Lisa: Your Local Tour Guide in SHanghai – on SHownbylocals.com

Sydney FC closed out their disappointing season with a 2-1 friendly loss to Shanghai Shenhua on Saturday night.

In a game watched by incoming Czech coach Vitezslav Lavicka, Sydney matched their Asian Champions League-bound opponents before being sunk by a late winner.

Shanghai’s Argentinean import Hernan Barcos opened the scoring for Shanghai with a scrappy finish from a 32nd minute corner at Hongkou Stadium.

But winger Alex Brosque levelled with a well-constructed goal in the 58th minute.

Just minutes after going on as a substitute for captain Steve Corica, rising star Kofi Danning made a break down the right and picked out Brosque with a near-post cross that was skilfully volleyed into the back of the net.

Sydney, led by interim coach Tony Popovic, looked set to hold on for a deserved draw but a quality finish from Shanghai’s Chen Lei stole the win for the home side with just two minutes remaining.

Striker John Aloisi almost got his name on the score sheet but had two goals disallowed in the loss.

The result closed a dramatic season in which Sydney failed to reach the A-League finals for the first time, leading to the sacking of coach John Kosmina.

Lavicka will arrive in Australia next month before officially joining Sydney in April.

FOR most locals, Huaihai Road in Shanghai has always been one of the city’s go-to retail and shopping corridors. On this strip, department stores like Isetan and smaller shops like Levis and Miss Sixty and Calvin Klein blend into the streetscape.

Recently, a wave of upscale openings has raised the higher end of the often crowded boulevard, borrowing plenty of DNA from its retail origins.

The first sign of this may not be immediately obvious, but walk through the meandering entryway marked 796 Huaihai Road, through the landscaped gardens, and you’ll find two newly renovated French-style villas — the twin villas, as they are known. This gorgeous three-story complex, with verandas on each floor, now houses stores of two of the luxury retailer Richemont’s biggest brands, Dunhill (86-21-5454-8699; www.dunhill.com/en-cn/ourhomes/shanghai) and Vacheron Constantin (86-21-3395-0800; www.vacheron-constantin.com). At the star-studded opening in October, where a black-tie crowd mingled in the garden, Jude Law, the face of Dunhill, could be spotted in a V.I.P. section.

An upper floor of the villas is home to the newly arrived Shanghai edition of the members-only Kee Club (86-21-3395-0888). Kee has long been a high-society hangout in Hong Kong, but the smaller Shanghai branch is a bit more democratic: it’s open to the general public — at least until it has a chance to establish a regular clientele. For now, visitors can enjoy the bar, filled with leather Chesterfield sofas and Jacobsen Egg chairs, or book a table in the more formal wainscoted dining room, which serves a selection of fine French cuisine (dinner for two is about 1,000 yuan, or about $145 at 6.97 yuan to the dollar). Kee Hong Kong is known for its dim sum, and according to Maria Rhomberg, one of Kee Club’s founders, the kitchen of Kee Shanghai also serves Chinese cuisine and dim sum (a day’s notice is necessary for the latter).

Behind the villas is a new, more modern and low-lying building that is surrounded by reflecting pools. Inside, art lovers will find a new space for ShanghART (86-21-3395 0808; www.shanghart.com), perhaps the city’s most respected and best-known contemporary art gallery. It is the gallery’s fourth location in Shanghai, and its fifth over all, after a recent expansion to Beijing.

Looking for something for the kids? When it opens next Saturday, children and grown-up toy enthusiasts alike will be delighted to find an elaborate Barbie store farther down the street (550 Huaihai Road; www.barbieshanghai.com). The store will be the first set up by Mattel, the brand’s parent, to sell exclusively Barbie products. Aiming to be more than just a simple toy boutique, however, the store will have a cafe developed by the chef David Laris, who also runs a restaurant in the Bund, Shanghai’s other big retail and dining district. The eight-story building will be fronted with a fritted-glass facade designed by James Slade, a New York-based architect. The kids probably won’t care about the architecture — only what’s inside it.

