China: Shanghai, Day 1

We left the hotel in Yantai bright and early at 6:45am for a 9am flight to Shanghai. For once, we didn't arrive in the middle of the night. We were actually the second group to leave this time. All the groups had to do our activities for the day in a different order depending on flight time. Our group's first stop in Shanghai was lunch at a local restaurant. Then we got to visit the Jade Buddha Temple. What beautiful architecture in the heart of the city, surrounded by construction and modern buildings. Kind of an odd location, but the building itself was stunning. Our tour guide, Vivian taught us about yin and yang with the happy and sad statues, which actually made a lot of sense to me. There were some people worshiping and praying and I felt a little awkward, like we were intruding. I heard from some of the other students later that I wasn't alone in my feelings. We were finally able to check in to the Holiday Inn after the temple and rest. The best part of the day was after dinner (at a different Holiday Inn), where we had the privilege of watching one of the most entertaining shows I have ever seen, an authentic Chinese acrobatic show. If only I hadn't had a migraine during the show (not the first one of the trip.) Traveling is hard on me. Anyway, all of the acts were jaw-dropping in their accuracy, incredible strength and precision. I've never seen anything like it! It is incredible what people can do with their bodies. During one hilarious act, they called up a member of the audience to participate and it happened to be one of our SDYS students (probably because we took up half the audience) where they blindfolded him and pretended to throw knives at balloons right next to his body. I didn't want any of it to end. I didn't take any pictures of the show because I wasn't sure if we were allowed to, but I've seen some floating around, so I'll ask to share them. Then it was back to the hotel for the evening. What a perfect start to our last city on the tour.