First Impressions of SHANGHAI, CHINA! Travel Vlog

Alright, welcome to China. So yes guys, I am here in Shanghai, China. It's been a long time coming. I've been wanting to come here for years and years. Obviously there was a whole big lockdown during COVID, but now China is back open. So as soon as I was able to, I booked a trip to come here, and it's going to be an awesome couple of weeks here in China. We start here in Shanghai, then I go to Xi'an, Kunming, and then Beijing. So make sure you get subscribed if you're not already, so you don't miss any of that coming up. So right now I'm in the People's Square. It's very central here in Shanghai. A lot of people out here today. It's Friday, and it's also Chinese New Year. Kind of the tail end of it. Happy Chinese New Year to all that are celebrating. Guys, in this video, you know how it goes. I'm brand new here. I just got here yesterday. Haven't seen much yet. So this is going to be my first impressions walking around as an American guy in Shanghai. Let's see what I discover. Let's see what I come across. It's going to be fun, that is for sure. Ni hao. Yes, one please. Alright, breakfast time. Jianbing. Okay, this is Jianbing. I had this last time I was in Shanghai, years ago. And it's basically like a Chinese crib. So there goes an egg on top of the batter. And what's going in? All of these different vegetables. A little cilantro, maybe? Some green onion. And I don't know what that is. Now she's going to fold it up in a second. This is like, I think, hoisin sauce or something similar. A little bit. A little bit of chili. Luckily, I know how to say a little bit. Fold it up. And inside went this crispy wafer. That gives it some nice texture. In the bag. Xiexie. Huh. Okay. Do I pay here? Okay. And now it's mobile payment time. So I gotta figure out how to do this. Alipay. Scan. Okay, and this is how payments work here in China. It's very, very common. I mean, you can use cash, but it's very common to use these mobile payments. This is Alipay. There's also one through WeChat. I just scanned this QR code in the app. And then, I don't know the numbers, so I just held up the phone. He typed it in. 7. That's like $1 for this. So we're going to confirm. I'm going to put my passcode in. And then it should go through. Done. Okay, we're all set. Bye-bye. And it's just like that. You also have your own barcode in the apps, which they can, like, charge you through their payment system, and then you just hold up your code and it charges you automatically. But for that, you put the amount in and scan their barcode. So it works both ways. Very efficient. And as of 2023, you can link non-Chinese bank cards or credit cards to your Alipay or WeChat account so you can pay directly from your credit card through the app. So anyway, we got it. Let's find a place to take a seat, and we're going to try it. All right, jianbing, Chinese breakfast crepe. It's two halves. I don't know if you're supposed to eat them one at a time or just go all in, but I think I'm just going to go for the double-decker. Here we go. It's got all that freshness from the greens and the onion in there. It's got the crisp from that fried wafer thing that they put in there. It's got the eggs. And it's got a good kick from my yi dian dian. A little bit of chili sauce that went in there. So tasty, though. It's not too heavy or anything. It's nice and light and very, very flavorful. And that cilantro really comes through, too. The perfect breakfast in Shanghai. All right, guys, moving right along. Now we're here in the French concession area. This is one of the most popular parts of Shanghai. It was actually like literally a French colony back in the day for about 100 years from the mid-1800s to mid-1900s. Now it's just like a neighborhood in the city, but still a very cool, trendy area. And this building right behind me is called the Wukong Mansion. Kind of looks like the Flatiron Building in New York to me. And this area is absolutely packed with people. Obviously, China has a huge population, and I think about half of them are right here on this street corner. So yeah, walking through the French concession area, they say this is where the Chinese influencers come to get their start. And as an aspiring Chinese influencer myself, I figured I got to come here. Now the thing about being a Chinese influencer is that in China, they don't really use the same social media platforms that we do in the rest of the world. Most of them are actually blocked. There's the famous Great Firewall of China. Google, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, X, YouTube, all that stuff is not used here. It's blocked. You can get past it using a VPN, but in China they have like a Chinese replacement for each of those platforms. Yeah, this area is really cool. It's a lot of like Art Deco-style buildings. It feels probably like the most foreigner-friendly area of the city that I've seen at least. It's kind of trendy and there's a lot of English. I notice that in like any quote-unquote trendy neighborhood around the world, they tend to use a lot of English in the names of the businesses and stuff. Hey, look at that. We've got the Iranian consulate general. Our friends the Iranians. We're in here in Shanghai. Hey, and right down the street we've got the American one. There we go, they're neighbors. Alright, so I'm just walking along and we've got this park here with all the old men from the neighborhood. I don't know what the game is, but it looks very intense. It's mahjong? No. Okay, very good. Very nice. Thank you. And they've got different games going on here. Alright guys, it is time to eat once again. I need to go