Wondering with Wind

I mentioned in my previous post that “Jinmao Tower is no longer the most visible building from The Bund on Lujiazui in Pudong, Shanghai”. Who is the new landmark?

The above image was taken from Yuyuan Park last weekend. It is the new icon of Lujiazui - Shanghai World Financial Center (SWFC): Height: 492 meters (72 meters higher than Jinmao Tower), 101 floors. The skyscraper is estimated to be completed before 2008 Beijing Olympic Games. It is a nice angle to view this ‘highest tower” in China from Yuyuan Park. (see official image below)

I heard about this building a long time before, as friends were circling the original design blueprints via email. The email was asking the recieptants to against the design because it resembled “two swords and the Sun” which are the icons of Japan and Japanese culture. (see right image.)

The owner and investor of SWFC is Mori Building Co.Ltd. (森海外株式会社), a Japanese company. SWFC Co. was found on 1995 but due to Asian financial crisis, the project was forced to stop until 2003. But after the design by KPF, an American firm, was publiced, a Singapore Chinese wrote a letter to Shanghai Urban Construction Department and pointed out that circle on the top resembed the national flag of Japan. Fengshui master also claimed that this building will hurt the Fengshui of Lujiazhui, even the design has been changed. The circle has been changed to an echelon. {Information in this paragraph is from this post.}
If you know about the anti-Japanese sentiment in China, you will understand why building a tower can be so difficult even in 21 century, especially with the help of Internet as information distribution/broadcasting method.

Anyway, I am not exciting to see this highest building in Shanghai, it is just another challenge for Spiderman.

Good Year is on the sky in Shanghai Bund, who else?

Two flying fishes！Who is on the ground?

Banks！

I haven’t visited Shanghai Bund for more than 6 years after I graduated in 2001 until yesterday. My parents-in-law are visiting us and we wanted to walk around the city in weekend. The bund obviously is our first choice of sightseeing. The weather wasn’t perfect, windy, cloudy and chilly, especially by the Huangpu River.

Things have been changed so much: Jinmao Tower is no longer the most visible building in Pudong from the Bund; Chartered Bank Building was redesigned and renovated by a team of international architects led by Italian designer Filippo Gabbiani, and was reopened in Nov. 2004. It is now no longer a bank; one of the Big Four nation-owned banks China Bank of Communications moved out of the Bund, but the other 3 (BoC, ABC, ICBC) of Big Four are still on the Bund. Wikipedia page didn’t catch these changes.

China Citic Bank

Take a real virtual tour on the Bund to see all the buidlings here:

http://shgov.city8.com/sh10951_BA1H-0.833_0.206_1.309.swf 

You wil need to install Flash 9 in order to take this grand tour developed by a Chinese map company city8.com

I joined the Stop Global Warming Virtual March today after I read a hilarious post about Sheryl Crow’s eco-friendly baby shower, saying that Sheryl, my favorite rocker, “wants to limit the use of toilet paper to one sheet per visit”. I don’t know if she was talking about using one sheet of paper after wash her hands or …

Anyway, I don’t own a car in Shanghai, so I feel good at doing something stopping global warming in my daily life. My action is to get around by foot instead of bus or taxi. I was “proud” that I took train to Beijing in my recent trip instead of plane. Train is the greenest transportation in travel, according to Tom Mercer on Trains, Planes, Automobiles.

Here are some more numbers for your reference:

Total Emissions Per Vehicle

SUV (15mpg) – 2.29 lbs/mi
Average Car (25 mpg) – 1.39 lbs/mi
Prius (55 mpg) - .61 lbs/mi
Motorcycle - .57 lbs/mi
RV – 4.58 lbs/mi

Total Emissions Per Person
Average Car/Single Driver – 1.39 lbs/mi
Average Car/Family of 4 - .34 lbs/mi
Train - .32 lbs/mi
Bus - .48 lbs/mi
Plane (250 mi trip) - .85 lbs/mi**
Plane (600 mi) - .69 lbs/mi**
Plane (3500 mi) - .56 lbs/mi**

I read a review about Taiwanese Ang Lee’s new Venice Film Festival 2007 award winning movie from one my favorite magazine on Saturday. I then followed the movie and research the story, the writer of the story, the husband of the writer, and the characters in the story/movie and reviews about the writer during the weekend. I enjoyed doing this because I really like the writer and her books. She is Eileen Chang (张爱玲). Eileen spent 30 years writing this 29-page short story which happened in 70 years’ ago.

The movie is rated as NC-17 in US. Ang Lee said Don’t expect much from ‘Lust, Caution’ to USA Today. He was talking about the box office performance; I think he was also talking about culture difference. I really doubt that people with Chinese culture background can understand it as the way Chang wanted to express. Can you undertand why it is a big deal? But maybe Chang took 30 years to make it for everyone. We will see.

Anyway, I would strongly recommend people who like Shanghai or want to understand Shanghai should go for the movie. Chang keeps every details through each single Chinese word, and Ang Lee repeated every detail about Shanghai in it. [Note: the woman on the magazine cover is the main original character in Lust, Caution from 1930s’; her name is Ruping Deng.]

I always wonder what do you see when you visit “ancient city/town” in Shanghai neighborhood, like Suzhou, Zhouzhuang, or Zhujiajiao.

This is the hometown to NBA hero Yao Ming.

A boat ride will be fun.

Windor shopping.