposely left out. The glamourous girls eventually made a secret escape from the festival to go to an exclusive, more quiet venue downtown to drink WINE.

The final day of the retreat included a splendid photo shoot on the beach with the girls bearing their new matching Tsingtao t-shirts

And later on in the evening, just before departure to the airport, the unthinkable happened: A moment´s carelessness left the backpackers without their luggage and passports, as their cabdriver drove off with their suitcases still in the trunk!!! Luckily, with some quick investigation, the girls got to ride in a policecar down to the station where they found their luggage safe and sound. Exuberantly relieved, they posed for a picture with the heroes of the hour: The cabdriver and the police officer

The three girls were astonishingly calm about the whole ordeal, and they were very happy that it happened to them and not the glamourous girls, as they were sure it would have totally freaked them out (as if). Nonetheless, it was a happy ending to the trip, celebrated with food and some

Tsingtao beer!

Revival of the blog

Patience, Pictures and Chinglish

You know it has been a long time when you can´t even remember the password of your blog! Luckily my mac possesses other word processing facilities for when I am feeling inspired to write, so I can post this later when I have gotten the password from my buddy.

I am sad and sorry to say this blog has been a bit of a dissappointment.. Guide of the week was abolished almost the second we started it, probably because we made the first feature too long and then never bothered to do a similar follow-up. As for the pavilion visits which were the main intent of this blog.. well let´s just say, when we have time off work we have very little urge to stay at the expo site at all! Like Trine expressed in her last post, there are A LOT of people. Way back in June some of us dedicated an entire evening to expo sightseeing, and I recall several getting very irritated when having to wait in line at the Thailand Pavilion for FOUR MINUTES!! Yes, we know patience is a virtue and that the people waiting next to us at that point had most likely queued for over an hour. But spending most of your time at the expo site, with an average of just under half a million people swarming around everyday, can really push your limits!

But you know what I miss writing/reading about? The funny stories from China and expo that can sometimes make us laugh untill we cry. Especially involving Chinglish. (No offense to the Chinese visitors, it is great that they try to speak English, and for the most part they do manage to get their point across.. but it is still so so funny) The process leading up to the picture-taking for example, is still quite a source of amusement. Seeing people fiddling nervously with their cameras and practicing their stuttering English can sometimes be priceless. Here a select few phrases that have been used by Chinese to ask us foreigners for a picture:

"Shall we take photo with us?"

"Excuse me, would you like to take a picture with you?"

"Let´s have a shot!"

"Can we make a picture with us?"

"Can we make phone together?"

"Let´s invite you to have a picture with her?"

"Would you like to take a picture with me?" ("No I wouldn´t like to, but it looks like YOU want to take one with me?!")

Please add the ones that I haven´t thought of..

P.S. Even if wearing a bright orange mustache for no apparent reason, people will still want to have their picture taken with you. Also, if you dress up like a dwarf with a mustache, you will be immensely popular. (Someone please send me the picture of Tine so I can post it).

ToRi

People People People

We have just closed the door for the 62nd night at Expo. So far the amount of visitors has been surpassing expectations, and we have just recently rounded 20,000,000 people. That is an enormous amount of people. The Norwegian pavilion was expecting to have about 15,000 visitors per day, but we have managed to add 5,000 people to that, averaging 20,000 visitors per day.

For a little Norwegian girl like myself born in Oslo (500,000 people) and bread in Waterloo, Belgium (the countryside), meeting so many people every day has proven to be a challenge. My job is to welcome each individual to a little piece of the far-away land Norway. This demands an enormous amount of patience and sanity (something which is slowly slipping away). Most people are very friendly and polite, but unfortunately you also have those visitors who are rude and unpleasant. Some of the visitors are meeting the "world" for the first time, and possibly even the big city, and this may be overwhelming for them, reducing their tolerance and patience. Just like meeting 20,000 people per day for the guides is tiring, meeting the world is exhausting for the visitors. Put two tired beings together and in addition two different cultures, and unfortunately a clash may occur. Sometimes it is the visitors fault and sometimes it is our fault, but most often it is a combination of the two. In any case, handling conflict is something we learn every day and after this I am quite certain the guides of any given pavilion will be able to sort out the conflict in the middle east.

I have always known that China has a population that is so enormous, it can be compared to the amount of sand grains on a beach, but I had not given the enormity of this amount a second thought before coming here. Our work situation is an extreme event which is not every day China, but for a handful of an international cocktail of people, this is our "every day". For us, it is almost relaxing walking down Nanjing Xi Lu (the main shopping street in Shanghai) because once in a while there is a pocket of air, something you do not encounter very often at the Expo site. I have in the past couple of months philosophised about the Expo Bureaus idea of what full capacity is and what I would call full capacity. I think this differs with about 300,000 people. When the line at the German pavilion exceeds five hours I would like to think the expo site may have encountered full capacity, but apparently not. Nine hours at the Saudi pavilion is still not full capacity either. So I really really wonder where the line is drawn...?
Going to meet and greet 10,000 people now, so I must dash.
Trine:)

The Expo Taxi's 10 Commandments

As the temperature of the Expo-fever has been raising in the last year, Shanghai needed a little icing on top of the already amply creamed cake. Riding taxis in Shanghai is not always a pleasurable affair, and I suppose the city had some self-realization on this point and decided that the city's traffic needed a little "pick-me-up". Apparently they chose the best drivers in the city and gave them a brand new car to drive as a reward. There is definitely a difference in the quality of the expo-drivers (sometimes... unless they decided that you are in a hurry, without your prior knowledge of this fact) and the "regular" drivers. On my last taxi trip I decided that they must have been given 10 holy commandments that they had to follow.

