Shanghaied

Okay so its been awhile, but there’s a reason for that. Since I arrived on the mainland, I have been under the ever-omniscient eye of the Golden Shield, China’s Internet censoring initiative. Thus, I cannot post blogs, or look at anything that might incite my mind to wonder towards the trappings of western greed and democratic hypocrisy.
Fortunately, there are those loyal to the cause who are willing to risk their very lives to bring the Word of the Mathomas to the people!
Seriously though, I won’t be able to post as often, but I’ll be including more content in each post.
So lets see… I arrived at Pudong airport around 10:30pm last Tuesday. After a slightly nervous queue through customs, I got my passport stamped and made through baggage, and then to the exit, where a smiling Chinese man in a dirty white shirt and black tie stood holding a sign that read Matthew Thomas. He took me to the cab, threw my bags in the trunk, gave me a bottle of water, and took off down the highway to Shanghai. Driving here is pretty aggressive, and seemingly lawless. The highways are really four lane tubes with metal barriers on each side that seem to trap you in between tractor trailers, and scooters on all sides. We stopped once because of an accident that left a scooter mangled in the middle of a street crossing.
We arrived at the Jing’an section of Shanghai, turned down Shaanzi Beh Lu (Shaanzi road north) a pulled up to a gated housing complex. The cab was about 200 quay (slang for the currency, like quid in England), and I hadn’t had a chance to change my HKDs to RMBs, so I was sort of wondering how was going to pay. The cabbie was calling a number he’d been given, when a young woman carrying laundry walked up to front door of the apartment building, and stopped to answer her phone. This turned out to be Debbie, one of the other interns I would be living and working with. She’d by chance been coming back to the apartment right when we arrived. Debbie and the cabbie exchanged some words and she paid the fare. Less than 30 minutes in mainland China and I’m already in debt.
I wasn’t sure what to expect when I got to our apartment, but I was not disappointed. It’s another huge space with three bedrooms, living room, two full baths, kitchen, and three balconies over looking Shanghai.
I met Beverly, another intern, picked a room, and crashed on my bed….which was a mistake. My bed is a Chinese bed, which is essentially a hard board with some plastic wrap and fabric on it. I was hesitant at first, but I was too tired to care, and the next morning that little pain in my lower back that I always feel in the morning was completely gone. Man, 3 billion Chinese people can’t be wrong right? I’m pretty sure I’m going to build a hard wood mattress when I get back to the states.

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so this is a continuation of a post I was working on, and its been more than a week so I apologize for the lack of info, but my memory and schedule can't keep up with all that I need to write about. But please, leave comments and questions and I'll try to fill in the details for you.