The 2010 World Expo

I’M BACK! Did you miss me? 🙂 I took a little break from blogging but I’m back to finish my posts on my Asian adventure. My pictures are on three different computer (ack!) so I’ve been slowly consolidating them…very slowly. I’ll finish my Taiwan posts as soon as I get the pictures from David’s computers, but for now, here are some pictures from my trip to the World Expo!

Warning: there are a LOT of jumping pictures in this post. A LOT.

We arrived in Shanghai on Monday afternoon and took a cab to the JW Marriott in Tomorrow Square, where we were staying for the night. The last time I was in China was in 2006, when I accompanied my mom there on business. Since then, Shanghai has changed so much! There are over 3,000 high rises in Shanghai and prices for the high rises are even more expensive than real estate prices in Manhattan. They also built a new airport (for international flights) and a new highway from the airport to the city. We were pretty amazed at how much progress the city has made since our last visit.

We only had one full day in Shanghai and the only reason we were actually IN Shanghai was to go to the world expo. We had to take a special van to get into the world expo; they purchased a fleet of VW minivans and only allow those new vehicles into the expo (all of the other cabs in the city have to stop at a specific entrance because they don’t match the expo look).

At the entrance of the expo:

By the China Pavilion:

Jumping by the China Pavilion:

The China Pavilion had the Macau Pavilion next to it, which was supposed to be a bunny:

A cool sculpture by the entrance:

Another picture of the China Pavilion:

You have to make reservations for certain pavilions, but people recommend not going to the China Pavilion if you plan on returning to China; they’re breaking down the majority of the pavilions, but the Chinese one is here to stay.

The China Pavilion is in the “Asian Square,” along with others like Nepal and India:

The most popular tent is definitely Saudi Arabia; they have an IMAX inside and supposedly it’s the largest in Asia:

We got in line and got ready to wait, but then we learned that the wait was going to be SIX HOURS. SIX HOURS?! We contemplated waiting since we had flown halfway across the world to see the expo, but decided against waiting because we didn’t want sun poisoning or heat exhaustion just to see the IMAX movie. Instead, we settled for a picture of me jumping in front of their tent:

And a picture of me walking past the pavilion:

The Korea tent had a more reasonable wait…2 hours of standing in the heat:

A picture in front of the tent was enough for me:

We did manage to go into the Syrian tent…absolutely no one was waiting in line to see it:

The interior wasn’t too interesting or nicely decorated; they had posters with information about their country that you’d find on wikipedia and at the end of the tour, they had a gift shop where you could buy sand art.

We continued walking through the Asian Square and saw Japan, Vietnam, and other Asian countries:

After a while in the Asian village, we decided we wanted to see how the waits were in the European village. We boarded one of the shuttles:

Getting on the shuttle was quite an experience; people were shoving like there was NO OTHER SHUTTLE ON EARTH. We couldn’t get on the first shuttle because it filled up REALLY quickly, but managed to squeeze onto the second. Who knew old people were so pushy? Maybe they all pushed onto the bus because they didn’t know how much time they had left ON EARTH.

In the European area, the waits were a little better, but they were still around 2 – 3 hours in the hot sun to get into any tent. We decided to just walk around and see the architecture because it seemed like the exterior was a lot more interesting than the interior.

The start of the European tents:

Switzerland originally wanted to build the Alps, but it would’ve been higher than the Chinese Pavilion, which wasn’t allowed. Instead, they built a ride on top of their Pavilion, which was like a ski lift:

Spain’s tent looked like it was made out of straw:

Poland’s Pavilion:

There were some free water fountains around the pavilions, but people were being really pushy and there was absolutely NO ORDER. We made David get water because no one really wanted to push him around:

We finally went into another pavilion – Ireland’s:

It was nice to be inside with air conditioning, but it was another tent that just had information and pictures from the internet (some were also really pixelated and you couldn’t even tell what they were!) A view from the end of Ireland’s tent:

Germany’s tent was very cool and I think it was designed by Frank Gehry:

Jumping in the middle of the street:

The Netherlands had sheep all over:

A lot of people brought cards and books to read – they just rested under the tent and hung out:

In front of England’s cool tent:

Jumping in front of France:

I also managed to take a picture by Haibao, the official mascot of the World Expo:

We took another bus across the river to the other portion of the world expo – this was mostly technology stuff that you had to reserve beforehand. Some other buildings:

If you end up going to the expo, you should definitely prepare for really LONG waits in the heat. A lot of people brought their own stools and chairs to rest on during their waits. You should also bring lots of containers for water (I don’t think you can bring filled containers into the expo) and definitely bring lots of sunscreen. The expo ends in October and the Chinese government has already told the people of Shanghai to not visit until the end of the expo so tourists can visit first, so it might be packed in October as well.