1. Thou shalt try to speak English, even if all you can meekly stutter is incomprehensible "chinglish".
2. Thou shalt listen closely to your passengers when they scream with indisputable urgency that they are scared for their life to the extent that at least two of the passengers are crying.
3. Thou shalt smile. Or draw your lips upwards towards your eyes so that it at least possibly resembles a smile.
4. Thou shalt not make your passengers deaf by playing Peking Opera so loudly that the singing only dogs can hear will burst ear drums.
5. Thou shalt use AC, because lets face it, white people cannot handle the hardcore Shanghai heat and humidity. They are not goldfish.
6. Thou shalt speak as much as possible with your passengers, even if they give no sign of understanding what you are saying.
7. Thou shalt not yell at a passenger who does not know the exact intersecting road they may want to go to. Not everyone knows Shanghais over one million streets as intimately as the Shanghai taxi driver.
8. Thou shalt keep your taxi clean. No paper, trash, smelly pillows, food residue, dirt or faeces.
9. Thou shalt take a shower at least once a week to reduce the potential smell of human bodily odors that make the passengers sick, or dog-like when they ride with their head out the window to survive the horrors of smells that should never have to be smelled.
10. Thou shalt not drive before all people and all limbs are inside the car. All passengers must be unharmed when leaving the vehicle.

Enjoy your Expo-taxi ride, they even have seat belts in the back seat!!
Trine:)

Climbing the Everest of the Expo: China Pavilion!

Last Monday, seeing as it was her last day ever at Expo, Kjersti and I (Tori) decided to climb new heights: We would attempt to enter China´s country pavilion, the "Everest of the Expo". I have nicknamed it this firstly because of it´s enormous size and grandeur, and secondly because ever since the expo opened it has been almost impossible to enter this pavilion due to the tremendous queues-- in the beginning spectators were lining up outside of the expo site at early dawn, and thereby running inside after the gates open at 9.30, to queue again outside the China pavilion. To solve this problem, the Expo centre issued a ticket system: A fixed amount of tickets to the pavilion are given out at every entrance gate of Expo in the mornings untill they are out, and visitors must show these tickets to enter. As you can probably imagine, this still means that many many early-birds line up outside around 4-5 am... But at least it prevents people from standing in queue all day, as the ticket gives you a fixed time slot.

The China Pavilion from a nearby skywalk, contemplating on how to get in..

When finally reaching the entrance, we found that excellent persuasive skills (and blonde hair?) can in fact make you exempt from the ticket rule. A surprisingly small amount of sweet-talk with a guard, and we were through the gates and ready to visit the Crown of the East.

First some facts: China Pavilion's design was chosen from 344 entries submitted from all over the world. The final design is made by a joint team from South China University of Technology and Tsinghua University.The budget of the pavilion is about 1.5 billion yuan (US$203 million), The design of China Pavilion expresses that Chinese ideals of "Oriental Crown, Splendid China, Ample Barn, Rich People", the desire for plenty and wealth, hallmarks of the Chinese culture. The long history of China from ancient to modern times, and its evolution from a rural economy to an urban society are also showcased through multimedia exhibits.(read more at http://en.expo2010.cn/c/en_gj_tpl_85.htm)

My first impression from the outside was that the pavilion is HUGE.. and so beautiful. I love the red structure in its´ traditional Chinese dougong style , yet with a simplistic modern touch. We rode an escalator up to the first pavilion patio to a new queue that we again managed to skip, and then took an elevator up to the exhibition inside the crown.

A group of professors from Guangzhou resting in the queue

View from escalator on our way up

The first part featured a 10-minute imax movie showing China´s development after the reform, through shots of various Chinese people in their (more or less) everyday lives. This film was actually one of my favourite parts of the exhibition, although it paints a rather perfectioned picture, that I am quite sure not every 1,4 billion Chinese can relate to. (But then every country wants to display itself at its´best and might at times stretch some truths.. at Norway Pavilion we have video-shots of people fishing in Akerselva and sunbathing from the Oslo Opera..)

Next we saw a copy of a very famous Ming Dynasty painting that is several meters long, but with a new twist: The people in the painting were moving around! The painting was truly spectacular. It really reminded me of Harry Potter´s marauders map:)

Part of the modern Ming painting

Moving on we walked through an avatar-like forest, experienced various advanced movie effects and witnessed a small flute soloist concert. Finally we walked through an exhibition of Chinese childrens´art work, which really blew my mind! (See pictures below). By this time we had been inside for over half an hour, and had apparently just finished the first part!

