letters from shanghai

back home

2009-07-27T04:46:00.000-07:00

MANILA - Cebu Pacific Flight 5J 679 landed at Ninoy Aquino International Airport at 3:55 AM, a few minutes ahead of schedule. Ground temperature was 26 degrees, a far cry from the 30 degrees which greeted us at Pudong International Airport just a few short days ago.

And THAT was three days ago. Hahaha. I've been bumming around ever since I got back home from Shanghai. I had a lot of catching up to do - with my family, my friends, with Plurk, Facebook, Multiply, Blogger, the History Channel, CNN, Farmtown, Sword of the Stars, Call of Duty 4 - hence the lack of updates since Friday.

Honestly, I have a bit of a hangover. I miss Shanghai. I miss the dorm, the bar, the food, the free Wi-Fi, the company. I miss the parks and the subway. I miss the feeling of adventure. But I missed home more, and now I'm back. I've got a lot to do - papers, blogs, exams, reports, changes.

Better start now.

***
I've got a huge backlog of blog posts and pictures about Shanghai. Will post them in the days to come.

tourist time

2009-07-23T08:35:00.000-07:00

..written at 9am today

* * *
SHANGHAI - With the eclipse over, we now have some time to play tourist. We'll explore Shanghai today. Weeee! We plan on going on the Shanghai Metro and see the sights on the Bund and buy some souvenirs for the folks back home in Manila.

We're just waiting for Aaron and Kiel to get ready. Am and I ready to go. I'm excited. Hahaha. I'm typing as fast as the thoughts come to me. Maybe I should go kick some people out of their beds. Hahaha.

I'll have more to talk about when we get back. One thing's for sure: I'll be on that maglev train before I return to Manila.

live from jinshanwei

2009-07-22T09:42:00.000-07:00

JINSHANWEI - Day turned to night as the moon covered the entire face of the sun in the longest total solar eclipse of the century.

The sky darkened and the lights of the seaside town of Jinshanwei turned on at 9:35 this morning to the cheers of dozens of Filipino, American, European, and Japanese tourists, who, along with the local residents, waited on the beach front from 7 in the morning for the start of the cosmic show.

Members of the UP Astronomical Society Total Solar Eclipse Expedition (UPASTSEE) set up cameras, telescopes, and other observation equipment to view and document the entire event. "We want to tell a story to our grandchildren", said Team Leader Jodl Gayatin, "this was the longest solar eclipse of our lifetime, and we were there."

However, the event was marred by heavy cloud cover over Jinshanwei - much of the Shanghai area was overcast starting the previous night. The sun was hidden from view for the most part of the morning, just peeking from behind the clouds from time to time. The UPASTSEE barely got enough pictures of the different stages of the eclipse, although video taken during the event showed the effects of the eclipse and the reactions of the people viewing it.

Totality ended at exactly 9:41. A brief break in the clouds at that exact moment revealed the beautiful diamond ring effect characteristic of total solar eclipses. Rain fell immediately after.

The eclipse ended at 11:01 here at Jinshanwei. Greatest totality - a full six minutes and thirty-nine seconds - occurred over the Pacific Ocean just off Japan's Ryuku Islands.

shanghai special 2: the night before

2009-07-21T09:43:00.000-07:00

SHANGHAI - In a sudden moment of epiphany, the members of the UP Astronomical Society Shanghai Solar Eclipse Team realized that, contrary to earlier speculation, there is no lumpiang shanghai in Shanghai. Hahaha.

With less than 24 hours before the eclipse of the century begins, I'm getting more nervous by the minute. We just concluded our last briefing before we go to Jinshanwei. Call time would be at 5 AM sharp. I hope I wake up on time. It wouldn't do for me to be left behind - I've been waiting for this moment for the longest time.

Spirits are high among the members of Team Shanghai. Even the news of approaching storms did nothing to dampen the excitement of the people here. While the weather forecast for tomorrow still shows overcast skies and thunderstorms, and even if the weather agency here has all but conceded that the eclipse would be spoiled by the clouds, everyone here is still hoping for the best.

Precautions are being taken, however. In case clouds cover the sky over Jinshanwei, the team will then move to an alternate site at Jiaxing, another town to the west of Jinshanwei. Hopefully, we woudn't have to move at all. Hahaha.

