Tips To go to China (School Holiday June 2019)

It's such a great learning experience for me and my family. China has been progressing and advancing in very fast pace beyond my expectations except people's attitude 😜😜
Most of the road are wide and have 4 lanes (3 lanes for cars and 1 lane for bikes and scooter) unfortunately the most dangerous ones are the bikes and scooter because they don't follow traffic rules especially in the junction and most of them seldom honking so we only can hear the tyre screeching few meters from us 🤦🏼‍♀️

When we think that Singapore has advanced, China has surpassed us. 

Tips for family with young children to go to China without joining tour

1. Rent portable wifi with VPN from Changi airport or if you prefer roaming on, make sure you have installed VPN before arriving in China

2. Install google translate before hand it will help us to communicate with the locals

3. Cash is still the king, 
Most of the shops are using alipay and WeChat payment but we need to have chinese local bank so it's kinda useless for foreigners to install those apps

4. Beware of the traffic 

5. Stay at the hotel or air bnb in the city area near the subway
The price may more expensive but it's worth it, you can walk around and mostly within 2 km walks if we don't want to take subway

6. Stroller is a must
Everywhere we are walking may be can walk 10km in total everyday and young children will get cranky 

7. Hold your breath when going toilet
Especially in Beijing, most of the toilets including big shopping mall except international chain hotel are squats toilet, so you can imagine how smelly it is.

8. Bargain until the seller give up
In China as a buyer we must be more fierce than the seller. Bargain as low as possible and to know that our price is too low or not, just walk away

9. Hire local guide especially in Beijing
Beijing has a lot of history and when we travel we just don't want to snap good picture but learn their culture and history so hiring local guide is always good ideas. You can cut queue as well especially in the crowded tourist places

Xintiandi - Former French Concession (School Holiday June 2019)

Another  "must go" place in Shanghai is Xintiandi - Old Town of Shanghai where in 1920's the riches and tycoons lived.

The building's architecture follows French and European style thus it's called French Concession.

We visited The china founder's house - Dr. Sun Yat Tzen.

Oriental Pearl Tower and The Great Sisters (School Holiday June 2019)

Oriental Pearl Tower was one of the famous landmark that associated with Shanghai, so we decided to go to the tower and see the bird's eye view of shanghai.

They have glass observatory where the floor is all glass.

These are Three Great Sisters, the tallest building in Shanghai.

The tallest is Shanghai Tower (the second tallest in the world after burj Khalifa), The second is Shanghai Financial Center and the third is Jinmao Tower.

It's called Three sisters because they were located in each other.

Nanjing Lu and The Bund (School Holiday June 2019)

At night, we had opportunity to stroll Famous Nanjing Lu stretching from the Bund until West Nanjing Lu. Some buildings were preserved as Colonnial Building, some were modern.

Those mix create perfect ambience at night.

The Bund was another landmark and "must go". It's like Mini Europe in the East Asia.

Most the buildings are European style and when it's lit up at night, it's so beautiful.

Another popular tourist spot is Lujiazhui. It's the modern skycrapers just opposite The Bund.

It's a must photo spot in Shanghai.

We can have Huangpu Cruise at night to enjoy the night scenery, unfortunately when we wanted to ride it, the weather forecast was not good so they cancel the cruise.

Venice of Shanghai (School Holiday June 2019)

This is another highlight of our Shanghai Trip, visiting Venice of Shanghai - Zhujiajiao.

It's located in Shanghai Suburb and it took 1 hour drive from city center.

We engaged day tour service from Klook, however we were not fully satisfied with their service.

We had very little time exploring the area. Nonetheless, it's like mesmerising our Europe trip 8 years ago to Venice, Italy.

After that, we were back to city and brought to Silk Manufacturer where we could see how the silk, one of famous comodities in China was produced.

Beautiful Yuyuan (School Holiday June 2019)

Since our hotel is just 15 minutes walk to Yuyuan, we explored that area in the evening and the next morning. We had two different view of night and morning and both are so beautiful.

The building is like in kungfu movie with hanfu costumes.

There also has food court selling local delicacies, souvenirs from the local artists.