WAM Vienna, 28th February 2009 (WAM) – Centennial celebrations were held in Shanghai this week to mark the 100 th anniversary of the International Opium Commission which met in Shanghai, China in February 1909.
The Opium Commission meeting was the first international conference to control drugs, and led to the conclusion of the first international convention on drug control, the Hague International Opium Convention of 1912. The commemorative event was attended by representatives of the thirteen nations that took part in the original meeting.

A century ago, China faced an opium epidemic. According to official statistics, almost one quarter of Chinese men consumed opium in 1906, and around 5 per cent of the total Chinese population was addicted. Today, around the world, the total number of problem drug users is around 25 million – less than 0.5 per cent of humanity. The number of people who use illicit drugs at least once a year has been contained to 5 per cent of the adult population – a much lower prevalence than for alcohol and tobacco. Deaths due to drugs are limited to 200,000 a year: one tenth of those killed by alcohol; and twenty times less than those killed by tobacco.

A century ago, the supply of drugs was out of control. In 1906, more than 40,000 tons of opium was produced, mostly in China and India (compared to less than 8,000 tons in Afghanistan last year). Thanks to international drug control, opium cultivation has been slashed by almost three-quarters: the problem is now concentrated in one country, Afghanistan, which produces 92 per cent of the world’s deadliest drug. Coca leaves, which used to be grown in several countries, are now only grown in three Andean countries: Colombia, Peru and Bolivia. “Compared to a century ago, drug demand and supply have been brought under control”, said the Executive Director of UNODC, Antonio Maria Costa. “Adherence to the international drug control regime (based on 3 UN treaties) is universal, and the principle of shared responsibility is unanimously accepted”. However, Mr. Costa cautioned that “while the world drug problem has been contained, it has not been solved”.
At the commemorative event in China, representatives of the countries taking part agreed on a Shanghai Declaration which will be presented at the high-level segment of the upcoming Commission on Narcotic Drugs that will meet in Vienna on 11-12 March.

Taipei – China’s Shanghai Museum will offer two enamel porcelains from the era of Emperor Yongzheng (1678-1735) of the Qing Dynasty to Taiwan, the museum curator said in Taipei Thursday. “We plan to send two enamel ceramics with colored paintings from Yongzheng era for an exhibition in Taipei in October,” said Chen Xiejun, curator of the Shanghai museum. Taipei’s National Palace Museum asked its mainland counterpart, the Palace Museum in Beijing, to loan it 29 pieces of scroll paintings and official documents of the Yongzheng period for exhibition in October. During a landmark visit to Beijing and Shanghai in February, Taipei museum director Chou Kung-hsi, the first director to visit the mainland museums since the end of a civil war in 1949, reached an agreement on the loans. The nationalist government of Chiang Kai-shek, which lost the civil war, took about 650,000 pieces from the Palace Museum with it to Taipei, and mainland China still claims full ownership of the complete collection. Chen said he hoped the cooperation would help promote exchanges between the Taipei and Shanghai museums in the future.