The people here are all writing their personal blogs about the eclipse. This is mine. I'm excited about the eclipse. I'm nervous about the weather. I'm afraid of screwing up tomorrow. I'm thinking of the people back home in Manila, where the weather is even worse than what we have here in Shanghai.

I'll be signing off now. The next update will be from the sunny beaches of Jinshanwei. Clear skies, everyone!

shanghai special: on to jinshanwei

2009-07-21T09:39:00.000-07:00

SHANGHAI - We're going out of the city tomorrow morning to watch the eclipse at Jinshanwei, a town about 70 kilometers south of the Shanghai city center located on the shore of Hangzhou Bay.

Jinshanwei will play host to the longest duration of totality for this solar eclipse here in China - exactly five minutes, fifty-seven seconds. After Jinshanwei, the next best place to watch the eclipse will be at sea. The sun will be completely obscured by the moon for the longest time - what astronomers call "greatest totality" - over the Pacific Ocean, just off Japan's Ryuku Islands. I wish the people who will observe the eclipse there good luck; the rolling seas will doubtless play havoc with their observation.

As such, we here at Shanghai will have the best seats in the house. Hahaha. Sorry for that bit of bragging over there - I'm really psyched for tomorrow's big event. I can't wait to see Bailey's beads, the diamond ring effect, and the sun's corona. This will be the best and longest eclipse for the next one hundred years and I want to enjoy every moment of it.

However, the latest weather forecasts for Shanghai show thunderstorms and cloudy skies starting tonight until tomorrow. The last solar eclipse expedition of UP AstroSoc, this one to Tawi-tawi in the southern Philippines, was also mired by cloudy skies on the day of the eclipse itself. I hope that history doesn't repeat itself. Let's all hope and pray for clear skies over Shanghai and Jinshanwei tomorrow.

shanghai day 1 part 2: a walk around the block

2009-07-21T09:36:00.000-07:00

SHANGHAI - I woke up at around 8 in the morning. A quick shower later and I was headed to the bar for some breakfast with the team - 20 yuan for toast, egg, bacon, banana, and juice. I squeezed in a bit of typing and chatting with the folks back home in Manila while I waited for my friends to get ready for a walk around the block; I needed to get to a bank to have my money converted to yuan - Hong Kong dollars are not accepted here.

It's a very different world here in China. Everyone speaks in Mandarin, which is a confusing and unintelligible mix of sounds for someone who grew up speaking English and Filipino at home. The written kind is impossible to read; at first glance it looks like random squiggles and scratches. In English or Filipino or German or Spanish we only need to remember around 26 letters and then mix and match them to form words. In Mandarin, each word is represented by a single character - you have to memorize literally thousands of characters to be able to write anything.

The people here range from very friendly to just cordial. Maybe it's the language and culture barrier - the more friendly people here understand and speak English well, although we met some Chinese who did not let language get in the way of hospitality.

As we walked around we started to look for something to eat. Every restaurant we passed didn't have anything in the way of English menus, even menus with pictures. We just didn't want to go pick something only to find out that it was something that we wouldn't touch with a ten-foot pole if we knew what it was - fried bullfrog, anyone?

Anyway, we finally found one place which advertised its wares out front with appetizing pictures. We walked into the quiet and deserted restaurant - it was late afternoon - and approached the smiling waitress who immediately engaged us in rapid Mandarin while we tried to communicate using English and hand gestures. After a frantic five minutes we agreed to go out of the restaurant and pick our meals from the poster outside. This turned out to be a good idea, and we were soon stumbling our way to lunch. The waitress was smiling all the time - it must have been difficult for her to take our orders and at the same time explain what the Chinese characters and pictures on the poster were all about - there really was fried bullfrog on the menu - in halting English. She was very patient and friendly towards us - as one of my friends put it, pinagtiyagaan niya talaga kami.

Lunch was simply delicious. We had beef, pork, and tofu. The beef dish was the best - it was sweet with just hint of spiciness, served with juicy onions and green bell peppers, and drenched in a sweet brown sauce. We gobbled up everything. After our meal, we even had our photos taken with the friendly waitress. Unfortunately, we had already left before we realized that we didn't get her name.

We returned to the hostel for a team meeting where we discussed what we were going to do during the eclipse. I'll have more details on that later. As for myself, I would be taking videos of the team and other people around us during the eclipse itself, as well as taking notes for an article which I plan to write when I get back to Manila.