find some noodles or something. Let's do it. Okay guys, so I've come to a different part of the city. This is close to like a garden or temple complex called Yu Garden. It is absolutely packed here right now. And I think it's got to be related to Chinese New Year because, I mean, I don't think it's like this all the time, but it's so packed. Mostly with Chinese people, like I haven't seen many foreigners. So yeah, good vibes. Okay, there are so many food options here. I think this whole festival thing is set up for Chinese New Year because it's just crazy. Like the decorations are amazing. This feels like what you would expect China to look like from like a western perspective if you come to China, which is very cool. Into the mouth of the dragon. You got the very spiffy soldiers on the outside. Alright, so apparently inside this area where the dragon mouth enters into, you need a ticket to get in there. I just got my ticket. And we're in. Alright, I am in. They've got a lot of beautiful decorations up there. Very cool in here. Very crowded. A lot of people. Let's find something to eat. Alright, I have made it inside. Found myself a seat. And luckily... Oh, thank you. Perfect, thank you so much. Luckily that lady speaks really great English because I think I would have been in trouble otherwise. Okay guys, and the food has arrived. So here is just like a fried pork chop. Over here we've got some simple noodles. You can take the broth and pour that right in there. Yum. And then we've got some soup dumplings, I think. It all looks amazing. I'm so hungry. Let's do it. Okay, and in these noodles, there's like little baby dried shrimps, I think. And some other greens of some sort. Let's give it a try. That was the bite I was waiting for. Wow. The noodles here are just... There's something different. They're like the perfect amount of al dente. Chewy, but not mushy. They're just insane. Okay guys, and Shanghai is famous for their soup dumplings. Xiaolongbao. This one has pork and crab inside. And the way you do it is, you put it on the spoon, you bite a little hole in it, then you suck out all the liquid, and then you can eat the dumpling. There goes the soup, and now... So good. They're sweet and they're savory. Almost has like a maple syrup flavor. I know, that's crazy. People are going to come at me for that. But it has that essence of like a really sweet goodness. I don't know. Okay, I've been roped into trying a bunch of rice wine. This is like my fifth one. Wow, nice. Nice? Very nice. This one's high alcohol. High alcohol. Try it slowly. Okay. But this is a nice one. Yeah. Whoa, yeah, you're right. It is higher. Oh, it's 38%. It's good though. It's just what I needed on a chilly winter day. It's not cold anymore. Not cold, exactly. I was just saying that. Yeah, it'll be warming right up. Say hi to YouTube. Yeah, woohoo, China. Cheers to China. Wow. More berries. Oh mulberry, huh? All right. I don't know how I got roped into this. Yeah, everyone. I'm gonna be in trouble. Thank you. All right. Oh, that's very good. Delicious. This is a Chinese medicine citrus. Medicine citrus. Okay. Whoa. This one's 52%. Oh my god. Yes. Really? You try it. You try it slowly because this one is a very famous one. Okay. All right. Slowly, a little bit. Oh, it's okay. It's good? Yeah. Very good. Yeah. I love them all. Feel like each one I try, I like it even more. We're going around the whole table here. She wasn't kidding. Oh my goodness. I think this should be my last one, maybe. Okay. Very good. Strong. Yeah, it is. All right. So yeah, right after I ate, I came across that lady giving out the free samples of all the different rice wines or different kinds of wines. I think I had several shots worth and I'm feeling pretty good right now. The sun is starting to go down. It's looking really nice out here with all the decorations. I want to head over to the Bund, a very famous part of the city, to end the video with quite a view. So we'll go do that. Stay tuned. There's something about traveling in China as a foreigner that is really unique and kind of a throwback to how travel was before the internet. As I mentioned before, the Western apps either don't work here or the people here don't use them anyway. So one example is Google Maps. People here don't use it and so they don't populate it with reviews and all that data that makes it so useful to us, like looking up restaurants and things like that. Here, it doesn't have anything on it. They might not even be listed. They might be placed incorrectly. So as a result, it really forces you to just go out and hit the streets and explore. And I feel like that's what travel was like before the internet. It was less planned. It was more spontaneous and you really just had to go out and discover stuff. And that is what travel is all about. And here is the perfect place to do it because you kind of don't have any other choice. All right. And we have reached the Bund. So you can see behind me there, all these lit up buildings right along the waterfront. And then across the way is Pudong. You've got all of the modern buildings across there, including one of the tallest buildings in the world, Shanghai Tower. Right there. This place is really cool. Tons of people again here still. But I would say this is definitely one of the best views in the city. You definitely got to come here at least once if you visit Shanghai. Alrighty, guys. I have to end this video very abruptly because my camera's battery is dying. But I hope you enjoyed it. And stay tuned for a lot more coming from China very, very soon. Other than that, thank you so much for watching. And I'll see you in the next one. Bye-bye.