Transportation Problems in National Holiday

National Holiday from Oct 1 to Oct 7 is the first long vacation after SARS hit China in summer. Millions of people canceled their travel plan in May so it is inevitable that people will rush out these days.

In Shanghai, from Sept 30 to Oct 2, the intensive traffic control is applied. The Henan Middle Road. Station of Metro Line #2 and People Square Station, the conjunction station of Metro Line #1 and #2 will be closed to avoid traffic overload.

We originally plan to travel outside the city. But we were informed by the travel agency that all tickets for Oct 1, 2 and 3 to any possible destination were completely sold out. They suggested us to come to the ticket office before 8:30 AM next day to see if there is ticket for Oct 10 or later….

My Big Fat Wedding

Finally, I find out some time to upload the pictures of our wedding to my site. Sorry for the week long pause of this site.

wedding.pickup-wenfeng.jianshuo-looking.up.jpg

Picking up the bride to the new home.

wedding.pickup-jianshuo.wenfeng-in.car.JPG

wedding.home-jianshuo.wenfeng-reading.card.jpg

Reading the greeting cards at the new home.

wedding.grass-wenfeng.jianshuo-pointing.JPG

wedding.grass-wenfeng.jianshuo.yuchunyi-arrange.JPG

On the grass of central park

wedding.ceremony-jianshuo.wenfeng-cut.cake.JPG

Cutting the big cake

wedding.ceremony-jianshuo.wenfeng-main.table.JPG

Lighting up candles on all the tables

wedding.ceremony-jianshuo.wenfeng-cheers.to.all.JPG

Cheers to all guests

More Pictures

More pictures can be found at http://home.wangjianshuo.com/family/wedding

Out of Blogging for Wedding

I was out of blogging since Aug 19 since I held my grand wedding ceremony at Garden Hotel, Shanghai on Sept 21, 2003. This will definitely be a big surprise for every one who gathers at this blog. I am just too happy and too busy (for sure) these days to upload the pictures. I promise to put it online tomorrow. Thanks for all and best wishes!

Shopping Malls are Always On Sale

I went to shopping at Hui Jin Department with Wendy today – I mentioned about the store two months ago. I was surprised that Hui Jin is on sale again after its last champion.

Almost all the goods are selling at 20% off. Besides that, they offer 50 RMB rebate coupon for every 200 RMB purchase. That is not all. According to how much you buy, they give you gifts worthing 40-200 RMB. That means, for goods of 500 RMB, you only need to pay 400 RMB and get 100 RMB coupon and some gifts worthing 40 RMB. So the original good is actually sold at 260 RMB – the half price.

I know in U.S, shops go on sale in the month around the Christmas. Here in Shanghai, it seems all major shopping malls are on sale every month and every day. It seems the goal of the program is to keep the customers in their mall as long as possible. They always put the counter to claim the rebate at the top floor or the mall – 7th floor for Hui Jin. People just go up and down and see more goods. Chances are, people will spend more money than they plan to when they 1) Have to pass by the goods (which they didn’t intentionally to see) 2) Has coupon on hand which will be garbage after serveral days’.

Very clever way to sell, isn’t it?

Thunderstorms Week

When there is nothing to talk about, people usually choose to talk about weather. It is the case for me recently. Life is so busy for me and I feel lucky enough to still be able to find sometime to write something on this blog every day instead of leaving blank pages. However, it seems the only topics I can share is about the weather. According to Yahoo!Weather, the coming week in Shanghai is a thunderstorm week.

Friday

Saturday

Sunday

Thunderstorms will last till next Tuesday.

Long National Holiday

There is something special recently – the coming national holiday. It is a long vacation from Oct 1 to Oct 7. This is unique in China since the national holiday is actually 3 days (Oct 1 to Oct 3), but combined with the weekend of Oct 4 and Oct 5, and shifted the working days with Sept 27 and Sept 28, the holiday become very long.

The holiday is also called the golden week since it will generate exteremely huge market for local travel industry – the travel agencies, the hotels and transportation industries….

