If you are into tea or just curious, Shanghai has it all. There are thousands of tea shops ranging from simple street stands to huge labyrinthine “tea cities”. For brevity, this article focuses on two of the largest tea markets, Tianshan Tea City and DaNing International Tea City. Both are very similar in scale and products although Tianshan is more well known. Tianshan Tea City Tianshan (天山茶城) is a huge complex with at least 150 shops selling tea and tea…
Qibao (七宝) is an old water town located about 20 kilometers from downtown Shanghai which has a very popular food street. Most days, and especially when the weather is good, people flock there to enjoy a stroll and eat traditional snacks. Qibao means, “Seven Treasures” in Chinese and the legend is there were seven of them around the area such as a Gold Lotus Scripture, a magic tree, and a golden chicken to name a few. The old town is…
This year (2018) for Chinese New Year we visit Ningbo Park Hyatt Resort & Spa and NanTang Old Street in Ningbo. A very relaxing and quite long weekend where we spent most of our time at the resort enjoying fresh seafood, the tea-house, and simple relaxations around Dong Qian Lake. One afternoon, we took a shuttle into Ningbo city to visit the popular NanTang Old Street with its many street snacks and shopping. Getting to Ningbo from Shanghai by…
Dafen Oil Painting Village 大芬 specializes in making large numbers of replicas of oil paintings by masters such as Van Gogh, Dalí, da Vinci, and Rembrandt. Almost certainly any replica painting you’ve seen in an office or hotel somewhere came from Dafen Village. It’s estimated that nearly 60% of the worlds oil paintings are produced in Dafen Village[1] thus giving it the name “World’s Art Factory”. In addition to cranking out replicas, artists do their own styles and take commissioned…