TICKETS for the World Expo 2010 will go on sale for groups on March 27 and for the public on July 1.
The basic ticket price will be 160 yuan (US$22.40). Foreigners will be able to buy tickets from overseas outlets authorized by the Bureau of Shanghai World Expo Coordination.
From March 27 to June 30, group bookings can be made for organizations, institutions and enterprises. The public can buy tickets from July 1, Zhong Yanqun, fulltime deputy director of the World Expo 2010 Shanghai Executive Committee, told a press conference today.
Peak day admission tickets will cost 200 yuan and will cover 17 days including Chinese Labor Day holiday (May 1-3), National Day holiday (October 1-7), and the last week before closing (October 25-31).
Tickets will be discounted from 10 to 30 yuan for those who buy before the Expo opens on May 1, 2010.
People going to the Expo after 5pm (apart from the peak days) can get tickets for 90 yuan but only during Expo.
Three-day passes will cost 400 yuan and seven-day passes 900 yuan.
At least 62 million tickets will be available, said Chen Xianjin, deputy director general of the Expo Bureau.
Discounts will also be offered to the disabled, senior citizens, students with valid IDs and Chinese servicemen and women. Children under 1.2 meters will not have to pay.
The basic price is “affordable” for the majority of people, and amounts to around 1 percent of the Chinese per-capita disposable income for last year, Zhong said, noting that it was common practice to set ticket prices within the 1 to 3-percent range of the host country’s per-capita disposable income.
The average ticket price will be 96 yuan taking into consideration the discounts available, Zhong said.
The Expo organizer will encourage people to reserve tickets in advance or buy group tickets in an attempt to control visitor flow, Zhong said. The organizer is expecting 70 million visitors, 5 percent of whom will be from overseas.
The organizer will appoint domestic and overseas agencies to sell tickets and there will be 3,200 sales outlets in China. People will be able to purchase tickets at branches of China Mobile, China Telecom, Bank of Communications and China Post. Online and hotline channels will also be opened.
The first domestic and overseas ticket sales agencies will sign contracts with the organizer on March 2.
During Expo, visitors will be able to buy tickets on site or at kiosks. The Expo Bureau will appoint travel agents to organize group tours.

CONSTRUCTION on the 29.68 billion yuan (US$4.34 billion) Shanghai-Hangzhou high-speed railway started today.
The project, which will be completed before the 2010 World Expo, will cut the journey between the two cities to 38 minutes from the current hour or more and is a part of a plan to cut rail travel time between any two cities in the Yangtze Delta Region to within two hours.
The Shanghai-Hangzhou high-speed rail link will have a top speed of 350 kilometers per hour and will have nine stations on its 159-kilomete route. The stations will be Shanghai Hongqiao Station, Songjiang South Station, Fengjing South Station in Shanghai, Jiashan South Station, Jiaxing South Station, Tongxiang Station, Haining West Station, Yuhang South Station, and Hangzhou East Station in Zhejiang Province.
Intervals between trains will be just three minutes. When it begins operation, the line will handle 210 trains in each direction every day and this may rise 235.
People in Hongqiao will be able to travel more quickly to Songjiang District on the new train than the Metro, which has a maximum speed of 80 kilometers per hour.
Construction on the 300-kilometer Shanghai-Nanjing rail line at a cost of 39.46 billion yuan started last July. A 251-kilometer rail link between Nangjing and Hangzhou is also under construction at a cost of 31.3 billion yuan.
Last April construction started on the 1318-kilometer Shanghai-Beijing high-speed railway at a cost of 220 billion yuan. It will shorten the traveling time between the two cities to just over five hours.
The railway ministry also plans to build new rail links to connect Changzhou and Suzhou, Suzhou and Jiaxing, and Hangzhou and Ningbo, completing a rail network in the Yangtze Delta region by 2020.

Much like the better toilet campaign enacted by Beijing before the Olympics, Shanghai will be upgrading its public restrooms in time for the World Expo. The city has said it will clean up and renovate more than 5,200 public toilets to meet the “urgent needs” of roughly 70 million expected Expo visitors.

According to the Straits Times:

More than 500 new free toilets will also be installed before the five-month event starts on May 1, 2010, Ma said in an interview Monday on Shanghai state radio.

To offer free public toilets is only part of the whole work. It is also important to improve the service,’ Mr Ma was quoted as saying by the China Daily newspaper Tuesday. ‘Some of the toilets will offer medicine and sewing kits.’

More than 300 of the new toilets will be built around the Expo site and they will be supplemented by ‘mobile public toilets,’ he said.

For the sake of everyone who has shimmied around the street, overloaded bladder just dying to burst, let’s hope city officials aren’t talking out of their asses.

BNY Mellon Western Fund Management, a joint venture fund firm between Bank of New York Mellon and China‘s Western Securities, is expected to begin operations some time of 2009, a top fund official said today.