I learnt that the travel price from Shanghai to Hainan (including round trip air tickets, 5 days and four nights, and 3-star hotels and some gate tickets) is only 1380 RMB for groups leaving at Sept 24. The price for the same group leaving at Sept 28 raised to 2600 RMB and for Oct 1 tour, the price is above 3000 RMB. The golden holiday is the major time for people to travel and relax, especially when the May long vacation was canceled this year due to SARS.

Today in Last Year

One oof the advantages to keep the weblog running for the whole year is, I can always go back to the same day in the previous year and check what I was doing or thinking about at that time.

Today, I added the function of Today in Last Year to my blog. Under the Navigation section of each page (starting from today), there is link named:

  • Read Today in Last Year

Click the link and you will be directed to either the article posted on the same day of last year, or to this page. If you hit this page, this is the possible reasons:

1. You clicked a link on a page posted before Sept 11, 2003. I started posting on Sept 11, 2002 so there is no Today in Last Year.

2. You clicked a link after Sept 11, 2003, but I happened not to post anything on the same day last year. This is possible since I posted 316 entries, making 87% of 365 days last year.

Enjoy the magical ball of time and history.

Scrawl on Shanghai Buses

Shanghai’s buses are either new and clean, or dirty and old, but I have never seen any bus with scrawling besides the buses No. 43.

The bus No. 43 runs from Shanghai Teacher’s University to the Nan Pu bridge. The two store bus without air condition provide very good places for young university students to scrawl. Here are some seats that were covered with their “art”

shanghai-bus43-back.seats.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

shanghai-bus43-goodbye.kiss.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

shanghai-bus43-i.love.qian.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

shanghai-bus43-i.love.you.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

shanghai-bus43-support.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

P.S My good friend just put her website online. Here is the link, so search engines can find it.

Old Houses in Shanghai

Shanghai is a lovely city because it has a lot old houses. Each of them are telling their own history. Shanghai is unique since most of the old buildings reflects the unique history when foreign traders enters China and build their own style of building. Taking the France Club as an example, it was built in 1900’s by German and was rebuilt in 1928 and becomes the France Club.

shanghai-france.club-old.jpg

France Club in 1928. Credit: libnet.sh.cn

The old picture below take at 1930’s clearly show the France Club, the large grassland before it, the tall apartment (which still stands there till now) and the Mao Ming Road between them.

shanghai-france.club-old.whole.jpg

Credit: libnet.sh.cn

A centuary past and the building was still there, but the new owner is the five star hotel – the Garden Hotel. The Art Decro style building reminds me of the old times when 500 people went to Chen Yun Shang’s wedding at this palace, the famous film star at that time.

© Jian Shuo Wang

© Jian Shuo Wang

© Jian Shuo Wang

Some change did happened. A 120 meter tall building (with 34 floor) raised behind the old house. I love this architect so much because it combined the history and today together.

© Jian Shuo Wang

There are so many old buildings of builders from different nationality in Shanghai. I am so interested to visit them, to find out the history behind them and learn how spendid and famous they were when they were “young”..

Update Jian Shuo Wang and Wendy’s Wedding September 25, 2004

Wendy and I got married at this fantastic place on September 21, 2003. This place means a lot to me.

My Previous House at Meilong

I suddenly missed my previous house at Meilong badly. It was on the forth floor of a 6-floor apartment building, which is 15-minute-walk away from Lianhua Road Metro Station. The 64 sq meter apartment with two bed rooms, one guest room, one kitch, one rest room only cost me 600 RMB per month. That was a great deal and currently, I cannot image any apartment with less than 600 RMB, let along the two-bed room apartment.

shanghai.meilong-BeautifulBedRoom-ThickEdge.jpg

© Jian Shuo Wang

Look at the nice and romatic bed room. I lived there for three years.

One Year Anniversary for This Site

Today is the one year anniversary for Wangjianshuo’s Blog. The website was setup on Sept 11, 2002, which is exactly one year ago.

