Some Impressions

Here are the long promised pictures:

This one's my room. My bed is the one by the window.

My dorm, front view.

Our university library, never been in there myself. It's pretty big, but I hear they don't have any books (?).

The quad.

The old library; the most prominent of the turn-of-the-century buildings in the old part of Xuhui Campus.

Credits: Ricky Qi, http://flickr.com/photos/27499687@N00/5144482260

This one I didn't take myself. It's a picture of central Xujiahui, about a five minutes walk from where I live, just to give you an idea.

That's it for now. If anybody wants to see more: I'm taking requests.

Still alive

Hey,
I just wanted to check in and let everybody know that things are still going smooth in Shanghai. We just had a one-week-break for the Chinese national holiday, although they really only gave us five days off - I have to go to school tomorrow & sunday -_- .  I didn't leave the city because traveling at this time of the year is a real hassle, from what I hear. Instead I explored the city's nightlife. Clubbing in China is really different from clubbing in Germany. The Chinese don't really dance, but have a style called "bottles'n'tables" instead. This comprises booking a table at a fancy club ( this usually starts at around 1000 RMB = 120€ but, of course, is open-ended ) and spending at least the same amount on drinks and food. Then you get hammered and play dice with your friends. I guess this is mostly meant to impress the people around you ( last night I spotted a table with about 50 unopened bottles of champagne on it, and a select few of Shanghai's Jeunesse dorée sitting around, looking damn smart ). The upside to all this is that most clubs don't charge any entrance fee. A poor foreigner such as myself will obviously get some beers at the convenience store around the corner, go to the club to have fun, and just move on to the next one if things gets boring.
I'm aware I haven't uploaded any pictures yet, but I'll try and see if I can borrow a friends camera to take some pictures of campus, so you can at least get an impression of where and how I live.
So much for now!

Settling in

Hey Everyone,
Today we had a beautiful day in Shanghai - the first since I arrived that was neither ridiculously hot nor stiflingly humid, instead: bearable temperature and a nice breeze ( mind you: every building here has air-conditioning, including my dorm and the class rooms; however, just a walk across campus or from the subway station to the store will get the average European sweating like a dog on a hot day ).
I was going to spend my afternoon relaxing in the People's Park ( 人民广场 ), which is located pretty much in the city center, directly adjacent to the most important museums and the city's main shopping area, but it was obviously totally overrun and it didn't take five minutes after I sat down, till some Chinese dude sat down next to me trying to practice his English. Well, At least I got a free Starbucks out of it ( which, btw, is one of the few places one can get coffee around here; most venues try to sell you a lukewarm sludge premixed with milk and lots of sugar ).
Other than that, things are good. Class started this week. I have three hours everyday, either reading, listening or speaking. Except for all the vocab I have to catch up on, this ( fortunately ) leaves me enough time for other adventures ( well, no real adventures so far, but we have vague plans for a trip to Hangzhou ( 杭州 ) during our little break in the beginning of October ).
Since I promised some pictures, I'd like to refer you to my friend Michelle's site:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/malmaeus5000
Note, however, I look either kinda gay of pretty grim on all the pictures I'm on. I'll try to make some less unflattering pictures of myself in the near future.

The first week

Hey Everyone,
I've been in Shanghai for a little over a week now and things look pretty good.
My trip started at Frankfurt Airport, to which my mom took me. Out of the blue my best friend Roman showed up to bid me farewell, which was pretty cool. Also, he gave me a pair of pants ^^
Other than that my trip was fairly uneventful. I had a layover at Dubai airport, which seems to be one very long terminal crammed with places to spend your money. Can't recommend it! About sixteen hours after leaving Germany I arrived at Shanghai Pudong Airport and actually managed to make my way to the metro station where I took a train downtown, or more precisely, to Xujiahui ( 徐家汇 ）, which is where my campus is located. A friend from Germany, who's also here on an exchange, picked me up there and escorted me to our dormitory. It's quite different from what we have in Heidelberg ( pictures soon to come ); I share a room with a Korean dude named Tony. Fortunately his English is a little better than my Chinese, so we manage to get by quite well. We don't have our own bathroom, but instead the whole floor shares one. Also: no kitchen and no community room, which is really a bummer ( I miss the Bar! ). Our campus itself is located close to the city center, about 6 metro stations from the Bund ( 外滩 ), which is Shanghai's prominent landmark / tourist spot. The area around our campus is famous for shopping and you really can get everything, although at highly inflated prices at times - 4€ for a pack of butter or 10€ for a box of imported cereal at the local fine foods store; I generally try to stick to Chinese cuisine and they do sell Baozi  ( 包子 ) ( the Chinese equivalent to, let's say, a McDonald's burger, just healthier and more tasty ) around the corner for 1 RMB apiece - about 10 cents. With Shanghai being the most expensive city in China these days, going out can easily cost you more than in Germany, at least if you don't know what places to go to!
So far we've seen the major tourist spots, i.e. the Bund, the World Financial Center ( 环球金融中心 ), the French Concession area ( 法租界 ), temples, streets and many many shopping malls ( it's insane - they sell you Gucci and LV at about every corner here, be it fake or the real thing ).
For those who wonder: Classes don't start till to tomorrow, so we had a whole week to explore the city - it already feels like a month! My school schedule consists of 3 and a half hours of class a day, which will surely leave me some time to do cool things on the side.
Today was Mid-Autumn Festival ( 中秋節 ) in China. Although we asked around everywhere, we couldn't really figure out what people do on this holiday, other than going out and eating mooncakes, which are very sweet, kinda nasty tasting pastries, traditionally filled with curdled egg yolks and lotus seed or red bean paste. You get the idea...   Anyways, we went to the city center, walked up and down Nanjing Road ( 南京东路 ) and had some Milk Tea ( 珍珠奶茶 ), which is the beverage of choice around here.

This was my first update on how I'm doing. I'll keep you posted the coming weeks and maybe do a little series on special topics ( food, people, traffic - yes, street traffic is life-threatening here ), suggestions are welcome!

Welcome

Hi,
My name's Dennis and this is my blog about my exchange year at Shanghai Jiaotong University where I'll stay from September 2011 till June 2012 to have fun, do stuff, and, hopefully, pick up some Chinese along the way.
I'll try to keep you updated every now and then, including pics & vids from my adventures.
If you have questions, comments, whatever, drop me a message or hit me up on facebook!