In 1932, a Chinese tycoon named Zhang Jingjiang built a residential neighborhood in Shanghai which he modeled after the villas of Europe. The land for the housing development was formerly used as horse stables by the British, whose racecourse was just a few kilometers east. The lovely new Jing’an Villa soon became an enclave of […]
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A Tough Knot to Crack: The Art of Chinese Knotting
Today I attended a class where I learned how to make jewelry utilizing the ancient Chinese art of knotting. There are different types of knots and many are named after what the shape resembles, such as butterfly and flower. Today’s lesson focused on a double snake knot where two coils are intertwined. Our instructor, who […]
A Tres Chic Lunch at Mr and Mrs Bund, Shanghai
Today happens to be Tomb Sweeping Day, a Chinese holiday where ancestors are honored and graves are tended. Since we had the day off, we decided to make the most of it by having lunch on the Bund. Many of the restaurants in this exclusive neighborhood are prohibitively expensive for dinner but offer set lunches […]
Affordable Art on Shanghai’s Painter Street
We brought a few pieces of art with us to Shanghai in need of framing because I figured we could have it done here for a lot less than it would cost in the States. The trouble was that we didn’t know where in Shanghai to go. Then I heard about this place called Painter […]
Learning to Make Dumplings in Shanghai
I recently attended a cooking class at Shanghai’s Chinese Cooking Workshop, which has been teaching expats to cook since 2003. The nondescript entrance, on Dongping Lu, would be easy to miss without knowing what to look for. Our class was held in a glass-enclosed room in the courtyard, hidden behind the thick stone walls. The […]