The World’s Fair
An inspiring article in an in-flight magazine a few months back convinced us to add Shanghai to our list of places to visit this summer. It turns out that the World’s Fair is being held this year, and an event that gave us the ice cream cone and the Eiffel Tower is surely not to be missed. Mike was a little disappointed to learn that the event is not actually called the World’s Fair anymore. Now it is just known as “the Expo”, which sounds a lot less spectacular. Even more perplexing than the name is the mascot they chose for this years event, the only image it calls to mind for us is a blob of toothpaste. Maybe it means something else, apparently the Chinese like it enough to put up statues all over the country. Aside from the marketing issues, it really was an impressive event.
The first thing you notice is how huge and crowded it is. People from all over the country come to visit, and the news reports the number of visitors each day. It was generally around a half million people per day while we were in town. This huge number of people probably made it a bit of a challenge to organize, but we thought there could have been some big improvements in that area as well. The ticket booth and entrances were setup and signed in such a way that it took us at least twenty minutes to figure out how to get inside. Once we solved that puzzle, we ended up in front of the China Pavilion with no way to get in. It required a reservation that none of the staff seemed to know how to get. Continuing on, we walked past a map of the grounds and saw a “you are here” symbol in the legend but it was not placed anywhere on the actual map. The other result of so many attendees is the lines. Some pavilions were almost empty and you could walk right in, others were so popular that they had four hour waits and lines that were so long it was hard to find the end. Adding to that problem was the typical Chinese attitude toward lines: everyone has to push his way to the front. We tried to skip most of this, and although we didn’t see everything we wanted to, there was plenty to keep us busy. We even went back for another day.
Another thing that was interesting to observe was the primary purpose of this expo. Rather than showing off new ideas to the world, it was to try and show a good image of your country to the Chinese people. Many countries had exhibits showing past cooperation with China, reasons why a future relationship would benefit China, or even a report from a Chinese journalist about why she liked that particular country. There was also a notable absence of foreigners and many countries’ pavilions were staffed only by Chinese workers. This wasn’t true across the board though, many countries just tried to show what life was like for them, some tried to promote tourism, and some tried to sell souvenirs. We tried to visit countries with short lines, countries we liked, and countries that we are thinking of visiting later on this trip. Turkey and Morocco were particularly interesting and we are looking forward to going there later this year. Cuba just decided to build a bar to sell rum and cigars. We found waffles and good beer in Belgium, empanadas and wine in Chile, and pirogies in Russia. The rest of Russia was just bizarre, it looked like a scene from a fantasy land in a children’s story book. Sputnik was there too. Overall it was very interesting stuff. We also visited the USA pavilion, which was huge, but a little disappointing. It consisted of three short movies that really had nothing to do with America, then there was a wall of advertisements from corporate sponsors, and finally a gift shop selling key chains, pens, and coffee cups that were all made in China.
Our visit to Shanghai wasn’t just about the expo. We also took some time to explore the city. We found it to be much more modern and comfortable than Beijing. They had some great public parks and gardens, as well as a very nice, free museum. The Shanghai Museum has exhibits on various aspects of Chinese history. Highlights were the art and clothing from various ethnic minorities, old coins and seals, and traditional furniture. Another exciting discovery was a street full of restaurants right around the corner from the first meeting place of the Chinese Communist Party. We found some German beer and pretzels! The Bund area was also quite lively and also gave us a good view of the modern skyscrapers across the river.
