Saturday 21st April
As mentioned in the earlier post we spent much of our first 24 hours in China holed up in our room, venturing out only for some food from the shop next door (pot noodles, fruit in jelly, bread and sweets) and to get the wifi code ... although the internet would only work on Bing. Hmm? Feeling a little digitally stranded but glad of a rest, we slept well. Watching the Robin Williams film "Hook" on the ex- pat channel. Then "Lord of the Rings", naturally.

Sunday 22 April
Breakfast again, in the erm, well it wasn't tidy, so... it was a trough really. A trough with chairs and tables. Although those staff who were on were smiling. Maybe because we were leaving ??? Whilst waiting to board our shuttle bus back to the airport, (so we could get the metro to the city centre) we met a tall young man named Wei. Very cheerful and happy to help. His family and he have been living in London for the last seven years, he is a chef and he was heading back there today, from South Korea. He helped tell the driver which terminal we wanted and then escorted us to where the metro was. "Down there for 5 minutes then left". What a lovely chap.
As chance would have it a couple of other Europeans were buying metro tickets too,
"One pass for 72 hours. That is ¥45 each (£5.50)."
'We'll have what they're having', as the saying goes. On the metro our confidence grew as this system seems to be much easier to follow - as opposed to having names the lines are simpley numbered 1, 2, 3 etc. And we only needed Line 3 to boot - much less stress. There was a change of trains in the middle (just to make it interesting), but asking one man with no english prompted two women (one younger with english, one older without) to help out there. Nodding, pointing, smiling and thumbs up worked too. Out of the station and smack bang into the heart of Shanghai.
We came out onto East Nanjing Road - the buisiest and most famous road in all of China. It was where western shops first came to China and the shopping area flourished since. It was big, it was busy, it was loud and it was - whoah wait a minute what's that smell? Ergh. Amongst the sweet smells of good cooking, hot fried food there was something else. Like a forgotten bin or something? It had gone as soon as we had smelt it. People everywhere, cyclists and scooters from all directions. Watch your toes! Telephone and electric wires twisted above your head. Horns blowing, bicycle bells ringing. A hive of activity. Lots more sniffing here and, unfortunately - but we had been warned, spitting. Real gutteral spitting. In the road, on the pavement, whilst riding their bikes or scooters - low rate 'Spitfires' if you like. Te he he. It all added to a feverish soundscape. Coming to the end of the road on which our hostel 'Blue Mountain' should've been, a security guard of a multi-story building ushered us over and pointed to the hostel's logo in the lobby, 6F - on the 6th floor.
"Xièxiè" (thank you).
Up we went and checked in. In a dorm of 8, I had the lower bunk - it had a privacy curtian and Frank the top. Our bags fitted in the locker, out the way - fab. Off out to explore then. Out and around town we started looking for the tourist information site (although I had managed to pick up a pretty good map at the airport - thankfully). Second map got, some  light supplies found and then we saw the top of one of the Bund buildings. Well we're here now, lets check it out. Wow. 'The Bund' is huge, so many people along the walk way all with their cameras out. We noticed rather a few looks and stares, more at Frank. Some people were trying to take sneaky photos of him/us. Except one bloke mind you...with his big paparazzi like long lens, he simply turned to Frank, pointed, clicked (a good few times) let it down, nodded and smiled at Frank!  Ok.
The Bund lies across the Huang Pu River - aptly named. It's a busy waterway with tourist boats but mostly big black barges - carrying everything, pumping out black smog clouds. The pollution SO BAD, we had to turn back from bund after a short walk as we both struggled with the thick of it.
Back to the hostel, we ate fruit on the steps outside, people watching. Lots of hustle and bustle even up this street. Whilst inside for coffee, a chinese couple came in, Bruce and Pandong, we started chatting together. Bruce gave us some good advice for our travels and warned us that Labour was coming up, which would mean all trains would be booked out. The rumble of our stomachs told us it was dinner time. 
It was now when we realised the lift has a personality of its own. As it opened and shut its doors, then went up to a floor where no one was waiting for it before depositing us on 1F. At least this brought us into a conversation with Nick from Switzerland, 20. He joined us for dinner in a near by diner. Black pepper beef, mushroom and pak choi, and broccoli with garlic. Nick had some spicier food.  Again we swaped some sage advice, he was heading to Taiwan after Shanghai - aha we've been there! Albeit breifly. When the meal was finished we split it 3 ways, Nick put his finger into a plastic storage box with dead fresh fish in... or so we thought, the ruddy things moved! They were alive!
Back to the hostel for one or two beers and bedtime.