I’d thought of starting off with a light (but long) post about the China trip about what most people might be concerned about-accommodation/travel and food. Here are my 2 cents worth about these aspects and some advice, hopefully of help to anyone.
Accommodation
Suzhou: Stayed in the 4 star Suzhou Jin Ling Guan Yuan Hotel.
Location: Quite isolated with almost nil amenities of walking distance, but I guess that’s just the way it is. Buildings in the new Suzhou area are sparsely located since urban spaces are systematically planned. At night, the streets are so empty that it looks like a ghost town.
Rooms: Really spacious since the hotel has the whole piece of land to itself. Depending on your room location, you might end up turning bends and tunnels to find it. Also, you might be facing part of a yard instead of some other scenery.
Service: Staff are efficient and polite. The doorman even puts his hand on the taxi door just in case you bump your head while boarding/alighting from the taxi.
Food: The room key contains breakfast coupons that last you throughout your stay. Breakfast is an international buffet, quite a spread ranging from duck blood soup to bacon.
Wifi: Depends on room location and device strength connectivity. You can borrow a router from the counter if you want a faster internet speed.
Overall the atmosphere and surroundings are good for a restful night since it is away from a busy location. You will need to call a taxi to get to the nearest shopping mall, which the hotel can it for you. From experience some taxi drivers have never heard of this hotel as it is relatively new, so be prepared to memorise some landmarks and road names to direct them here.
Shanghai: Stayed in Shanghai Xingyu Oriental Bund hotel
Location: Located right smack in a busy street of old shopping centres and a construction side. It is pretty convenient to get to tourist places like Shanghai Bund and City God temple since they are within walking distance. At night expect to hear the symphony of traffic and honking, as well as the Shanghai Customs House clock tower chiming “The East is Red” every hour.
Rooms: Much narrower, but that’s understandable since the surroundings are occupied by buildings. Spatial organisation is weird too. The sofa in the hotel room is within 1 arm distance from the bed if you are staying in a double room, and the mirrors are placed right behind the bed. Bed too hard and pillow too soft. You can get a view of the financial district apart from that out-of-place building (as seen in the photo)
Service: Staff not that proficient in English and lift is rather slow. Strangely enough the lobby and breakfast area is located on the 8th floor, and to exit the hotel you have to go to the 1st floor. I mean, most hotels have their lobby and exit on the same floor, right?!
Food: Moderate selection of breakfast. There is a dessert section available, and check out their translation of the dish:
Wifi: Pretty bad in rooms (hotel even ran out of routers), but able to get some reception if you stand outside your room door. The connection is best at the end of the corridor near the last room, which can be identified the tables and chairs placed there for users.
Overall the hotel’s convenient location beats every other thing else it offers. It will be suitable for adventurers who are keen to explore every nook and cranny of the area and be comforted that “home” is within walking distance. Just be careful that the lane leading back to the hotel is quite quiet at night since the shops close early (but further out it is noise pollution).
Food:
The Chinese place great emphasis on food and table manners. Even business deals are made over a meal in restaurants. Honestly, I felt that the food is quite 重口味 (lots of seasoning, oil etc.) as compared to Singapore food.
Restaurant food highlights: Nearly all restaurants we ate at served sweet sour pork for lunch and dinner, so I am going to avoid it whenever I eat chap chye peng for the rest of the year.
And introducing… THE SQUIRREL MANDARIN FISH!
It is a popular delicacy in Suzhou and originated from there. The flesh of the fish is spiked out, and arranged in a manner resembling squirrel fur. It is then fried and dripped with sweet and sour sauce.
Restaurants in Suzhou serve nearly the same food everytime we dined, while those in Shanghai offer more variety. When we saw fried egg and xiao long bao during our first dinner in Shanghai, everyone was… exhilarated. Just to note, we did not have anymore fried egg during the rest of our restaurant meals in Shanghai.
Beer, gassy soft drinks and chinese tea are served in every restaurant. Also, be prepared to use chopsticks for meals. Restaurant staff will only give you a fork if you look distinctively non-Chinese.
Fast Food: Just for experience, we tried KFC (at Shanghai Pudong Airport), Mcdonalds (City God Temple) and Burger King (Pudong Airport again). Surprisingly they are less oily than Chinese food in general. For KFC, the chicken looks uncooked.
Fast food staff generally give out tomato sauce, and only give chili if you ask for it. Menu is mostly in Chinese, which surprised me because I thought the airport would have bilingual versions since it is an international place. If you are adventurous enough, you can try out their “localised fast food” such as rice with the chicken thigh (Mcdonalds), or their mushroom egg soup.
Street Food/Food Court: The amount of oil leftover from a packet of noodles is enough to fry an egg!
City God temple in Shanghai has a selection of street food such as smelly tofu, takoyaki, and 灌汤包 (a pau with soup filling). It also has a multi storey food court serving Chinese dishes of different provinces, where you can choose and make payment at the counter. However as all portions comes in minimum 3 pax, it is better to dine as a group. The temple area is also famous for xiao long bao, which saw a really long queue. Didnt try it, but classmates said it wasnt that fantastic.
Had fried rice in a food court in Suzhou Hua Ren Wan Jia shopping mall (They call it neighbourhood centre). You need to become a food court member to buy food, even if you are a tourist. Basically pay a deposit of 10 RMB for the card, then top up with any amount you want. At the end of the day return the card to the counter if you dont need it anymore to get back the balance and deposit. The counter lady will shout out your order instead of a “collect when you see your number on the LED screen” system. Anyway, the food court also displays models of the dishes so that you can see the food in real life just in case you cant read the chinese menu.
Supermarket Food: Expect to see food like these. (More supermarket elaboration in the shopping post)
Oreo in 734314 flavours e.g. banana, peach cum grape.
Lays in lime and cucumber flavour. Also saw a braised pork flavour but didnt capture it. But you get the idea.
Other food: Tried the red velvet cake at Simply Bake Cafe in New world. Wasnt as velvety as those I had in Singapore, and that piece of jelly on top tasted like war heads. Not sure if this is representative of Red Velvet in China, but it was still an experience trying the same kind of food overseas.
Potted ice cream from Suzhou old town. Basic flavours such as chocolate, mango etc are available, then a layer of choco powder will be sprinkled over the ice cream. Just a typical ice cream, but I loved the concept.
LAST BUT NOT LEAST: WATER! You gotta remember this even if you thought what I wrote above is crap. It is best to buy bottled water in China as the tap water is not suitable for drinking. I didn’t use the room kettle to boil water just in case it is not rinsed cleanly (from my Royal Caribbean experience). So far I didn’t have any body reactions from drinking iced soft drinks in fast food restaurants, but if you want to play safe/ have a sensitive stomach, it is better to avoid iced drinks.
And so that’s it from me about the food and accommodation aspect from the trip. Initially I wanted to lump shopping together with this post but realised that it will be so long that I decided to make shopping another post of its own.
SuperRandomWorld 