Results tagged “temple”

In the latest episode of the Hard Hat Show, host Mia Li visits the 600 year old Xiefangde Temple, which was to have been disassembled and rebuilt elsewhere, but has now been ruined beyond salvation to make way for a new apartment complex.

Share with us how you see Shanghai, or China! Post your photos on Flickr, tag them with "shanghaiist", and we'll select one favorite image per day. Or you can simply email your photos to photos at shanghaiist.com.

You may have walked past the Holy Trinity Cathedral before and not even known it. The church has been under construction for a couple of years now and protected from public view by the ever-cunning big cement construction wall. But it's still there, awaiting its impending resurrection amid a chorus of jackhammers.

It wasn't that long ago that Shanghaiist headed straight to Crystal Jade in Xintiandi for our regular weekend dim sum brunch. Since then, however, our new loyalties lie with two restaurants closer to headquarters. Our first impressions of Lynn back when it opened early last year was that customers were paying the bulk of the price premium for its sleek, modern decor and presentation rather than the quality of its traditional Shanghainese fare. However, dim sum lovers have been flocking to Lynn for their weekend all-you-can-eat dim sum menu, and for good reason. For 68 RMB, one can indulge on a free-flow of traditional Cantonese and Shanghainese favorites. Not a bad price, considering ordering a la carte for a single serving of hot and sour soup will run about half of that (and yes, the soup is also on the all-you-can eat menu).

Every now and again, time and space just seem to line up in an incredible display of fate/coincidence (delete as appropriate). For months now, we have been trying to get to grips with the strange brand of Uncle Tom-ism on display in the Shanghai ex-pativerse. It has so many unique facets that it appears to defy summary or clear explanation. Then along came Matthew Polly who wrote American Shaolin, a book that sets it all out with the purpose and prose of a Plato’s Republic. Albeit unintentionally.

Shanghaiist is happy to learn that we finally have a chance to break free from the shackles of political impotence and actually make somewhat of a difference in the increasingly heated U.S. presidential campaign. Democrats Abroad, the overseas branch of the U.S. Democratic Party, is holding its first global presidential primary from February 5th through the 12th. For the first time, expatriates who are American citizens have a chance to vote in the Democratic primary without having to mail in an absentee ballot (or for states that have caucuses, travel back home). According to the organization's press release:

Share with us how you see Shanghai, or China! Post your photos on Flickr, tag them with "shanghaiist", and we'll select one favorite image per day. Or you can simply email your photos to photos at shanghaiist.com.

By Derek Sandhaus

At least 20,000 police surveillance cameras are being installed along streets in southern China and will soon be guided by sophisticated computer software from an American-financed company to recognise automatically the faces of police suspects and detect unusual activity.

Yes, it's hard hitting reporting like this that has people wondering how we avoid the censors. But we recently found ourself in need of an ACE bandage, known in some parts of the world as an elastic bandage. Back home, we would have just headed to the local drugstore to buy one, but we had heard some people having trouble finding them in Shanghai — so we figured we'd tell you how we found ours yesterday.

It is now official: The Great Wall has been chosen as one of the new Seven Wonders of the World in an unprecedented global vote that drew nearly 100 million internet and telephone voters. In fact it received the most votes among the 21 finalist sites (not very surprising as China has one of the biggest internet populations?). Other sites that have been recognised as new wonders include:

Two monks from Shanghai's Jade Buddha Temple donate blood yesterday. Another 67 people from the temple will donate their blood in the coming week.

Continuing the fine Shanghaiist tradition of plagiarizing and plundering regurgitating Shanghai Daily stories, we bring you this article:

SHANGHAI named 83 folk arts as its first batch of city-level intangible culture heritage today as part of the city's efforts to protect and promote these "traditional treasures."

Continue reading "Shanghai protects its (in)tangible treasures"

We have whined before about the dearth of decent restaurants in Shanghai's airports. Pudong travelers are still better off brown-bagging it, but it seems relief will soon be on the way for domestic travelers: Element Fresh is opening up shop at Hongqiao Airport. From their website:

Attendance falling at your local place of worship? Loyal herd looking elsewhere for spiritual direction? Have a carnival! That'll win 'em back. If only the Pope had thought of it ... like the Shanghai Xuhui District Tourist Bureau did. It's annual Longhua Temple Festival runs until May 7th, meaning you have one weekend left to catch all the fun.