The firm currently is looking for an ideal location for its new headquarters in Shanghai, said Hu Bin, who is expected to become the CEO of the fund firm.

According to Hu, the joint venture fund has to open an office and hire sufficient staff before it can be evaluated by China‘s security regulator and receive a license.

Once its license is approved, the company will be the 33rd joint venture fund firm in China.

Western Securities, based in Xi’an in northwestern China, is expected to hold a 51 percent stake in the firm, while Bank of New York will own the remainder.

According to regulations in China, foreign investor’s stake in a joint venture fund firm cannot exceed 49 percent.

Bank of New York Mellon Corporation is a leading global asset manager with close to $1 trillion in assets under management, and leading global provider of securities servicing with about $20 trillion in assets under custody and administration.

SHANGHAI (AFP) — Shanghai has sought to reassure visitors to next year’s World Expo that they can expect relief from the city’s sometimes foul public toilets.

The city will clean up and renovate more than 5,200 public toilets to meet an expected 70 million Expo visitors’ “urgent needs,” according to Ma Yun’an, head of the city’s urban management bureau.

More than 500 new free toilets will also be installed before the five-month event starts on May 1, 2010, Ma said in an interview Monday on Shanghai state radio.

“To offer free public toilets is only part of the whole work. It is also important to improve the service,” Ma was quoted as saying by the China Daily newspaper Tuesday. “Some of the toilets will offer medicine and sewing kits.”

More than 300 of the new toilets will be built around the Expo site and they will be supplemented by “mobile public toilets,” he said.

Ma spoke about the issue during a wide-ranging interview about public works projects in preparation for the Expo, which has a slogan of “Better city, better life.”

The interviewer mentioned public debate about the poor state of the public toilets outside Shanghai’s railway station.

Those toilets, which cost one yuan (15 cents) to use, could earn 100 million yuan a year — if they were better maintained — according to the interviewer.

Chinese toilets have endured a poor reputation among foreigners for many years.

Foul smells, a lack of toilet paper, failures to flush, and having to squat rather than sit on a seat, are some of the common complaints.

Authorities in Beijing carried out a similar toilet campaign ahead of last year’s Beijing Olympics. The stated goal of the Olympic effort was to make every public toilet a “pleasant experience.”

actually i feel like the girl from confessions of a shopaholic, not that i am as extremely as shopaholic as her, but rather we share the same thoughts from the book. i can’t wait to see the movie though. so anyway here are some ways i’ve come up with to save up.
i once read from confessions of a shopaholic, that there are two ways to go when it comes to our finances, either you save more, or you earn more.
definitely i’d try to earn more, coz i don’t know how it’s even possible to save anything at all. but since people have been losing jobs left and right, i guess the best option is to save more.
okay here’s some of my tried and tested efforts to save up. well, at least i tried.
1. when you get your paycheck, save already a portion of it for times of need. times of need, doesn’t include sales at sephora.
2. eat at the canteen. ok if you can’t stand canteen, pretend you’re on a diet instead and don’t eat at all. just kidding.
3. try to cook your own food. this has saved me lots honestly. (note to self: learn new recipes too while you’re at it, i’m beginning to resent my own cooking)
4. share. why does it always have to be about you? some people may need to save more than you do? share what you have to others.
5. waste not. don’t buy anything you could live without for a month. use up first your stuff before buying new ones. and no, getting something dusty doesn’t merit for a new one.
6. turn off most of your appliances when not in use. my electricity just trippled during the holidays just because i was too lazy to turn off everything. sigh.
7. give yourself a budget and stick to it.
8. don’t carry all your atms or cash with you. that way you can’t spend them.
9. think of other ways to save up:
instead of buying dvds – watch them online on youku
instead of taking a bath – don’t. kidding!
instead of letting the heater run all night – turn the timer on.
10. when all else fails, don’t leave your room, there’s just too many cute small shops on your neighborhood.
there, some nice tips from your financial expert becky bloomwood. what a cow!