After the meeting we grabbed our equipment, unwrapped our tarp which screamed "UP Astronomical Society", unfurled our organization's flag - a caricatured telescope on a white background - and headed outside the hostel for a photo-op. Hahaha. All the pedestrians outside were staring at us as we posed for pictures in front of the Blue Mountain Hostel.

For dinner, we returned to the restaurant where we ate for lunch. The people there appeared to have recognized us; even though the restaurant was full of customers at that time, one of the waitresses led us out to the back of the establishment where there was another - classier - dining area. There was only one table there, made of wood and ornately decorated, with enough chairs for our group. The room was air-conditioned, with its own cooking area and what looked like a porcelain sink.

This time, we were served by someone who spoke English. She introduced herself as Chris, and she started to explain the menu written in Chinese. We only had a small sampling of the restaurant's food that morning; now we could check out everything they had. Chris told us all about the food they had there - no need for pictures this time. We decided on another plate of the beef dish we had that afternoon, plus the house specialty, braised pork, along with shrimp, haretail fish, cucumbers in soy sauce, and clams.

One of my friends was celebrating his birthday on that day, and when Chris heard of this - we asked her how to say "happy birthday" in Chinese - she told us about a Chinese tradition where the birthday celebrant would be given a plate full of noodles. That lucky person must then scoop up as long a strand of noodles as he could and hold it. This was supposed to show how much longer his life will be.

When our food started to arrive, Chris said goodbye and started to leave. It was only then that we found out that she didn't work at that restaurant or that she owned the place (as we originally thought) but that she was also a customer there. She only stayed to help us get our meal. Wow.

Dinner was even better than lunch. The beef dish evaporated in a few short minutes. The rest of the food lasted just a little while longer. Eating exclusively with chopsticks turned out to be more fun than using a spoon and fork; getting the food into your mouth with the two thin sticks is just as exciting as tasting the appetizing delights on the plates in front of you.

On our way back to the hostel we decided to get some snacks at Buddies, the Chinese version of Mini Stop back in Manila. Nearly everywhere we looked there was a Buddies store. I got a chocolate bar while my friends got ice cream. The chocolate cost only 4 RMB (renminbi = yuan) - cheap, until you convert that amount to pesos. 4 RMB x 7 PHP = 28 pesos. Not bad, roughly comparable to chocolate sold at Mini Stop or 7-11.

I spent the rest of the night typing and chatting with the folks back home. More updates coming soon, as fast as I can type them and as soon as a laptop becomes available. Hahaha.

shanghai day 1

2009-07-20T12:11:00.000-07:00

SHANGHAI - We landed at Pudong International Airport a few minutes ahead of schedule. The terminal was nearly empty - yet another advantage of flying at night. No queues, no waiting, no noise. We breezed through customs and health inspection and were soon on our way out of the airport.

The magnetic levitation (maglev) train to the city was already closed when we arrived. I had wanted to ride into Shanghai on the fastest passenger train in the world - the 30 kilometer trip would have taken just seven minutes - but due to the very late hour we had to settle for a taxi.

We were soon on our way. The ride into the city was quick and painless. We rarely went below 80 kilometers per hour on the smooth highway. This was very different from highways in the Philippines, where going over 60 over unevenly paved roads is a rare treat. Our drive on the Outer Ring Highway took a little less than an hour, and we soon entered the city through the Lupu Bridge.

From the bridge it took us only a few more minutes to reach our residence for the next five days. The Blue Mountain Youth Hostel is located near the Huangpu River, just off Luban Road. It's in a quiet part of Shanghai, quite far away from the busy parts of the ciy. However, the proximity of Luban Lu Metro Station makes the major tourist attractions of Shanghai - like People's Square and the Bund - just a short subway ride away.

The hostel itself is two floors above street level. A steep staircase leads to the lobby and check in counter, opposite of which is a wall covered in hundreds of pictures of Shanghai. The lobby leads to a bar/library/computer center. Food and drinks are available at affordable prices - a breakfast of eggs, bacon, toast, a banana, and juice costs only 20 yuan - and books about Shanghai line the shelves. Three computers are available for use free of charge; the only
challenge in using them is in figuring out how to use the Chinese version of Windows 98, Chinese characters and all. It's a good thing that the bar also provides free Wi-fi - how I wish that I had my own laptop here.

