Readers back in the US likely have no idea what the World Expo is or the fact that is being held in Shanghai this summer. I certainly had no idea before I came. The World Expo is the current version of the old "World Fair", which honestly I only vaguely remember from an episode of the Simpsons. I also highly doubt that any Chinese citizen had ever heard of the Expo until Shanghai was awarded it and the marketing campaigns began. Either way, Shanghai is well on its way to setting the two records that they set out to smash when they began planning the event: (1) Largest area used (2) most people to attend. In terms of size, China has already won that title as the Shanghai Expo site covers 2 square miles. This is significantly larger than any previous Expo. The currently record holder for most attended World Expo is Montreal, Canada with 50 million people. That record will be smashed at the current pace of 400,000 – 500,000 people per day that the Chinese government is reporting. Although, I am not sure I trust the Chinese government's weather forecast, let alone a self-serving report of the number of people that are going through the turnstiles. Either way, the point is the Expo is huge in China and very crowded.
A couple weeks back me, my Dad and a friend of ours decided to brave the elements of a Shanghai summers eve (and the crowds of 400,000 Chinese people) and head over to the Expo. The Expo is a bit expensive for an entire days pass (about $28), but the price drops about $10 for an evening ticket (after 5 pm according to the website and 4 pm according to the signs at the ticket gate). Thus, we decided to skip out of work at 4 pm one Friday and press our luck.
Every local person in Shanghai appears to be an "expert" when it comes to the Expo. Everyone has advice on which gate to use, which lines are worth waiting for, how you can avoid the lines, which pavilions have no lines, etc. Funny thing is, these experts seem to differ on every one of the topics just mentioned. The result was we really didn't have much of a plan prior to the event. The only thing we knew for sure was that only special taxis are allowed into the expo drop off areas. Thus, we had my Dad's driver call a special cab for us. We decided to take the advice of a colleague of mine and use Gate 5. She said that this was the only gate that was on the Pudong side that was not near a subway stop or bus stop. Therefore, it should be much less crowded. She was right. We walked up, bought our tickets and made it through the queue in about 5 minutes. We were encouraged to see that just as many people were leaving as were coming. Raising our hopes a little that the 4 hour lines we had heard about may not exist on this day.
Our hopes were soon dashed as we walked past the Saudi Arabia pavilion. Commonly known in Shanghai as the 2nd best pavilion after the Chinese pavilion, this line was rumored to be 4-5 hours on most days. As we walked past the line, we noticed the sign that said "approximately 3 hours wait from this point". As people were still piling up after that point, we realized that our hopes of seeing the most popular pavilions were probably crushed. However, we were encouraged that this line was only two thirds as long as it usually is. Thus, we figured we might be able to see a couple of pavilions that are on the "moderately popular" list.
The list of places that were worth seeing and had small lines included: Malaysia, Indonesia, and the South Pacific joint pavilion. Since we entered in the Asia/Middle East region, we decided to start with a pavilion there and make our way "across the world" over to Europe. First stop: Nepal. Positives were that the line was short. The negatives were that there were no Sherpa to guide us and really not much to see inside. Thus, we took a quick spin through and decided that our tour of Asia would come to an end.
Based on the recommendations and the fact that South East Asia and the South Pacific pavilions are located between where we started and where we were going, we headed over to the South Pacific joint pavilion next. This pavilion was basically a combination of small island nations including places like Fiji, Tahiti and Bora Bora plus about 10 islands I had never heard of. The best part about this pavilion was A) it was air-conditioned, B) it was empty and C) you could play the game "guess how many people live there" or "guess what the highest point of elevation is". One island only had 1,000 permanent residents and a highest elevation point of 5 meters. Who knew?
After our "tour" of the South Pacific, we wandered over to the Malaysia pavilion. Again, no waiting. Two for two on the advice of places to see. This pavilion was a bit disappointing. It would have been really cool if all of the stuff that they had inside was working. Unfortunately, either nothing was on or everything was broken. The golf simulator was collecting dust, the touch screens with mini-movies were barely functioning and the simulated jungle left a lot to be desired. It was air-conditioned and there was a very small line.
About this time we decided that it was time to get dinner. We were told that the Australian pavilion had Aussie BBQ. We were lied to. However, we didn't learn that until after we got the "non-Asian people" treatment. As we approached a worker from the Australian pavilion to inquire about the food options, he asked if we had been inside yet. We said we hadn't, but were looking for the Aussie restaurant. He asked where we were from, to which we responded "The States". He said that was close enough and escorted past the 2+ hour line of Chinese people to the front door. He left us with a "enjoy the show mate!" The show was a weird combination of a movie and statues and a bunch of other stuff. It was based on three kids talking about the future. Although two of the three were clearly not Chinese, they decided that the kids all spoke fluent Chinese. Thus, I was left reading the English subtitles and recognizing every 3rd word being spoken. It was a decent show, probably not worth the 2 hour wait, but since we didn't have to wait, it was one of the highlights of the trip. The food at the pavilion was not. Instead of a restaurant there was basically a fast food window. They were serving Aussie burgers, meat pies, and fish and chips. One of us had each. The burger was reported as average at best, the fish and chips weren't memorable, and the meat pie was the size of a king-dong. See the movie, skip the food.
Our tour of the South Pacific and Southeast Asia was coming to an end. We decided to head toward the UK pavilion and check out any pavilions that looked interesting on the way. The UK pavilion had been rumored to be one of the coolest ones to look at from the outside. The reason being is that they were supposed to have translucent tubing filled with seeds from all over the world protruding like spikes from a ball in the center. Thus, it was on our list of things to see. On the way over there we stopped at Finland, Romania, Greece, Iceland and Ireland. Finland, Greece, Romania and Ireland had no wait. They were all worth walking through, but certainly not worth waiting for. The Iceland pavilion had probably a 30 minute wait because the pavilion had a 15 minute movie that was shown on the inside of all six sides of the pavilion's cube shape. We managed to skip the line as an employee entrance to the cube happened to be open and we were in the right place at the right time. The movie was really neat and probably worth the wait anyways. It was certainly a highlight of the evening. As we left the Iceland pavilion we realized that we had just visited two pavilions (Iceland and Greece) that probably had no business being at the Expo since their countries are basically bankrupt. Iceland definitely did a lot more with their limited funds than Greece did.
We had finally made it to the UK pavilion. We were extremely disappointed. By this time the sun had set and most of the pavilions had very nice lighting to showcase their pavilions. UK was not one of these. What I had described before was almost impossible to see in the evening. There was no backlighting or spotlights or anything that would even remotely display the uniqueness of the architecture of the pavilion. The line was still very long, so we passed on waiting to see something that we could barely make out from a distance. Instead we headed over to the Netherlands and Spain (which was playing each other in the World Cup finals that next Sunday). Based on the pavilions alone, we decided that Spain was going to win. There pavilion was much more impressive and finished with a two story moving "Baby of the Future". Very strange, but very intriguing.
We wrapped up our day with a quick trip through the Monaco pavilion and some Belgium beer and waffles. All in all it was a good evening and changed my attitude towards the Expo. It is a place that you can go to keep yourself entertained for a day. It is probably best to skip the lines and see places that you have never been (or never plan on going). On my next trip I would like to see the African pavilion, Indonesia and venture to the Puxi side to check out the corporate and city pavilions.
No comments:
Post a Comment