Shanghai is an enormous, sprawling city. It is divided into two main regions: Puxi and Pudong, and we live in Pudong. Within Pudong we live in an area called Kangqiao (Kong-Chow). We’ve been trying to get out and explore our new home lately.
Last weekend we explored our neighborhood on foot…
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A street past the lower school we found an awesome wet market (fruit and vegetable market).
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The sweet lady who sold us our veggies. She kept digging around behind the counter to find us the best produce, and on top of that kept adding free veggies to Mandy and Darren’s bag. We will definitely be visiting her again!
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We found pastry wrappers, which we turned into perogies and little apple pies over at Mandy and Darren’s place later in the week… delicious!.jpg "kangqiao blog12")
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Caught snoozing on the job =).jpg "kangqiao blog14")
Fresh noodles.jpg "kangqiao blog16")
We found a stand selling hot sticky buns filled with pork… tastes a lot like a breakfast sandwich.
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Darren and his hot buns =).jpg "kangqiao blog18")
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A wire stringer working amidst the crazy traffic…
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Does not look like a fun job!.jpg "kangqiao blog23")
Just down the road from the lower school is this big wall, and behind the wall is a wet market. Many of our coworkers get their produce from “behind the wall.”.jpg "kangqiao blog24")
Going behind the wall….jpg "kangqiao blog25")
Behind the wall was the most peculiar combination of produce stands and piles of garbage….jpg "kangqiao blog26")
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I found a little buddy… don’t worry, I left him behind the wall with his family.jpg "kangqiao blog28")
On the way home we found our wire stringer again, but instead of braving traffic, he was tightrope walking over the water….jpg "kangqiao blog29")
Tightrope walking in flipflops, no less! I don’t envy his job…
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This morning our new couch and jute rug were delivered from IKEA! Hooray! It is so nice to have “our” couch back. Already our apartment feels so much cozier, so much more “us.” There is still plenty of work to be done, but it’s a great start. Around midday we headed over to Giant and purchased new bikes. Mandy and Darren joined us and we rode for about an hour, exploring the beautiful farmland just outside town. We set out searching for rice paddies, but didn’t find any. Still, winding through the farmland was so lovely and relaxing. The pale blue sky was dotted with puffy white clouds, and there was a light breeze blowing, which made for perfect bike-riding weather. We’re looking forward to exploring some more, especially when we have time to stop and take more photos.
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Wanda Plaza, a shopping center near our home, is in the center of the image.
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A little Vanna White action… =)
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My rear was sure sore by the end of the ride… good thing we have our super comfy couch to come home to!.jpg "kangqiao blog40")
