Shanghai

Your mission, should you choose to accept it: acquire a Russian visa. Sounds easy enough. Until this point in the trip being an American citizen has been an advantage, but, unfortunately, we're not in good standings with the Russian embassy. Although we were originally planning to go straight to Beijing, we read that the embassy there doesn't issue visas to foreigners. Shanghai, therefore, became our next stop. The train ride was one of our best in terms of luxury, but Nicole's sleep was frequently disrupted by the painfully loud nasal gurgling from the guy below my rack. Some of the finest nose trumpeting I've ever heard.Fortunately for us, we were able to meet up with Allison(right of Nicole in picture above), a friend of mine from Oregon State (thank you Darin for the email address!), while we were there. Being able to hang out with someone who knows the area and speaks the language always makes traveling more fun and this was no exception. Allison has been living in China for four years and working in Shanghai for two, so she was able to give us the inside scoop on some good restaurants and local life. We also met, Helen, one of her good friends from China. We had a great time hanging out with both of them - mostly just hours and hours of talking over dinner! To be honest, though, our favorite night in Shanghai was spent watching Dreamgirls, eating Papa John's pizza, and gorging on popcorn and Trader Joe's dark chocolate covered raisins....mmmmm, so good. It was the capstone to an all-American day: McDonald's for breakfast, Starbucks coffee, and Burger King for lunch. Actually looking at that in print is pretty sickening and I can't believe we ate it all. It wasn't entirely American, though. Oh, yes, there was more food! In between Burger King and Papa John's, we managed to eat some local street food. Allison introduced us to a flat noodle with cilantro and peanut sauce, pineapple and banana pancake(the guy in the picture below is throwing the dough over his head), and an amazing deep fried vegetable cake that tasted a lot like an egg roll.When we weren't eating, we spent our time walking through the city streets and The Bund. We both really enjoyed the Shanghai Museum - definitely the most elaborate and well maintained museum we've seen in Asia and one of Nicole's favorite attractions in China. And, in keeping with every other city in China we've visited, Shanghai is full of construction and restoration projects in preparation for the Olympics. Just walking through the streets and stopping at local food stands made for a fun day. The only downside of the city was dealing with countless street vendors selling "watch-bag-dvd's-gucci-prada-sunglasses-what-you-want?" Mostly, though, they stuck to the whole brevity thing and just offered "watchbags" or "watchbagsDVD." It was funny and annoying at the same time. My favorite was when they just asked,"What you want, we have anything!" to which I would reply,"Do you have any watchbags?" Childish, yes, and it certainly didn't help the situation, but I couldn't help myself.The Russian visa ended up being very straight forward, but only because we've spent countless hours preparing. Mostly we've just read personal accounts and online references, but we also filled out several documents that, ultimately, ended in the garbage. In order to apply for a Russian visa you are required to be 'invited' by a Russian company or hotel. While that sounds ridiculous, it's pretty easy to get online from any number of websites. We were mostly worried because the application form that we downloaded asked the following questions:

1) Do you have any prior military service?
2) Do you have any specialties in nuclear, biological, or chemical activities? If yes, explain.
3) Have you ever been involved in a foreign conflict? If yes, explain.
4) List every foreign country, including the cities you visited and dates involved, that you have visited in the last 10 years.

Along with those questions we were also asked to list all of our educational background and prior employment (including addresses, phone numbers, and supervisors). On top of the absurd paperwork, the embassy only receives applications between 915 and 1215 on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday morning. Additionally, the visas can only be picked up on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday between 1245 and 1315. Finally, since it's one of only three places in all of China that you can get a visa, the lines are long and people start showing up two to three hours before the embassy opens. Good times.

Fortunately, the only trouble we had was a funny look from the guy processing my application. Apparently he thought my clean shaven, military buzz haircut, 22 year old passport mug didn't quite match up with my current pissed off mountain man look. Strange. In the end all our preparation paid off and we picked up our passports, with Russian visa, on Wednesday afternoon! We've both had our doubts about passing through Siberia during the spring, but we were excited to hear from Chellis that we may have a potential connection in Russia. It's not finalized yet, and I'm not sure if I can give out full details, but we're crossing our fingers that we can meet up with this particular Russian during our travels!! Althought I'm sure we'll have plenty of adventures on the Trans-Siberian Railway, it would make it that much more memorable to have a friend on the inside.After meeting with Allison one last time on Wednesday, we caught a night trian to Beijing and arrived this morning. Once again we were treated to the lovely tune of gurgling snot and spats of choking on said snot. Nicole slept through most of it, but this time I was unable to manage the noise. The worst part about listening to someone snoring is the knowledge that each brutal snort keeping you awake is an indication that the offender is solidly sleeping. Trust me, I tried everything. Poked him with a coat hanger at least a dozen times. Even beat him over the head with my pillow. Was finally able to rouse him by tugging on his pillow just hard enough that his head moved a little. The rule of thumb: if I could hear three consecutive snores through the pillows firmly clamped over my ears I gave him a tug. I justified my actions by telling myself I was helping Nicole sleep - which she was doing. It was enough to keep me sane at four in the morning.

Today we visited the Forbidden City and Tianamen Square and tommorrow we head out to The Great Wall. We've good access here so I will put up pictures and stories tommorrow!