Last morning on the boat. Last batch of 7AM announcements. I don't think I'll miss IvyIvy. We packed and I settled the bill and decided on tips. Our itinerary for the day kindly laid out what was expected from us (about triple what the travel agency had told us should be the maximum), justifying their figures with a crew number (125) that had to be at least double, and maybe 4x, the actual crew size. In addition they wanted us to compensate IvyIvy separately... which wouldn't have left her a rich woman if she had not had a conversation with Lidia in which she explained what a hard life she had (which we believe -- she seemed to work around the clock), and which rendered her human in our eyes.
After breakfast we set off for our tour of the DAM... by many measures the largest in the world. After the amazing locks yesterday night, I was hopeful... but once again it was foggy/hazy, so we couldn't see that much. For example the other side of the dam was invisible, which rather limited its size wow factor. And the already poor visibility was not helped by the fact that the viewing sites were set quite far back from the dam itself. What we could see looked impressive, but I wasn't blown away. And the information center was (typically for China) primarily focussed on selling us stuff. So, disappointing.
We were met at the boat by our new guide Daniel, who reminded me a little of a relative of mine who can't stay still -- always jumping up and down or fiddling with something. He didn't have much to do -- basically to ferry us through town to the airport -- which was probably just as well, because I'm not sure that we would have gotten much of interest from him if he had had sights and history to explain to us. We are supposed to fill out and sign assessment forms for each guide, then sign and seal them in envelopes (with another signature over the seam) and give them back to the guide to be sent to the travel agency. Few guides actually followed through on the entire procedure... usually withholding the envelope, which left one a little inhibited about giving unvarnished feedback. Daniel was the winner in this department -- he just wanted the signature... said we didn't have to fill anything else out. Efficient, I suppose....
The plane was delayed an hour (which makes three of four flights in China -- something to bear in mind if you are planning a trip there), but once again books and iPad made the time (even if not the plane) fly. In Shanghai we were met as reliably as always at the exit from baggage claim by our next guide, Bella, one of those ageless Chinese women who could be 25 or 40. Her English seemed fairly good, but what we have come to call a "Chinese conversation" on the way to our hotel revealed limits.
A "Chinese conversation" is one in which you ask a question, and you get an unclear answer that leaves you unsure whether or not the question was understood. So you ask again, with different phrasing to try to make your question clearer... only to get another, usually different, response that leaves you as confused as before. We went around three times on the question as to whether she had ever taken the Maglev train from Shanghai to the new airport before I gave up. We've had a lot of these conversations during the trip....
We ran into some traffic on the way to our hotel, which was on the edge of the Old Town in the center of the city, an experience that was repeated several times the following day. Although Shanghai has clearly been building and widening roads at a frenetic pace, it hasn't kept up with traffic growth. Lots of of lights and color on the buildings, lots of advertizements for global brands... the first impression was that it was glitzy, but we couldn't see too much in the dark. We checked in, had an OK dinner in the hotel, and then spent the rest of the evening catching up on the world after three days without Internet access.