Kjersti in front of the "lightsticks-forest"

Our favourite work of "little kid art"... age 8!

The following section featured a short amusementpark-like ride(but without the bumps and loops.. like Disneyland´s "It´s a small world.."), which took us through several rooms showing art displays of the building blocks of cities(bridges, beams etc). It was amusing to sit down and do something different, but honestly this ride was not super-interesting or informative.

wuuuhuu, yes azz!

The third section featured a more regular exhibition, the hightlight for me being a waterfall, which drops water in the shape of HaiBao (the expo maskot). Finally we were led out to the patio beneath the main struture, were we got to see a fantastic view of the entire expo site. This was also one of the highlights in my opinion. Here there was also a spot where one could line up for stamps, for those that are interested (personally I have abandoned my Expo passport because of the stamp craze). Finally it was time to take the escalator back down again.

But of course I made sure to attain the most important souvenir: A picture with one of the employees in his uniform!!

Bumped into co-worker Lars, here he is on the patio with a night view of the Expo

Riding the escalator down to earth again

Overall I give the pavilion top rating, and recommend everyone who has the chance, to try to visit it!

Tori

One guide down:(

It is with tremendous regret I have to write a post saying bye to one of our most patient, kind and blond guides - Kjersti. She is returning to Norway after a short stint at the Expo to teach children in Norway math and Norwegian and important stuff like that. Before doing this she will be enjoying a Norwegian summer and chilling out with her friends, family and boyfriend. She really deserves this break as she has been one of the most patient guides at the Norwegian pavilion. Although she doesn't speak much Chinese, she communicates with the visitors by allowing over half the Chinese population to take pictures with her, and she actually smiles in all pictures. It should be noted that many of the other guides have now forgotten how to smile in pictures and are making something of a grimace instead. We will really miss Kjersti at the pavilion, but we wish her all the best in the future!

The Zealand that is New

For the first time in over a month both Tori and I were done working for the day before we were so tired that we only just managed to lag our sad little bodies back to our beds while cursing heavily towards anything expo-related. This new-found energy also comes from the lack of stamps at our pavilion and a better queuing system. To celebrate this we decided to hit up a few pavilions. We began at Portugal which will not be covered lengthily as it was a bit of a disappointment, besides the delicious egg/vanilla/butter dough snacks they served. Following this we went to Australia which will be covered at length, but not in this post. Then we visited Thailand where we had to queue for about five minutes which gives them a big minus (that's right, I don't queue!). The last one visited by me was New Zealand which I have been curious to take a closer look at because of its alluring roof-top garden. A proper green lung. With mosquitos.

pitstop at Portugal pavillion, this was the highlight!

Lets start up with a few facts and figures before I brainwash you with my opinions about this particular pavilion. New Zealands theme at the expo is "Cities of Nature: Living between Land and Sky". Does this mean that the kiwi population is in constantly air borne? No. This is not a literal statement contrary to what some of you may think. It illustrates the close connection between people and nature. Very nice. The pavilion is situated in zone B close to the Australian, Singaporean and the Indonesian monster pavilion. It stretches out over a 2000 square meter piece of land and is architecturally quite beautiful. In the words of the Kiwi voices they proudly proclaim on their website that, "The dream team of New Zealand’s award-winning visitor experience designers comprises Story Inc, creator of The Lord of the Rings international touring exhibition, Plan 9, music composer for The Lord of the Rings trilogy, and Kim Jarrett, greens master for King Kong.". I mean, all of this in one sentence can only make for a great pavilion! With a budget of 20mill USD they have certainly managed to get a lot out of their cash.

I would like to tell you now what I learnt about NZ while visiting their oasis. They have sheep, they go to school, they have cities, they have plants and they have wind energy. Also I believe it is quite a "cute" country. By walking through their pavilion I got the feeling that city and nature intertwine quite closely, and that nature is a high priority for New Zealanders. There was however a lack of information as there seems to be in all pavilions at expo, and I was unable to learn as much as I would have liked. This may also be because of the lack of guides present throughout the pavilion. I saw one, but the poor guy was stamping his ass off... Stupid stamps.... Who decided this stamp thing was a good idea?? REALLY?? Hmm.. ok enough of the digression. One very strong plus for the Kiwi pavilion was their use of flora on the roof. I felt like I was back in nature doing a very crowded hike especially popular with the Chinese. They had a little luxurious-looking pool in the midst of it all, and me and the girls are fervently trying to figure out how we can smuggle ourselves, bathing suits and a big bottle of champagne into the pavilion after hours.

This pavilion is definitely worth a visit. I would recommend kidnapping one of the guides so that you can get a proper tour of the pavilion. This way I am sure all the clever details that the "dream team" have come up with will be a little clearer, and you will leave with a much stronger impression of what they are trying to tell the rest of the world.
Huan ying nin lai xin xilan guan!! check out the pictures below!
Trine:)

walking in the garden (roof of pavillion). cheese!

Outside of New Zealand

and finally: illustration of a stemp desk situation (Portugal)