Shanghai Expo and Start of Summer Travels

It's been awhile since I updated the blog here, the main reason being that I spent most of the summer traveling around Asia. Luckily enough, I negotiated some leave from my work so that I could meet up with some of my old Northwestern buddies in China and then do some more traveling through Southeast Asia with Phil. Since there are too many places to write about, I'll probably do less detailed posts than normal and just post a few of my favorite pictures with some comments.

To start out the trip, four of us met up in Shanghai. Phil flew in from Zurich, Switzerland, Chris flew in from San Francisco, USA, and Derek flew in from Beijing, China, all with varying levels of jetlag.

Nanjing Road

View of Pudong

We mainly met in Shanghai because it was the easiest place for everyone to fly to and also because the Shanghai Expo was going on. In China they say that the 2008 Beijing Olympics brought China to the world, whereas the Expo is a chance to bring the world to China.  At the expo there are large pavilions for most of the countries of the world that allow Chinese people to catch a glimpse of the cultures of some of these other countries.

We went at night to avoid some of the huge crowds and heat. The expo itself is ok, but there are huge lines for all the pavilions and once you get inside a pavilion, there isn't too much interesting to see. The best thing is to just walk around and see the pavilions from the outside.

European Pavilion Area

UK Pavilion

USA Pavilion (Boring Office Building or Car Dealership Style)

Spanish Pavilion with Long Lines

Canada Pavilion

China Pavilion (On Right)

South Korea Pavilion

Axis of Evil Pavilions (North Korea - left and Iran - right)

It was great to meet up with some of my old college buddies after not seeing some of them for two years. We had around 10 days of traveling in China, so there will be another post or two of China before I get to the Southeast Asia pictures. Stay tuned!

For more pictures, see: http://picasaweb.google.com/wallred10/ShanghaiExpo#