Sept 17th

Today we arrived in Shanghai at about 6:00am. We had to get off the train really quickly because the train was continuing on further then Shanghai. I had a bit of a problem getting off because of my backpack and I had waited for everyone else in my cabin to get their stuff out. Which left me with very little time myself to get off.
Once getting to our hotel which we took a bus to get to. We had until 2:00pm to recover and eat. It was really strange, once we got to the hotel It felt like it was really late in the day instead of 10:00 am.
We went to this place that was referred to as a garden. Upon arriving there it didn't seem like much of a garden, but more of a place with many many shops to buy over priced goods. Though I found out after walking around a bit there that there was a garden in the center of the area that you had to pay to get into. Instead I went with Brooke, Sylvan and Christian to areas surrounding this shopping complex. We ended up heading towards the Bund which is a large walk way that goes right along side the river next to these huge old banks. We took a detour before we got there and found a discount mall which turned out to be really cool. Lots of cheap stuff that is probably sold to the people who try and sell it on the streets.
We eventually made it to the Bund which was really beautiful. Not much to do but look at the scenery. After a brief walk on the Bund we made our way back to the hotel. We were meeting everyone back at the hotel at 5:30 to go to dinner.
We went to dinner and then took a bus to go to the top of one of the huge skyscrapers on the other side of the river. It was really cool at the top, being able to see large portions of the city at night. I also was able to get my girlfriend a pearl necklace at the top of the tower for a good price. You got a free pearl for presenting your ticket at the top of the tower and for just a bit more you could get it mounted for a necklace.