The Begining

At that time, I was inspired by a blog RussianLegs.com on Sept 3, 2003, I am thinking about setting up my own blog.

So on Sept 11, 2003 (just coincident to the one year anniversary of Sept 11 event), I setup MovableType on the desktop computer in my reading room (the computer has been selt out at 2500 RMB later), and wrote my first blog entry MovableType Successfully Installed on Windows XP. It turned out to one of the most valuable entry on the whole website. I am happy that this entry helped a lot of bloggers to start MovableType on Windows based platform.

The Effort

From that day, I started to write daily on this blog. This is what Geo from Russianlegs.com told me when I asked how much time he used to maintain his blog: “Everyday, I spent 15 minutes to write the blog and 15 minutes to edit it”.

I followed the rule but some time I spent more than 1 hour on a long article and sometimes only take 5 minutes to note down what is happening.

The Blog

Now one year has past, here is the statistic for the blog (as you can see on the right side of my home page)

Created: Sept 11, 2002

Entries: 316

Categories: 7

Page views/day: ~ 4K

Comments: 2387

Location: Shanghai, China

Author: Jian Shuo Wang

Update Frequency: daily

It seems I am doing pretty well in the last year that I created 316 entries in the 365 days, making write rate of 87%. This certain include the long week in Daocheng when there is no mobile signal, no electricity and let alone network. The second long absence in blogging is in February, when I was on busy business trip to Beijing. Besides that, I believe I ALMOS kept this blog updated everyday. Wow. What an accomplishment, I didn’t think about that I can keep doing something continuous for one year or longer. I typically would give up half way or earlier.

The Reason

The reasons I kept the hard work (sometimes) are the feedbacks and comments on this blog. It is such an interesting place that people share the same interest gather and interactive with other. I got 2387 comments under 316 posts, making the average comment/post rate 7.55. That is impressive number, I believe. From the comments, I see people are happy either because I provided some valuable information about topics like Shanghai, SARS, Pudong Airport, OT715 or Windows Media web cam, or because I shared my personal life and experience like going to Daocheng, learn to drive, even to buy a mountain. Actually, I was really flattered by the good words.

The Popularity

In the previous year, the site becomes a little bit famous among search engines and media. My Google PageRank reached PR5 and become the target for some common term, like Pu Dong Airport. Meanwhile, it was featured on some local magazines like Shanghai Magazine. Thus the highest hit rate reached to 5K some time.

The Friends

I also treasure the relationship I built within the blogging world. I have a lot of friends who monitors and reference to my site consistently but I never linked back. It is because they are all in Chinese and from my site log, majority of my readers cannot read Chinese. I felt bad not doing that. These sites are: Chinese Tea (by Christina), IsaacMao.com (by Isaac Mao), Joycode (by Joy Wang), Tiger Cafe (by Raymond) and lots of others sites.

I’d like to celebrate the one year anniversary and share the happiness with you. I’d like to thank Wendy for her support. Click here for a complete list of the 316 articles.

Shanghai is Cooling Down

After so many weeks’ extremely high temperature, Shanghai finally becomes cooler. After the rain, it is only 28 degree C now. This will be a piece of great news for those who plan to travel to Shanghai.

SARS Alert

After reporting SARS case in Singapore yersterday, the Shanghai Morning Post published in the same location that WTO claim that the case in Singapore is not confirmed. However, Shanghai is so alerted that the contigency plan in both airport and travel agencies have been started to filter passengers from Singapore for SARS symptoms or warn people who planned to go to Singapore. I am satisfied with the quick response from the local tourism industries. This definitely shows that the systematic prevention measures have been established already to treat the protential SARS threat.

Dopod 515 – SmartPhone in China

I used 1300 RMB to exchanged a SmartPhone Dopod 515. It is maybe the first SmartPhone on the market. The listed price seemed to be 4000+ RMB. This is the promption from Shanghai Mobile that people can exchange a mobile with the credit points and promise to consume certain level of communication fee in the next one year or two.