A round-up of BBS posts on the Shanghai metro:
• People's Square concrete drying... and drying... Poster SanNiu British Teacakes noticed yesterday that the yellow metal floor protectors place in front of the glass safety doors on the People's Square Line 1 platform have been moved around as the floor is repaired following the safety door installation process.
• Line 7 to perform "double crossing" of Suzhou CreekThe Metro Line 7 will perform a over-and-under double crossing of the Suzhou Creek south of the Zhenping Rd station. Line 7, a north-south line stretching from the outer Putuo District down to the World Expo site in Pudong, will cross the Suzhou Creek southbound through through a tunnel and northbound over a bridge. This is an unprecedented arrangement for the Shanghai metro system. On its journey, Line 7 will also intersect with Line 2 at Jing'an Temple and with Line 1 at Changshu Rd.
• Rumors say Line 4 to be delayed to 2008Rumors say that the structural engineering of ring line 4 will be complete by mid-2007, and that the installation of equipment and testing will take another full year to complete.

A few days ago, we linked to a BoingBoing post entitled "Buddha Machine: spiritual, generative transistor radio." Well, Shanghai blogger Swiss James, who is, naturally, "an Englishman born in the year of the Horse," recently bought six of these plastic chanting contraptions and videotaped them for us all to see and hear (he used his close proximity to Jing'An Temple as an excuse).

Sure, your wife/husband/partner might slap you, but assure them that this is not a fanciful excuse, because it could really happen to you.

Alert web surfers notice that the Shanghai Metro has redesigned their website. The English version is well done, and has some cool "inside" pictures of the subway car storage warehouse.

Over the years, we've seen plenty of cartoon characters pasted onto cars here in Shanghai — it's just part of Chinese car culture — but this is the biggest display of Disney devotion we have seen yet. Who needs diamond-encrusted rims when you can have cute dalmations? We can think of no better way to pimp out a VW sedan.

Five reasons we won't be rushing back to Yeeha Texas BBQ & Sports Bar

Remember the Shaanxi Temple Axe Murderer? You know, the one that killed eleven people aged 12-62 at a Taoist temple with an ax, dismembered them and fed some of their choice parts, including eyeballs, to the spotted dog that accompanied him? He was sentenced to death on October 19. For some good background on this man and his life, check out what ESWN had to say.

Yesterday's Metro Express reports on a vote by 2470 internet users of real-estate website Sofun.com to decide which Shanghai metro station has the most romantic potential, ie where you would be most likely to meet your one true commuting love.

Tickets to Longhua Pagoda (second from the right in the Shanghaiist logo) are RMB 100 and proceeds will go toward the pagoda's renovation, which hopefully won't be made more of a necessity by all the tourists. To that end people wearing high heels won't be allowed inside (which eliminates a large chunk of female Chinese tourists). Leave your lighters and knives (and children shorter than 1.4 meters) at home, too -- a lot of the pagoda is made of wood.

The video clip about Tong's case was "useful in helping us protect state secrets,'' the Sichuan Population and Family Planning Commission said in a July 31 statement on its Web site.

Despite our admiration for the career of this fellow Aussie (who has won a swag of majors), Shanghaiist couldn’t help feeling a bit better about our own very ordinary golf game upon hearing the news of her bunker blues. After all, we might be bad at golf, but we’re not that bad.

Last week, the always entertaining People's Daily website ran a series of photographs under the headline "Yao Restaurant opens in Shanghai." The first Yao Restaurant opened in Houston, Texas, in 2005 -- Yao Ming's parents are part owners. The People's Daily headline surprised us. We hadn't heard anything about Yao opening up a place in Shanghai.

In Jarrett Wrisley's column in this weeks SH we learned some encouraging news:

We at Shanghaiist know that you have felt something amiss in Shanghai since you arrived, whether you were born here or the day you stepped off the plane. A nagging feeling tugging gently on your consciousness -- a feeling that there is more to this great city than meets the eye.