After
my Easter experience, I was afraid that Christmas in
Shanghai would be like Whoville after the Grinch stole all the trimmings and
trappings. I am happy to report I was wrong; the Chinese know how to spread
Christmas cheer (in an extremely secular way).
One way the Chinese celebrate the holiday season is by housing
European style Christmas markets. Once I
spotted these markets on Smart Shanghai, I needed to check it out!
The first market Chris and I visited was the Christkindlmarkt
on Fenyang Rd.
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| Welcome to German expat heaven. |
According to Chris, this
market was extremely similar to the German Christmas markets in Stuttgart. I think every German living in Shanghai came
out to experience a bit of home. For a
couple of hours we got lost in the land of Christmas trinkets, brats, and
gluhvein.
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| Many of the vendors had all sorts of Christmas goodies! |
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| Nutcrackers were very popular at the market. |
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| I suddenly feel eating like a slice of pizza... |
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| Gluhwein is warm, spiced, red wine. It is like Christmas in a cup! |
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| The potato dumplings and kraut were tasty! |
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| This was my lunch. The brat was AWESOME! |
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| This little guy was loving his hot dog! |
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| We picked up a couple of these ornaments for 6RMB (about $1). |
While we had a great time at Christkindlmarkt, we didn’t
find the decorations we wanted. So the following weekend we headed to Yu
Gardens to check out their loot.
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| It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas. |
Yu Gardens looked like the North Pole had bombed it. Garland and ornaments were everywhere.
After taking our first lap around the market, I took Chris to the restaurant
where I had my first Yum Cha date. There was a little more talking than my first time dining here.
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| He's much cuter than my first date. |
After lunch, it was back to shopping.
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| There were boxes of garland everywhere. I was amazed that none of it got tangled. |
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| Some of the reindeer lost their antlers, bless their hearts. |
Luckily we were able to pick up some decorations for our door.
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| It's not the Grizwalds, but it will do. |
While Yu Gardens was nice, there was one more market we
wanted to visit, the Shanghai Christmas Market at Xintandi.
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| The lights were very pretty. |
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| The carousel at Xintandi park was dressed up for the occasion. |
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| This was the first market where Santa Claus made a visit. Apparently visiting Santa is a very American custom. Notice the kids don't sit on Santa's lap, and there is no line to see Santa. The kids just mob around him. |
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| Chris poses with one of the creepy candy mascots. He wasn't happy that I made him wear his new (free) Santa hat. |
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| Chris picked up a couple of champagne flutes from a vendor that was selling candles and slippers that you can heat in the microwave. |
While the lights were nice, many of the
vendors were not exactly festive.
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| Ice Cream at an outdoor Christmas market? That made no sense to me. At least it wouldn't melt in the cold weather. |
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One of the high points of my night was when Chris bought me measuring spoons. These are VERY difficult to find!
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| Yes, I am sure people were Gangman Styling it at the birth of Christ. |
Overall, we had a good time at the markets. They put us very much in the holiday spirit.
