The PENguin Blog

For now, I'm loading images without narrative and just a bit of commentary. Since we went to Shanghai without the laptop, my observations of this remarkable society and culture (for what they may be worth) were made the old fashioned way in pen and ink in my journal and will be added in time, inshallah . . . These are from our first day and the bus tour, an overview of the city: I tried here to convey just a bit of the architectural diversity of the city For those of you who know her, Rosa greatly enjoyed the sites as she enjoys all her travels. It is said that the city used to belong to bicycles and then to scooters. Today is seems owned by cars, though not entirely. The walkway along the PuDong River is referred to as The Bund, housing, among much else, the city buildings. This highlights the pall that settles over the city as the day passes. We were not at all sure how much is natural and how much pollution. We were not prepared for what modern Asian cities do by night with a...

My first written comment on Hong Kong was sent in an e-mail to a friend who has provided much-valued advice on touring the city last night on the way in from the airport. Wow! We arrived here late Monday afternoon/evening after what may have been the longest flight of my life, 15 hours Only today, nearly 24 hours later, after a day of desultory touring (thanks Gray Line), was I able to synthesize my response to the city. Imagine, if you will, London and Los Angeles and New York compressed into a dense ball with accents from London’s and San Francisco’s Chinatowns. You may get an idea. Generally Sharon’s and my approach to a new city is a tour, usually a hop-on, hop-off. They don’t seem to do those here, so we ended up with a Gray Line tour. It was a new experience. Back in the day, my parents used to travel a lot and they invariably toured with groups, returning with all sorts of stories of this one and that one and those whom they liked and those whom they dislik...