On the morning of Dec. 9, we flew from Guilin to Shanghai. Upon our arrival, we visited a local community and met with the manager of the facility. We had lunch with a local family in their own home, which was very good. The mother of the family cooked probably 20 different dishes, and they were all wonderful.
That afternoon was one of the most fun parts of the trip. We went to a local kindergarten, and met a class of 6-year-olds. As soon as we walked in the door they grabbed our hands and up the stairs we went. When we got to their classroom, we were treated to singing and dancing by the children.
After they were done, they asked us to perform for them. Of course we did not prepare anything, so we did the once dance that most of us you know, could sing without music and had choreography. What dance is this? That would be the hokey pokey! It was so much fun even though I’m sure we looked like fools. But the kids had fun, and that is what mattered.
After hugs and goodbyes, we headed to a local market, called a wet floor market. This was actually our third wet floor market that we visited, but the one most worth writing about. The wet floor market is their food market, and nearly every type of food can be purchased there.
Meat, produce, grains, fish and tea can all be purchased. Fresh, cooked, bagged and in every form you can imagine. Some of it is local, other shipped in. However, the biggest difference is how it is presented.
In the U.S., produce is sold in a clean building, temperature controlled. Meat is sold is refrigerated cases. This system does not exist in China. Food is sold in bulk in a building with semi-dirty floors, tons of traffics, and bicycles and scooters running around everywhere. Sometimes food is knocked on the floor, and it’s picked back up and put back up for sale.
Meat is not refrigerated. It’s displayed on a table as whole parts, cuts and every part of the animal, not jut the meat. Organs, ears, tongues and tails are common sales of pork. Poultry is sold as a whole bird, feet and head intact. Ducks are sold in a similar way. Or sometimes they are sold as just the body, which the head sold separately.
The way their food is sold is basically a giant farmers market, except meat which is never sold this way in our farmers markets. At first I was disgusted by the way people buy food in China, but when it was brought to my attention how similar it is to our farmers markets, I couldn’t argue with it.
I still prefer the food standards we have here, and am surprised that more people don’t get more foodborne illnesses in China. I think the reason they don’t is because they only buy what they need each day, and everything is very thoroughly cooked Medium rare doesn’t exist.
The most interesting part of the wet floor market in Shanghai was the seafood. Almost everything was live. The only items that I saw that weren’t was the “squishy” creatures, such as Octopus and Squid, and also the shellfish such as clams. Almost everything else including several varieties of fish, crabs, turtles and eels were live. There were some frozen fish, but very little.
You can’t get seafood that is any fresher. You can literally pick the item that you want, and they will kill it right there, descale it and you can take it home. I saw huge fish chopped in a half on a cutting board (after it flopped onto the floor) and then put on a platter for sale. The head was still trying to breath.
Crabs are picked out of the tank and then tied with string (all their appendages) and away they go. You can’t get fish much fresher. A lot of it made me queazy, but I was fascinated at the same time.
The only part that really bothered me was the turtles. In general those of us in the U.S. don’t see turtles as food, but the Chinese see it as a delicacy. They cook turtles in soup to heal all kinds of ailments.
On our way out of the wet floor market, we were stopped by a shopkeeper making sweets. He gave us a sample of what he made, and it was like heaven in my mouth. It was made of peanuts and sesame seeds, and was like nothing I’ve ever eaten. I had to have some.
The next day (Dec. 10), we headed to the agricultural trade office (ATO) to meet with representatives from there and from the U.S. Meat Export Federation (USMEF). The ATO Shanghai Director, Keith Schneller spoke to us first. He talked about the programs they have, and how much product China imports from the U.S.
One of the most interesting facts that I learned what that China imports 28 billion dollars worth of product from the U.S. What is even more fascinating is that half of that is from soybeans. China imports 1 million metric tons (2,200 lbs) every week of soybeans, half from the U.S. and half from South America. That equates to 20, 50,000 ton Panamax (the biggest ship that fits through the Panama Canal) every single week. Almost all of that goes for livestock feed. Income is increasing in China, and as incomes rise, people eat more meat.
Their dairy industry is also growing in China. In fact, they import 600,000 tons of alfalfa each year now. People want more dairy products now, even if they don’t trust it. This goes back to the food safety standards, and after a lot of people got sick, the people began to question dairy products.
It actually got so bad during the cultural revolution that people went to Hong Kong to bring back dried milk, and then Hong Kong had a huge shortage of dried milk. Today, people are only allowed to take back 2 containers of dried milk on each trip to Hong Kong.
The biggest meat product that is imported to China is pork. Chinese people eat a lot of pork, and in 2012, 450,000 metric tons (990 million lbs) of U.S. pork was imported into China. They are the largest pork importer into China.
American products are extremely popular in China. Forty percent of Chinese people prefer American products, and will pay up to 80 percent more for these products, because they see them as higher quality. Many Chinese people see products made in China as inferior and not good quality.
After the presentation, we headed a few blocks down the street to a more modernized local market to see how U.S. pork is marketed in Chinese grocery stores. We got to taste samples, and view the packaging. It was pretty cool.
We then headed to a restaurant called Xibo for lunch. They feature food of the people of Western China, who are Muslim. They are called Uyghur people. The food was phenomenal. It was like Indian food with less curry. We had several different dishes which offered different flavor profiles and spices.
We also had lamb in several forms, but my favorite was the lamb kabob. Perfectly cooked and seasoned, I think this was the best lamb that I’ve ever had in my entire life. We had good beer made with barley (most of the beer is made with rice) and it was hands down the best meal we had all trip in my opinion.
That afternoon we visited a local silk shop, and learned how silk is made. It all comes from the silk work, and after the worm builds it’s cocoon, it is harvested. The entire cocoon is put in hot water and stirred with a brush, and the ends of the cocoon come lose and a group of eight are put together and hooked up to a machine that unwinds the cocoon. This is used for garments and paintings.
Sometimes the silk worms form a cocoon together, called a double cocoon. These cocoons are what they use for comforters. Several thousand double cocoons are used for one comforter. Shortly after I arrived in China I was told by a friend back home that if I buy one thing in China, it was a silk comforter. I took her advice, and purchased one. We’d been sleeping under one the whole trip, and I was sold on it.
After that, we drove through the expensive area of Nanjing Road, which is one of the busiest shopping malls in the country. We then headed to the area called The Bund, which is along the Huangpu River. It was beautiful. This area of Shanghai has extensive European architecture, since the Europeans built it. They have a matching bull to the one near Wall Street in New York, and high rise buildings with abstract architecture across the river. It was beautiful.
After our walk, we headed to another copy mall for more shopping. We then had dinner, and then back to The Bund for an optional boat ride on the river. I decided to go since I don’t know if I’ll ever be back to Shanghai.
It was very cool. The buildings have giant LED lights all over them, and flash lights of many colors. The first half of the trip I sat on the upper deck. The second half I had the opportunity to meet the Captain of the ship, who invited me into the Captain’s cabin to look at the lights shielded from the wind. I was nervous but took a leap of faith, and it was worth it. I got to see all of the lights as before but didn’t freeze. I was the only one from the group who had this opportunity.
When we got back to the hotel, I decided to call it a night, pack my bags and get some sleep. Some of our group partied all night. The morning of Dec. 11 we had a relaxed morning and headed to the airport to go back to the U.S.