That's the Shanghai Summit Shopping City building. When they say "shopping city" they aren't fooling.
Shanghai is a city of enormous contrasts. On our way in we saw everywhere evidence of its dynamism. Huge towering ultramodern structures stretched toward the sky and off to the horizon.
This picture, however, shows another side of the city -- a canal bustling with industrial activity and just on the other side from the new structures, squalid slums as bad as seen anywhere.
Sometimes the slums run right smack up against the new structures.
On we went heading for our destination, first dinner, then the world famous Shanghai Circus where we saw an amazing acrobatic show. I would place the quality of the performance about at the level of Cirque du Soleil.
Here's the exterior of the Circus City building.
And the interior.
We were banned from taking pictures of the performance, but you can get some idea of what we saw from this video of the "Incredible Acrobats of China" on tour in America. We saw many of these acts as well as others, including a "cage of death" in which eight, count 'em, eight motorcyclists circled simultaneously.
At last we headed off to our hotel for rest up for the next day which promised to be one long, grueling shopping opportunity. I looked forward with apprehension -- "She Who Must Not Be Named", with excitement.
