Ni Hao Shanghai. I have embraced you with open arms leaving behind my relationship of twelve years with Portland. I am all equipped to step into my new role of an explorer along with my family. Ready, get set, go.............
Immigration and customs was a cake walk. What more? Hop into the cab and go to my hotel. I see the Marriot counter right in front of me. We walk there and the guy in the counter talks to me in English asking me if I need a taxi. We say 'Yes' and he talks to someone on his walkie talkie in Chinese. 500 yuan and my family and I get into this 7 seater Buick minivan and off we go....
What a beautiful city this is...city of skyscrapers...yet, not as crowded as I thought, a lot more road discipline than I thought, very friendly demeanor than I thought and most of all very easy to live in than I thought...well, everything true but the last one.
45 minutes and we are in our hotel room in Pudong, Shanghai. What is Pudong? Good question. Pudong is a district in Shanghai and is named because of it's location on the east side of the Huangpu river. "Pu" in Mandarin means River and "Dong" means East, thus Pudong means East of the river. The West of the river is the district of Puxi, "xi" pronounced as "shi", so as to say "Pushi".
Standing next to the huge window of our hotel room I see the new area of Pudong.
But my heart cries out for Portland, my house, my people. I feel totally out of place.
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