I didn’t spend time to research on the phone yet, but the camera feature of the phone is really good. To be continued on this topic.

Traveled to Beijing with China Eastern Airlines

I believe the transportation between Shanghai and Beijing should be busiest in China. Taking me as an example, almost 2/3 of my travel desitniation is Beijing – maybe it only reflects the importance of Beijing, since it may be the same for people in cities like Guangzhou and Hong Kong.

I just checked the flight schedule and found it amazing that how frequent the flights are. The China Eastern Airlines (MU) alone operates hourly flight to Beijing from 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM:

MU5101	8:00	10:00

MU5103	9:00	11:00

MU5105	10:00	12:00

MU5107	11:00	13:00

MU2579	11:35	13:40

MU5109	12:00	14:00

MU5111	13:00	14:50

MU2577	13:50	15:50

MU5113	14:00	16:10

MU5115	15:00	17:00

MU5117	16:00	17:55

MU5119	17:00	19:00

MU5121	18:00	20:00

Air China also offers a lot of flights from Shanghai to Beijing.


CA1590		8:55	10:55

CA1502		11:30	13:30

CA1520		12:45	14:40

CA1558		14:25	16:25

CA1518		16:10	18:10

CA1516		18:10	20:10

CA1856		19:25	21:25

CA1550		21:05	23:00

I am one of the passenger on the flight MU5119 – maybe this is the third time I took this flight, not sure.

Comparing Shanghai and Beijing

I got email from Christina today asking about which city I will recommend if she comes to China.

====Original Message===

Sent: Sunday, September 07, 2003 10:40 AM

To: Jian Shuo Wang

Subject: Possible Trip To Shanghai China in December 2003 – January 2004

We are going to travel to China this coming December!!! Another good friend from Shanghai, Shexi Bouvier, told me that we should definitely travel to Shanghai, rather than Hong Kong or Beijing!!! Is this true???

It appears thta you have much information about Shanghai. Please advise if you can provide us with some good advice – both about China in general & Shanghai in particular!!!!

Thank you very much,

Christina

It is not easy to answer. Actually, it is very good to visit Shanghai. I will definitely suggest you to come.

What do you want about my suggestions? I have posted all the topics I think may be interesting to my website and I’d like to see what do you want. It will help me or other readers if you prepare a questionnaire about what you want to know more about China or Shanghai and I promise I will answer all the questions to be best of my knowledge and posted on my site – with credit for you.

For example, I am interested to travel to Washington DC and what would you describe about the city? It may not be easy to answer.

Well. I think Beijing is a must-see city in China, not Shanghai. Shanghai is the best place to live for foreigners since it is similar with other large cities like SFO. But Beijing is so different…

Regards

Jian Shuo Wang

Shanghai Hotel Guide – Part II

My friend E took me to some very good hotels in Shanghai. They are not as significant as International Hotel Big Names like Hilton, Marriot, but they are so unique in Shanghai and represent part of the history of the city. I’d to continue my Shanghai Hotel Guide and write the second part – the historical hotels in Shanghai.

It is a pity that the Sony P8 I took with me ran out of battery at the time when I want to take pictures of the hotels, otherwise, I can record the most beautiful scene of them.

Xing Guo Hotel – Radisson Plaza

Just as the State Guest Hotel in Hongqiao, it was the national guest hotel, which was designed to host national level guest. There is very large grass before the nice buildings. See a picture of the old house here

Jin Jiang Hotel

There is a Jin Jiang Tower. It is one of the tallest building in Puxi.

shanghai-jinjiangtower.jpg

Credit: Cintec

I am not talking about this modern architect. The old Jin Jiang building is more delux and beautiful. I remember the interview of IBM was held three years ago which I didn’t attend.

Garden Hotel

This is the second flower ball room in the old house. There is a large tall building (the brown one on the right on the small picture above. It was built based on a very old and nice building.

shanghai-garden.hotel-2f.ball.room.jpg

Muslim Restaurants in Shanghai

The question:

hi there!

