shanghai life,I have been living in Shanghai since September 2013 and below I will
share my positive and not so great experiences here from a foreign
perspective.
Ease of living: Shanghai is great! You can get everywhere easily, shops are open 24 hours and the shopping malls have long hours, a lot
of people speak English compared to the rest of the country, you can buy
things online, you can go everywhere.
Superb transportation: metro, taxi, buses, shared bikes, didi or
Uber (the first owns the second in China), e-bikes (you need to own
one), 2 airports, 5 train stations (the first 5 that come to my mind are
Central station, HongQiao, SongJiang, South, West), illegal black cars
(if you are brave or desperate or no alternative available). I feel
Shanghai has one of the best transportation systems in the world and it
is great to move around.
Smartphones: you can do everything (almost) with your smartphone in
Shanghai. Just download WeChat (Tencent) and Alipay (Alibaba), connect
them to your bank cards and start enjoying it. You can pay everywhere
with them, you can order taxis, read the most recent news, pay the
bills, order taxis/vans/buses, order food and get delivered it
everywhere you want, buy holiday trips, etc. There are so many things
available you can do by just accessing these 2 apps and all their
affiliates.
Food: the different provinces of China, Italian, French, Japanese,
Korean, Singaporean, American, English, Russian, Spanish, Argentinian,
Thai, Indonesian, Malay, etc. Salty, sweet, sour, spicy, barbecue,
soups, fried, seasoned, etc. The food options are so different and
varied that you can get lost and the prices are overwhelming. You can
find everything based on how much you want to pay. 3 Michelin stars to
the street food. You pick your choice.
Coffee culture: coffee is growing by leaps and bounds in Shanghai.
Before it was only the big chains (Starbucks, Costa, Pacific, Dunkin and
so on), but now there are plenty of small and private coffee shops that
offer great coffee and awesome experiences. They are located everywhere
in Shanghai (from the top shopping malls, to the small alleys typical
of Shanghai). The prices are somewhat pricey (5/7 Euro/USD for a coffee
is weird for me as an Italian), but the variety and the quality can make
up a bit for the price you pay. Or you can skip the pricey ones and go
to the small shops.
English: a lot of foreigners come to Shanghai because it is easier
to communicate with the locals and there are also a lot of international
businesses. So it has become a positive circle for the internationals
and the Chinese alike. But get out of the main areas (HuaiHai rd,
Nanjing W/E rd, LJZ, University areas, some areas around the
international schools and the big companies or tech parks) and you will
feel a lot like being outside of Shanghai because no one speaks English
there. Some districts have only Chinese so if you want to improve your
Mandarin / Shanghainese skills (and save a lot of money) consider living
in certain suburbs (Minhang and SongJiang have plenty of cheap
estates).
