The thing about Shanghai is that it is effectively two worlds superimposed. One is the international, cosmopolitan world city, and the other is a regular Chinese city. I love the fact that you can move from one to the other really easily, from one block to the next. This does mean that it is a little difficult to work out what things are likely to cost – for example for food, you can pay European meal prices at some restaurants or pennies in others.

A couple of days ago I went to buy a couple of things  – a plunger and some thread (exciting huh?). I was actually pretty excited that I found exactly what I was looking for in a local shop. Very often when you go to pay the shop assistants show you the price on a calculator. (Actually I am mostly OK with numbers but it is still useful). The guy tapped in 55. I thought – Ok that’s about 7 dollars. Sounds completely reasonable. The guy looked at me like I was completely insane as I messed around with various different bank notes. It turns out that the total for the two items was actually 5.5 RMB. That’s a tiny amount of money and I was out by a whole decimal point.  I am now wondering how often I’ve done this and they have just taken the cash…

One of the things I really like about Shanghai is the energy, driven to a large extent by the pace of change. I’ve always said I like change but actually sometimes it is nice if things just stay as they were when you left them.

I was away for just a couple of weeks recently and my favourite local . During this time my favourite restaurant, that was just 3 minutes walk away, had closed and moved to somewhere miles across town and there are shops disappearing and new ones popping up on a daily basis. Just the other night we went out and thought we’d check out a new bar that was getting great reviews. We did find a great bar at the address we had, although it was a brand new one. Things change so fast that the old one is still in all the online and print listings.

As part of the whole relocation package of things that have been arranged for us we were offered “Cultural Training”. Oh great I thought. I could just imagine someone wearing comfortable shoes and too short trousers explain to us that things are different in China. Mkaaaay?

As has happened so many times here, I was wrong. Our trainer was a great guy (whose trousers fitted fine) who shared a great deal of his enthusiasm for Shanghai and China. One of the most useful things he showed us was how to spot a fake RMB banknote. This is a fantastically useful lifeskill as there are a LOT in circulation. Some look like they have been badly photocopied, others look pretty good until you check all the watermarks and other security feature. Fakes are so prevalent that every shopkeeper will carefully scrutinise each note you give them.

But as this is China, it isn’t just the notes that are fake. Pretty much everything is. Or might be. Walking along many streets involves running the gauntlet of people selling fake Gucci, LV, Coach bags and watches. Talking to a hairdresser the other day, he said that he imports all his products from Hong Kong so he knows they are authentic. Video shops here are apparently shops selling exclusively pirated videos.

In fact it seems that everything you can buy is often counterfeited – even water. Now I don’t particularly want to buy a Gucci bag or similar, but if I did, I’d be concerned about their authenticity, even from the brand shops. It’s not great when you stop trusting everything.

Take another look at the picture here. What do you see  (apart from the scary eyebrows of course)?

I don’t mean my blue eyes I mean the enormous eyebags. Can’t you see them? Apparently they, and the surrounding wrinkles are enormous, and visible from at least 50 paces.

How did I find this out? Well, every time I walk into a department store or chemist’s shop (Boot’s or CVS or Watsons) all the Chinese shop assistants literally sprint over to me to sell me anti wrinkle cream. It doesn’t seem to be because I’m the oldest person walking into the shops, or because I’m the only foreigner. So maybe my wrinkles, which have previously not given me more than a passing thought, really are crater like.

To add insult, the ladies always show my how they have far fewer wrinkles than I do despite being far older. They all then try to sell me special Chinese medicine to help cure my terrible affliction. Usually they drag me over to their station, plonk me down on a chair then dab some of the special Chinese medicine on one eye. They then show me my reflection to see the huge difference it has made.

I haven’t bought any yet..but I AM starting to get more than a bit paranoid. I did buy some concealer and intend to wear that under large sunglasses every time I go out from now on.  Maybe a hat too, just to be on the safe side…

Now I have no idea what Kung Fu tea is but I have visions of it appearing out of nowhere in the tea gardens and kicking the &*%^ out of you – a sort of tea based Kato from the Pink Panther…..

In any case I didn’t stay around long enough to find out…

One thing that I have noticed about Chinese girls is that they have fabulous eyebrows. Most of them are painted on but they are beautiful. They manage to draw exactly the right sweeping arch. Compared to British and American girls they are amazing. I don’t mean anyone on TV…anyone who goes near the silver screen must get dragged off to get their eyebrows properly wrangled. Think Kate Winslet or Beyonce. Megan Fox  has amazing eyebrows (she’s dumb as a rock but still manages to have rocking eyebrows). I mean regular people in the street in the US and England. Anyone over the age of about 25 probably has plucked theirs into oblivion. So many of them have skinny sparse looking strips that start too far over and make them look cross or just weird.  Those that do use an eyebrow pencil tend to draw them on in mad half circles – Ronald McDonald style.

Anyway, I have to admit that mine are also not great. Not as a result of too much attention, more because they are very fair so tend to disappear. So when I heard about Browhaus here (international leading eyebrow wranglers) I thought I’d pay them a visit. When I asked for advice I thought they might suggest dye, or maybe sell me some eyebrow pencils. No. They suggested what they call a ‘resurrection’. That’s a temporary tattoo. Gulp. That was a rather bigger step than I was expecting so they suggested showing me the possible outcome using pencils. OK, that’s not so scary. So a girl with exquisite tadpole shaped arches drew the eyebrows on me. I was a little surprised at the result.

Not only did they not quite match but they were HUGE. They looked like exactly the large hairy variety that people go in there to have wrangled. After I mildly freaked out they made them a little smaller but I still found them pretty intimidating. Here’s what they looked like. Give me a cigar and I’m Groucho Marx.

Scary eyebrows

I think I’ll stick to using pencils/ powder now and again. I’m not ready for the tattoo yet.

In addition to wearing pyjamas out of the house, the Shanghai folk seem to like to sleep. Which they can do anyone and at the drop of a hat. It’s pretty hot at the moment so at many times of the day you can see people crashed out all over the place. Sometimes it looks like there has been a catastrophic lethal gas leak or something, This is what it looks like.

There are many people wandering round Shanghai dressed in pyjamas. Not just popping over to the corner shop to pick up a newspaper, or picking up the post from the postbox, but actually hanging out, going about day to day activities wearing full on stripy PJs.

Here’s one example, I found this chap yesterday afternoon, nonchalantly taking his bananas for a stroll:

There’s a lot of it about. Why are there so many? Care in the community open day? Sleepwalkers anonymous? No. It’s apparently a sign of status. Wandering around in your PJs all day means that a) you can afford pyjamas and b) that you are wealthy enough not to have to demean yourself by actually having a job.

I like the  idea of this. I might just try it myself. I wonder if it works with nighties.

There aren’t many things that I’ll miss about US domestic aritravel, but the one highlight of each journey is the Skymall catalogue. I’ve mentioned it a few times before – it’s a collection of some of the most bonkers ideas I have ever seen. I can’t imagine that anyone would actually buy most of this stuff (see references to ornamental zombies etc).

Anyway, this will be my last opportunity to share the latest craziness I found in the most recent edition.

I bring you: the inflatable tie…

In case you can’t quite read it, it says: “Boring meetings, hour-long conference calls – might as well make yourself comfy.” Genius.