the aquarium

At first I thought I'd collect pictures from different sights and places and just make one post out of them all, but the colors in the aquarium photos were so pretty and the shots from the antique market kind of captured some kitschy old-time charm that I figured it would not hurt to share more of them. And I think pictures do say more than just words.

This little buddy has a tail!

The jellyfish room was an absolute highlight.

In some sections, you walk in a glass tunnel and them fishes swim all over you...

the antique market and a glimpse of the old town

Some charming dragons.

An alley off Liuhekou rd.

Tea sets, anyone?

Maybe they're old, maybe they're reproductions...

All kinds of ironware, porcelain, trinkets, watches...

A corner shop in Old Town.

Cute coffee boxes...

Old Town.

Entrance to Old Town.

A cat!

Old Town. It was way too crowded...

Statues.

Cute things everywhere...

...and vintage posters...

food, food, glorious food...

Korean BBQ restaurant.

At the school cafeteria.

At our nearest produce market.

Fresh market fruit!

Ajisen Ramen, Japanese food.

Japanese food in Zhoupu.

Local street food - jian bing.

Fruit and veggie market near Old Town.

School cafeteria fare :D

Chinese fast food.

Japanese food at Shanghai Science and Technology Museum metro station.

...aaaaaand the occasional beer.

xia wu hao!

I wrote a long text with a lot of pictures and then some God of the Internet decided it was inadequate and wiped it all away...so my post is going to be shorter than I originally planned, since I still feel kind of stupefied.

Time has been sprinting by and today marks the beginning of my fourth week in China. I haven't yet visited any other places besides Shanghai, but two of my classmates took a weekend trip to Suzhou and enjoyed it. There is still so much to see and do in Shanghai that I will probably make my first trip somewhere else a bit later in April. Let's see!

Shanghai by day!

Our school is situated in Zhoupu, Pudong New Area. Downtown Shanghai is 30+ km away, so when we venture out to central Shanghai we take a bus to Longyang metro station and then get on line 2 to People's Square or Nanjing Lu. All this takes about 1,2-2 hours, so we tend to make these trips only during weekends.


Our clinical practice hospitals are located in Shanghai, but a day at the hospital usually leaves you craving for some peace and quiet, so we gladly return to Zhoupu at the end of the day on the courtesy bus operated by our school. Our first weekend here was full of awe and it was pretty overwhelming - people do not speak English as much as you'd expect and fresh off the plane our Chinese was MIA, so everything seemed a bit complicated. Luckily you do learn fast f.ex. what buses to take to get to the local area center (Zhoupu), how to get to the nearest metro station (Longyang) and so forth. During the first week we got Chinese prepaids, got our internet services going and bought everything necessary from laundry detergents to spoons and coffee mugs, so the first week of school started off nicely.

Our schedule has been mostly a so-called 4 + 1 schedule, which means that we spend 4 days at the hospital (us physical therapists spend our weeks at Shanghai East Hospital, nurses practice at Renji Hospital) and one day in school studying Traditional Chinese Medicine, Chinese Herbs and Pharmacology, Chinese Language and Culture and Tai Chi. 

Our room!

On campus.

Making dumplings and springrolls with Chinese students!

Yummy...

A view of the city from the VIP floor at the hospital.

At Shanghai East.

Our clinical training at Shanghai East takes place at the Sports Medicine and Rehabilition Medicine department as well as respective wards including Trauma, Orthopedics, Sports Medicine and so forth. Most Trauma patients have fractures (typically femur neck fractures) resulting from traffic or work-related accidents, and Orthopedic (and some Sports Medicine) patients have typically had total or partial hip replacements or total or partial knee replacements. Outpatients usually seem to have some ACL problems and rotator cuff ROM issues, but it has been surprising that there are a lot of post-op knees with patellar movement range problems. We have been trying 

to figure out why this is - let's see if we're any wiser towards the end of our stay here...

All in all, life in Shanghai has kicked off nicely and everything is a-okay :) Our evenings are spent mostly exercising - we run on the track, hit the weights at the small school gym or, as of lately, sweat our butts off with the help of Insanity Workout DVDs, so days are full of activity!

At the clinic.

Hey...wait a minute..!

A lifesaver some mornings. We leave for the hospital 7 AM every morning.