I am visiting Shanghai in October. My major concern is about FOOD. It is because I am a Muslim. So, I would appreciate that, if you could provide me an info about MUSLIM FOOD in Shanghai.

Thanking you in advance.

Warmest Regards

The answer:

I found a list of Muslin Restaurants on the Shanghai Government Website. I believe I don’t need to translate it into English since it will be more useful in Chinese. Just show print it out with you and show it to your taxi driver. They can pickup the neareast one for you.

网点名称 社区 地址 电话
明珠大饭店清真餐厅   肇家浜路212号 64330880
和甸清真食府 徐泾 徐泾卫家角公墓 59766754
多旺清真点心店 天山路 遵义路555号  
京钟清真馆 北新泾 金钟路318号  
伊斯兰教餐厅 四川北路 四川北路2035号  
萃华楼清真馆 提篮桥 海门路9号  
清净斋 广中路 广灵一路3号  
虹临清真饭店 嘉兴路 临平北路甲28号  
杨同兴清真牛肉馆 石门二路 石门二路221号  
鸿宾楼清真饭店 江宁路 江宁路昌化路  
顺和清真店 瑞金二路 复兴中路536号  
原渔人湾清真店 淮海中路    
宁记牛肉面馆(永新) 打浦桥 顺昌路529号  
民族饮食店 江川街道 江川路238号  
京城饭店 长寿 长寿路345号  
阿凡提清真餐厅 宜川 交通西路21号  
金沙江清真馆 长风 枣阳路369号  
宜红清真馆 宜川 宜川路218号  
普回清真饮食店 石泉 岚皋路261号  
洪长兴浦东店 梅园新村 八百伴9楼  
真康生面馆 潍坊新村 崂山东路622号  
穆斯林饮食店 川沙镇 川沙  
浦东清真饭店 上钢新村 历城路121号  
浦东清真馆南浦店 南码头路 兰陵路5号  
一心斋清真饮食店 大桥 平凉路1503号  
双阳清真饮食店 控江 双阳路498号  
万事达美食楼 四平 四平路1985号  
迎宾斋清真饭店 延吉 隆昌路740号  
回凤楼 豫园 河南南路89号  
湖滨美食楼 豫园 豫园路59号  
洪长兴餐饮公司 南京 南京东路685号  
洪长兴西藏路店 广场 西藏南路28号  
小桃园清真饮食店 金陵 河南南路572号  
雅叙居浙江路店 金陵 浙江中路90号  
口福食品商店慎发祥店 广场 龙门路116号  
穆斯林饮食店 金陵 浙江中路90号  
海师傅餐饮店 月浦镇 宝泉路28号  
宝山中心商业区清真店 友谊 中心商业区  
为民清真饮食店 大场镇 南大路164号  
赛俩目清真店 徐家汇 天钥桥路127号 64388077
华谊清真饮食店 枫林 枫林路147号  
康乐清真饭店 北站 康乐路205号 63145123
芷江清真馆 芷江西路 芷江西路200号  
彭浦清真店 彭浦新村 汾西路753号  
彭浦清真分店 彭浦新村 三泉路423号  
新雅快餐天目分店 天目西路 天目西路285号  
民族饭店(暂定)   缸甏街21号  
味多香清真馆     石化 石化金一东路56号  
民族饭店 周浦镇 周&#2

8006;康沈路子628号

 

Credit: Shanghai Government Website

Eager to Drive Soon

Driving? I never felt so excited and eager to drive before I finally get the confirmation that I passed the final exam for driver’s license. It is said the license will be delivered to me within the next week, that means, I can drive lawfully on the street from then on.

I don’t have a car and I don’t think any of my friend want to lent their cars to me. It is common practice that car rental companies will not rent their cars to new driver within one year after their licenses are issued. That is a very big problem for people like me.