Our rooms are adequate for our purposes - we're here to observe an eclipse, not sleep. UP AstroSoc's Shanghai eclipse team is spread across five different rooms, from 6-bed dorms to 3-bed suites. The rooms have soft beds, air conditioning, and television sets, although one would have to make do with Chinese cable TV - no CNN or Discovery Channel or HBO here.

We'll be making our first trip outside into the city tomorrow morning. I should get some sleep if I want to see the sights.

en route to shanghai

2009-07-20T11:57:00.000-07:00

This blog entry was written this afternoon. Posting was delayed due to the unavailability of Blogger, Multiply, and Facebook in the People's Republic of China. This blog entry was posted thanks to the assistance of a friend back home in the Philippines. Thank you.

I'm writing this on the plane. I would have wanted to have up to the minute updates here, but sadly the technology which would have enabled me to do so is unavailable to me (someone please get me my own laptop!). For the moment, I'll have to make do with pen and paper. All great journalists have to start from somewhere, you know.

Cebu Pacific flight 5J678 left Ninoy Aquino International Airport at approximately 8:20 PM. The take-off roll had me holding tight on the arm rests as the pilot seemed to have out the pedal to the metal - this was my fastest take-off ever.

***
My father was right. Flying at night is even better than flying by day. As the plane climbed up into the air a dazzling array of lights filled my window. Manila by night is a sparkling jewel shining brightly in white, blue, orange, and red.

***
We left Philippine airspace a few minutes ago. It is pitch black outside my window - we're over the South China Sea right now. I think. Hahaha. I miss flying on Philippine Airlines. While Cebu Pacific is way cheaper, the ride on a PAL plane is way smoother, plus the in-flight drinks and snacks are free. Good thing I bought a hamburger from Jollibee before I left. It has been a jittery flight for me. The plane has been vibrating continuously since take-off.

***
The cabin lights are out now. Most of the other passengers are sleeping, though there are still some who chose to read. This is my first international flight. While there are many other Filipinos aboard, there are also other people of different nationalities. Chinese mostly, but there are also a few Westerners here and there. I'm going to turn in now. We're still two hours away from Shanghai.

***
9:45. Sleep just wouldn't come. Just as well, as the sky outside was simply beautiful. We're passing close to a city right now, probably Taipei. A nearby cloud glowed a faint orange, while above it the stars shone brightly in the clear night sky. There's another city below us. Another thing I miss from PAL is the real-time flight map. I have no idea where we are right now. Hahaha. I'm really getting nitpicky over here.

***
I can see the constellation Ursa Major (commonly known as the Big Dipper) outside. It's higher up in the sky than I'm used to seeing it - we're way up north now, the farthest I've ever gone to date. So we're probably over China right now; my initial estimate of being over. Taiwan seems to be way off mark.

****
11:10. We've started our descent into Shanghai International Airport. A bit earlier than expected. Hahaha. I'll have something up about the airport and the place we're staying in soon. Until then.

leaving on a jet plane

2009-07-18T21:35:00.000-07:00

I'm about seven hours away from boarding my plane to Shanghai.

This will be my first trip abroad, the very first time I leave the Philippines. Too bad I'll be flying out at night; I really want to see all the sights on my way up north.

All this for a six-minute total solar eclipse. Hahaha. It's a once in a lifetime opportunity - there will be none like this for the next 100 years at least. I plan to enjoy every single minute of it.

I'm excited. I'm also scared. My first trip out of the country, and I'm doing it alone. It would be just okay if I was going to an English-speaking country, but I'll be diving right into the People's Republic of China, with nary an inkling of Mandarin.

Six days in a foreign - in every sense of the word - country. Six minutes of totality. An eternity of bragging rights - I WAS THERE! Hahaha! *Cue theme music from 2001: A Space Odyssey*

The University of the Philippines Astronomical Society (UP AstroSoc) - of which I'm a member of - will have an official team in Shanghai to observe and document the eclipse. I plan on becoming an "embedded journalist" and as such document the entire trip. Stay tuned for updates about the expedition. Also check out the expedition's official site at http://solareclipse2009.co.cc/.

Let's hope and pray for clear skies on July 22. Hehehe.