Roses in Fuxing Park, Bike Ferry, Sun

Biking around Shanghai in the wonderful spring weather reminds me of a song from Tom Borton’s classic live-action masterpiece The Nightmare Before Dragon Boat Festival. In it, nasty old Chinaman named Mr. Bu Gi greeted a group of foreign two bikers when they stopped to rest in his neighborhood. Here is an excerpt:

Well, well, well, what have we here?
Two bikers in Shanghai, huh?
Oh, I’m really scared!
So the weather’s fine, the sky is blue, the sun is out? Ha, ha, ha.

You’re bikin’, you’re bikin’
To parks and down the lanes.
Pumping hard, you gotta be
To keep out of people’s way.
Construction everywhere, it’s ugly
I don’t know which is worse
I might just crack a smile now
If you don’t die on your bikes first.

This weekend, J. and I did it all! We ate. We biked. We sat in parks, read books, played with kittens, got in arguments, had a job interview (not me, her), ran errands, went to the train station, took the subway, drank iced coffees and bubble tea, kicked the feather, took a ferry, played computer games (Crysis Wars), and helped make dinner and watch a bad movie with friends. It was a varied, relaxed and decent two days.

Plus, my IBS was MIA. A-OK BMs FTW!

Some pictures of the weekend IN JPEG FORMAT!:

Fuxing Park’s wonderful rose garden.

More roses.

White roses.

Construction worker is sad in the shade.

A common feature of Chinese parks is fake rocks with speakers in them.

Fuxing Park walkway.

Water treadmills.

Hand cranked paddle boats for the kids.

A family of kittens was hanging out in the shade of one of the planters. They seemed scrawny but unafraid of people. I wanted to feed them. We did our best to protect them from a group of kids and the groundskeepers who were watering the plants with a fire hose.

Delicious rose flavored tea.

Statute of Communist elite.

Stairwell of apartment.

Umbrella lady and construction wall.

Pink flowers transported on the side of a motorbike.

Green tower.

Old something-or-other on a dusty street.

Temporary pipes.

J. on her bike.

Old locked door.

An empty road near the river.

The bike ferry terminal.

Vines on an old factory lift.

Lupu bridge and boats as seen from the ferry ride.

Old boats.

Old characters on a tile wall.

A narrow park along the river in Pudong.

Old lighthouse.

Barge carrying insanely big pipes up the river.

Another view.

Oil tanker.

Stubble legs.

Rusted and gutted by still gaudy music-themed boat.

Detail.

Outdoor beer storage.

Old arched gate.

Another arched walkway with mysterious, shadowy interior.

The remains of a fire escape on an old building.

Old bike rickshaw.

Watermelon season!

Shadowy street.

Husking peas to make pea soup. It was a lot of peas for a lot of people.

Salmon.

Salad.

People.

Cheers to another weekend I was lucky enough to not have work responsibilities. Time is passing very quickly here.