China: Noodles, Noise-Core, and Nanjing road

Shanghai - Part A (2 days before keegan)

We got the hard seat train from Suzhou to Shanghai, which in truth was very comfortable! It was spacious, air-conditioned and there was no livestock running around the train. Safe to say it was a refreshing antithesis to what our guide book described as pretty much hell-on-earth. However, the scenes at Suzhou train station were akin to that of the apocalypse. Absolute carnage ensued as the train was announced, and it seemed that half the population of China suddenly appeared and began to cram through the barriers, and literally fight their way bare-handed onto the train. Babies were being thrown about like american footballs, people were fosbie flopping over barriers without batting an eyelid, crowd surfing was rife, and bloodshed most certainly occurred. The atmosphere was one of palpable tension, screaming tore through your ear dums, and train tickets filled the air and scattered like confetti. This madness was actually about 45 minutes before the train left, so after the Jumanji-esque stampede had fizzled out, Vinny, Stu, and myself nonchalantly strolled through the barrier, stepping over dead bodies, and nodding politely at the bedraggled railway staff.

We arrived in Shanghai in the evening, and met two chaps in our dorm. One was an English guy called Spike, and the other was a Chinese gentleman who did not speak a single word of English; instead he literally just laughed and smiled the entire time. Thus he eternally became 'Smiler.'

We ended up grabbing dinner at an absolutely awesome restaurant with Spike who could also speak Mandarin. Over a dinner of Fried Noodles, Mi Fan (rice), Belly Pork (aka: Hongshao Rou = unbelievably good), Beef in chilli oil, Bullfrog, Sweetened Beef, and Boiled Jellyfish (which did not taste like food, neither texture-wise nor flavour-wise), we managed to learn some more useful Mandarin phrases off Spike. Most importantly were- "Bu Yao!" which means "no want" and is an essential phrase in responding to the endless amount of people trying to sell you stuff in the street all over China. In fact, I think every day after this I used the phrase "Bu Yao!" at least 100 times a day.

Day 2 in Shanghai started with a much needed lie in. But then we got up and headed over to a venue on the east side of town called- Red Star. We had heard about a gig there with some local alternative music, so we were pretty excited. The bands turned out to play avant-garde, noisecore music. It was pretty crazy, and stupidly noisy. The show even involved some weird elements of theatre. Halfway through the set of the last band, a chap dressed as a doctor climbed aboard the stage and pretended to inject the band members with a giant needle, which resulted in them going properly mental. Effects pedals hit the wall, tables were turned over and deafening drones filled the room.

When we got back to the dorm, we found Smiler (still smiling) but repeatedly miming that he was shivering, and pointing at the air-conditioning. Unable to turn it off himself, it seemed he had just sat there for a good few hours. We switched it off for him, and Smiler's smile could clearly be seen from space. Quality.

After that we just had a stroll down Nanjing Road and drenched ourselves in the lights of Shanghai''s most vibrant/commercial street. We just relaxed again in the evening, and I got an excited early night, ready to meet Kirstie at the airport the next day.