Thanks God I heard there is a nice car rental company from my friend Roy. They require their club members to hand in 3800 RMB at the begining of the year and the money will be returned at the end of the year. During the year, club member can rent cars at low price. Here is the price list I got from them on the phone:

Volkswagen Santana 160 RMB

Volkswagen Golf 190 RMB

Volkswagen Polo 260 RMB (completely new car)

It sounds good. I am planning to rent a car as soon as possible and practice in nearby areas. To be honest, I am still not confident enough to drive on the busy Shanghai street. As I described in this article Traffic Rules in Shanghai, most people with driver’s license in U.S. are afraid to drive here in Shanghai – some were even frightened when they were seated in a Shanghai taxi…

Relocating to Shanghai

This article is to answer questions from my friends who are planning to relocate to Shanghai from Beijing. Most of the tips only apply to people born and grow up in China, especially north China.

My Own Story to Relocate to Shanghai

Shanghai is an amazing city for local resident, for foreigners who comes from U.S or Europe, but it is definitely a strange and awful city for people from north China. I strongly believe so.

In the first two years I came here (1995 and 1996), I was so frustrated to live in the city. It is not easy to get used to it.

1) The irregular road. In most cities in north China, like Beijing, Xi’an and my home town Luoyang, streets are either N-S or E-W and the street intersections is always 90 degrees, like a chess board. It is totally different here in Shanghai – streets winding through the city and seldom can I find a complete strait road. Later, I found even the newly designed roads in either Pudong Area or in the Jiaotong University Min Hang Campus, were not straight. The design drew two big cycles on the blank area and constructed the campus based on the circles. This was completely unacceptable for me, who came from traditional Chinese cities. Actually, how the road was designed had nothing to do with my daily life, but this kind of unfamiliarity definitely made my home sickness worse.

2) The Smallest Big City. As one drives into Reno, Nevada there is a sign saying, “Reno, the biggest small city in the world”. Shanghai give me the feeling that it is the smallest big city in China. Shanghai was definitely the biggest city in terms of population (Chong Qing is now the biggest in figure), it still seemed so small when I just came here. They call building square, while my concept of square was something like Tian An Men square – the largest square in the world. Roads were narrow, dishes were small on the table, and people were so sensitive to very minor price change. Everything seemed smaller in size compared to cities I lived in.

3) The weather. Shanghai is near the sea and it is hot and dry in summer, cold and rainy in winter. This is completely different. In north China cities, like Luoyang, it is rainy and hot in summer. I didn’t expect rain in winter which made it colder. I never experienced colder winter than Shanghai it may be the north most large city without warming facilities. We kept the windows open for fresh air at night in cold winter since there is no difference when closing the windows. Everything was cold. Keeping the windows closed didn’t help to warm up the wet air inside the room.

4) The people. People in Shanghai were so business oriented and process driven, so I felt cold and hard to fit into the city at the very beginning. I don’t want to talk about it more to keep away from the flaming discussion – it happens everywhere on almost any BBS if someone posts anything about the Shanghainese…

So the famous scenes Huahai road, the Bund and the city were meaningless to me – I felt myself as a tourist, not part of the city at that time. In the deep part of my heart, I was so eager to escape from the city – as soon as possible.

I Get used to Shanghai in One and Half Year

I talked with many friends just came to Shanghai, and I never found anyone love Shanghai in his/her first year. However, after one and half year, I hopelessly fall in love with the city. This happened to many of my friends who original hated the city too.

After several years, I am so used to the city. Whenever I leave the city, I felt very uncomfortable. Here are some examples.

1) The 7×24 Stores. When I was in Chengdu or Beijing, I missed the 7×24 convenient store like LAWSON, Lianghua so much. I wandered on the streets after 11:00 PM and found it was not easy to buy some drink. The city went dark.

2) The bus and taxi. The public service like taxi, bus, gas, electricity… are very good in Shanghai. I believe many people were either impressed by the clean and unified Shanghai taxi or impressed by the dirty and small taxi in many cities. With the effort to prompt public transportation, the air conditioned buses looked very nice and comfortable in Shanghai. This changed a lot during the last eight years. When I just came here, so many people are pushing each other to get on board a crowded bus – it was true but recently, buses are no long crowded with the operation of the metro and light railways.

