Shanghai'd

I wish I had more exciting tales to share, but the only one would be a story of misery and woe on my 'deluxe' boat tour that was anything but. Think boiled cabbage and rice for 3 days stuck in the chilly galley of a run down ship. To make up for it the travel agent did put me up in a swanky hotel for my final night in Vietnam. Frankly leaving Vietnam wasn't that difficult for me, besides the whole leaving part which took me nearly 12 hours of travel time to reach Shanghai. Joyfully I reunited with my family at Katherine and Raoul's apartment in the heart of Shanghai a few evenings ago. It has been great to spend time together catching up as it had been 2 weeks since I'd seen Larissa, 3 months since last speaking face to face with my father and over 4 since Katherine and Raoul were around. We've been busy exploring, and shopping for cold-weather clothing which I came without. Bumping between 10 degrees and freezing we've gone to the Old Town to eat a street-food buffet for a couple yuan, and wandered the historic river-front financial district of The Bund. Signs of Christmas are much more plentiful here than most places, as Shanghai attempts to be as Western as it can be. The Ferrari dealership's window is lit up with decorations and on the main street stands a massive Christmas tree built entirely of Heineken bottles. However our Christmas is going to be a quiet, family-oriented one with a nice buffet dinner at a fancy hotel. Celebrating in China is a completely different experience of course and will be memorable in its own right. Hopefully yours is as Merry as can be, wherever you're celebrating. Merry Christmas!
 
PS: A tiny Christmas present to you all is this tiny photo album. Stuck beind the Great Firewall of China it is a pain to blog, upload or do most anything on the internet but I perservere, for your sake.