新天地 Thursday splurging~

Hey Y'all,

Yesterday we only had morning classes! Today we took a group picture in front of the Fudan Main Gate and then took our exit exam, which is the same exam we take for the placement. Anways, since we had time yesterday, we decided to head to 新天地 (Xintiandi) for lunch. 新天地 is this really high-end developed area in Shanghai so a lot of things here are nicer and expensive. There's more foreigners in this area and most of the restaurants will be able to speak English.

I got this for 88rmb plus a sprite for 15rmb. A bit pricey but it was so good.

We went to this German restaurant that some of our friends went to before. The burgers were really good. I heard the Goulash was not so great, so definitely don't get that. I just hang out with my friends while we ate. I'm not sure what my friend, Giulianna, got but apparently she had a really good beer. That was also a bit pricey. But hey, 新天地 style!

After eating, we went around to browse the stores. Everything was literally so expensive. Little trinkets and charms were probably over 10USD and a tea set was over 100USD. Granted, it's probably nice quality and such but I could get something from Chinatown that looks just as nice for less.

We then went into the mall. On a side note, this mall has a club in it called G+ which we went to before. The stores in the mall were even more expensive then anything I've seen in China. The most expensive things were 6000USD and just the normal clothes ranged from 100-400USD. I've never seen stores like that in my life. You can literally just walk in and touch everything and what not. I've been to quite a bit of nice stores in the US but it definitely felt a lot classier if it was worth more. But then again, I guess 新天地 is more of a rich area compared to randomly walking into a mall. 

After browsing a bunch of stores, we decided to head to the international supermarket! Right next to the international supermarket was a store that sold this famous cat icon thing. Not sure how to explain it quite well but you'll understand. It's like going into a Disney store or something.  I got a bunch of stuff for friends here. 

Aren't they super cute?

Afterwards we went into the international store to check it out. I had been there before but I grabbed some granola bars because I just saw it and impulse bought it? Other than that, I bought a going away present for my roommate and his girlfriend. My roommate is here for the fall semester!!!! Win~

Only one more week :( I'll keep you all updated!

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五角场 shopping

Hey everyone,

Today, I'm going to be talking about a recent experience at 五角场(Wu Jiao Chang)'s shopping. So yesterday night, we wanted to go to a place that required business casual clothing. I wasn't sure how business casual it was since in China, that could be pretty different. We finally settled upon the conclusion of collared shirt, nice pants and nice shoes - so pretty much the same... I packed a lot of clothes so I just tried to wing it with the clothes I had. My roommate, Eddie, on the other hand, didn't pack business casual. It's not very convenient to pack, as well as packing for summer classes. So we ended up have to miss the first hour or so of the group KTV party (which was also at Wujiaochang) to shop around.

五角场
Source: www.ypta.gov.cn

五角场 is a huge shopping plaza area. It's so huge!  The image is on the right. It's so awesome because at night, it's so bright and changes colors a lot. I can even see it from my room too. It's the closest shopping area by Fudan University. Everyone likes going here, but mainly for the Walmart. Also the Walmart here is huge. It's three stories.

Anyways! We looked around a bunch of places to shop. There's a lot of big brands here - ones that you can find in the US and ones that are from Korea as well.

We spent an hour looking around. I was a bit disappointed seeing all the prices. Definitely thought things were going to be a lot cheaper but everything pretty much is the same price. H&M, Zara, etc. All the same price. It had a bit different selection though. I thought the clothes were a lot more trendy (but that's just because I like some Asian fashion). Eddie ended up buying clothes from H&M, Zara, and (Shoes) Nike . I'm thinking it rounded to about 160USD for an outfit. So the big brands are pretty much price consistent here. Gotta look for the little shops if you want to find cheaper clothes. But honestly, I still thought Eddie's outfit was nice and suited him well. Cough~ I think so because I was there in the process of helping him pick.

Eddie and I (The Kiwi) in business casual before we left. Eddie's entire outfit was bought at 五角场！

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