Shanghai Expo, Pt.1

Hearing all the stories of huge crowds and 4+ hour line ups at the Expo on the weekends, I thought I'd be smart and take a day off on Monday to go check it out. We took the designated Expo subway line in the afternoon, and it wasn't crowded at all, so we were expecting a nice leisurely day strolling through the grounds. However, when we got there, we then realized the reason the train wasn't busy was because everyone was already at the park! It was just a huge mass of people for as far as you could see.

The train station opened out right in the middle of the park, so we took a few minutes to get our bearings. First order of business - we wanted to get the passports so we could get stamps from each pavilion. If you've never been to an Expo, that's the thing to do. I still have my passport from Expo '86 in Vancouver. I remember how much fun it was collecting the stamps. (But then again, I was 12 at the time..).

Incidentally, if you were at Expo '86 too and want to relive some of the great memories, go here. (In particular, read the 'Memories' section - it will bring a smile to your face). An interesting observation from that site, which becomes particularly apparent at the Shanghai Expo (in a negative way, unfortunately):

"The memories people have shared with me over the years bring another dynamic of Expo to life -- the human factor. As we talk of architecture and ticket sales we sometimes forget that fairs are primarily built by people for people. Without people a fair is just a shell. Imagine how ghostly an empty amusement park would be. It wouldn't be the same without the throngs of children or the screams from the roller coaster. So, it's not the fair but the reaction of visiting a fair that is important. A fair itself is just a backdrop for the human experience."

Anyways, we find an Info centre and ask the girl behind the counter for a map. Expressionless, and staring blankly into space, she mechanically puts one on the counter. We ask for one more. Repeat. Um..ok. "Excuse me, where can we buy the passports?" She points and tells us to go to the adjacent souvenir shop behind us. "Ok, thanks." Then almost as an afterthought, she adds, "But they're sold out." What the??.. Aren't Expo staff supposed to be like ambassadors for their country? Then why were they like robotic morons? Damn, I was really looking forward to getting the passport. Our Expo experience was not off to a great start. But we didn't let that dampen our spirits. We were at the World Expo!

We hadn't eaten yet, so were starving. We decided on the nearest thing, which was an Irish pub. Hectic, over-priced, and not so good. Pretty much to be expected at an Expo. Will leave it at that.

Ok, now to face the crowds..

We just kind of wandered around for a bit to get a sense of everything. The grounds were actually nice, everything was clearly marked, and the pavilions looked pretty amazing (from the outside at least). But there were just so many people walking every which way, it was kind of hard to focus.

Some of the line ups for the pavilions were so long, you couldn't even tell which one it led to. A friend joked, "For all you know, that could be the line up for the toilet!" I saw a sign for the German pavilion that said, "6 hrs from this point." I heard the Saudi Arabia pavilion was 9 hours! NINE!! No thanks, I'm not spending the whole day lining up just to see one pavilion. From what we had been told, the line ups got shorter later in the evening, so our strategy was to check out the smaller pavilions first, and wait till towards closing to check out the more popular ones.

We saw a lot of random countries: Luxembourg, Africa had a huge pavilion the size of an exhibition hall, so we saw all those countries in one go, South and Central America had a consolidated pavilion too. Nothing exciting so far - reminded me of you know when you were in elementary school and had to do a big project on a particular country, and you had these 3-paneled boards that you stood up, and on it, you pasted maps of the country, pictures of famous landmarks, facts like population, official language, currency, etc. - well, that's exactly what the insides of these pavilions were like, just bigger..

Onto Peru and Brazil. Then, even though there was a long line, had to go to Canada. Of course, I'm biased, but I liked it. Made me miss home so much..

Then Chile, Venezuela, and Cuba. The interior design for the Chile pavilion was actually really nice. The Cuba pavilion basically consisted of a bar where you could buy mojitos.

By this time, it was getting to nightfall and we were thinking about trying for some of the bigger pavilions. We went to Spain, since everyone said it was good, and it was pretty cool, minus this creepy giant baby?? Although people seemed to like it..

After that, we still had time to see a few more. France was pretty nice. It was sad though - they'd flown in original paintings by Manet, Cezanne, and Rodin, but nobody gave a sh*t; they only cared about the friggin' Louis Vuitton display..

We also managed to hit Serbia, European Union, Poland, and Belgium, where I'd forgotten the Smurfs are from!

And finally, we ended with the Finland pavilion. Now, I haven't mentioned much about the crowds yet, other than that they were large. But the lack of courtesy from the people of the host country left me pretty peeved. People were constantly trying to cut the line or push ahead. I think I actually hip-checked a granny that was trying to squeeze past me. And the most frustrating part is they would just ignore you or laugh at you when you tried to tell them to line up.

So there was this poor Finnish girl working at the pavilion. She was in charge of the retractable rope at the entrance and was letting in people about 20 at a time. We just miss the cut off by a few people and she draws the rope across the entrance. Well, this older Chinese lady, total disregard, just lifts the rope over her head and barges in. So the retractable rope goes zipping across to the other side, out of reach of the door attendant, and all these people start charging in like a mob. I don't know how, but she manages to physically hold off some people and grab the rope back, and you can tell she's super frustrated and probably just wants to down a bottle of Finlandia Vodka and lament the fact that she still has 4 more months of this to go..

Here's a view of the night sky from the open air atrium of the Finland pavilion once we finally got in.

Apart from all the pushing and shoving, litter strewn all over the place, kids peeing on garbage cans, old Chinese ladies talking so loud behind you in line you need ear plugs, and people faking the need for a wheelchair so that they can go in the handicap line, the Expo is great!