3) The over-careful people. This was the reason I didn’t like Shanghai – People in Shanghai was so sensitive to the small money. When I used the whole year to get used to this style, I found them easier to deal with. If you take taxi in Shanghai, and the meter shows 141 RMB, you need to pay exactly 141 RMB – including the 1 RMB, or you give them 200 RMB and they give you 59 RMB as change. In Beijing, taxi driver typically will ignore the 1 RMB and only ask for 140 RMB. I am comparing the styles only to point out the difference, without judgment. In fact, the accurate, cold and professional behavior in Shanghai made life easier. Taking the taxi example, the clear agreement between the passenger and driver will cause no argue, while if the price is not accurate, people will be uncomfortable if some driver charges 141 RMB – in which situation, people will say “the drive looks like a Shanghainese…”

Besides these tiny differences, the culture, the buildings, the people and everything are so wonderful, not to mention the bars, the saloons, the theaters and the museums… In conclusion, it will cost you at least one and half year to get used to the city and take longer for you to fall in love with it, if you come from north China.

If you are foreigners new to China, Shanghai will be the city that you can easily get used to, since Shanghai originated from western culture and are more similar with western cities than any other part of China. If you first visit Beijing, the culture shock will be huge. Do you agree?

Suggestions for Relocation

If you change your job and relocate to Shanghai, here are my suggestions:

First, Check my article The Living Cost in Shanghai

In addition, the transportation cost should be about 4 to 6 RMB. Most buses cost 2 RMB (air conditioned) or 1-1.5 RMB. Metro cost 3 RMB (for most trips). Double the price and you get 4 – 6 RMB, which will be 180 RMB per month. If you take taxi, average taxi fee should be 20 RMB (about 6 km).

For apartment, 1000 RMB to 1500 RMB should get a nice apartment for two persons in downtown Shanghai.

For food, Shanghai may be more expensive on food since it is not easy to find cheap food like Beijing – 10 RMB per meal is the bottom line. Typically it costs 15 RMB per meal.

Regarding working time, it is common practice to work from 8:30 to 17:30 or 9:00 to 18:00, including one hour break time. Typically, it is not possible to go back home during the break.

If you concern about Shanghainese – the language, don’t worry. I live here for 8 years without be able to speak Shanghainese and I still feel good and respected. My personal judgment is, people older than 40 with salary less than 1500 RMB tend to speak Shanghainese and hate people from outside Shanghai. For young generation, people with university education or with high income, they are very nice to people from outside Shanghai.

So good luck in Shanghai!

Microsoft is Hiring in Shanghai

Update October 8, 2007

This job is no longer available. It is almost for sure after I posted it 4 years ago. Hope my update today helps.

End of Update

Are you native English speaker in Shanghai? Interested to find a job? How does the Microsoft sound like? I am posting an attractive opening here for my friend, who is the hiring manager for this position.

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Position: Communication Specialist

Company: Microsoft

Location: Shanghai

Microsoft Global Technical Engineering Center (Shanghai) is seeking recent college graduates or young professionals for a Communication Specialist contingency staff position. Requirements: Bachelor’s degree, native English speaker, able to commit to a 40 hour week, 6 month contract, prior teaching or customer service experience, fluency in Mandarin is a plus. Job entails working closely with Chinese engineers to help them improve their English skills, proofreading emails, conducting workshops, and various other projects. Please send resume and cover letter to comsphr@microsoft.com

Posting questions using the comment system below or directly send email to the address above.

My Driver’s License

I went to the final road exam for my driver’s license today and successfully passed it. I am very happy that from the next week, I will drive lawfully on the road. I don’t have a car and would like rent a car and go to nearby areas like Sheshan this Oct. It is 160 RMB to rent a Volkwagen Santana per day.