Day 10 - Around the world in one day
No Ha from the Shanghai World Expo!
Sorry for the lack of updates, but Stanley and I were just enjoying ourselves far too much!
We started day 10 in Shanghai by going to the largest World Expo (formerly called World's Fair) in human history. The place was enormous!
It took us a full day just to visit a few places and take photos of the outsides of most of the world's countries represented. It was said that the crowd was nearly 500,000 in one day. The queue lines for security were very long, but orderly and really didn't take as long as expected.
We didn't bring a backpack today, so Stanley hitched a ride in my pocket. You should have seen the face of the young Chinese lady when I emptied my pocket and she saw Stanley. It was quite a reaction.
Stanley enjoyed the fact that there were natural gas and electric powered buses to transport us around the expo.
Stanley said the Expo felt like going to Epcot at Walt Disney World, just on a much larger scale. He wanted to start by visiting the Africa pavilion, so off we went. It was so terrific that he could be exposed to so many different African cultures under one roof. Stanley saw a really tall giraffe, many types of intricate artwork, a giant gorilla and lion and played on a tribal drum.
He then asked to visit the Egypt pavilion where he saw genuine ancient Egyptian artifacts from the Pharaohs. One was a mask made of solid gold. The one Stanley made in Beijing was only made of paper mache, but just as priceless, he thought.
When we visited the Tunisia area, Stanley loved the colorful dancing waters that again reminded him of the water show in Epcot. How awesome that someone thought to bring Disney World all the way to China! He asked why so much of their architecture looked like it was from Greece. The kind person working there explained that it was once a colony of Greece after Alexander the Great conquered the area.
We saw countries like Argentina, Algeria, Angola, Libya and Slovenia. Stanley thought the word Slovenia was a funny word. He asked if there is such a thing as “Fastvenia.” Stanley really loved our visit to Lithuania. He watched as Nathan, Jordyn and I shot baskets on the official goal. 10 feet was just too high for Stanley to reach, so he opted to play the fun computer game version instead.
He stopped for a quick photo with Yao Ming, the Captain of the Chinese basketball team. He was so large he could hold Stanley in one hand, while dunking with the other. He was so tall that Nathan barely came above his waist.
We saw more countries' pavilions like Italy, Greenland and Iceland. Stanley loved the United Kingdom's area because he thought it looked like a gigantic porcupine. By this time the lines for most pavilions were now topping 3 to 5 hour wait times. Stanley asked if they offered Disney's Fastpass service, but none was to be found. Stanley really enjoyed Venezula's area because it allowed him a moment to take a siesta, that's a nap in Spanish.
He was amazed by Mexico's pavilion because it looked like hundreds of shiny, colorful kites. Stanley then remembered making a kite earlier in the trip with a kite master. Stanley liked the tiny Sombreros here. They were just his size.
Stanley loved looking at Paraguay's expo. It looked like he was under a giant cow. He got to meet a couple of Bolivian cowboys and climbed a Guatemalan temple which was like a stone version of the Summer Palace.
Stanley stopped for a photo with Haibao who was super nice. Haibao is the mascot for the World Expo and is made from the Chinese character for man. Jordyn just had to take one of these cute snugglies home with her and purchased a couple of pins to add to her collection as well.
We saw so many countries that we can't list them all, but Stanley was pretty impressed with the host country's pavilion. China's area must have taken 4 city blocks all by it's own. We were told that it will be the only building that remains after the World Expo is over in October.
Stanley and the gang took a taxi back to the hotel to meet the other adventurers for dinner. We enjoyed an evening of genuine Shanghai steamed dumplings filled with things like pork, crab and shrimp. When we boarded the bus, we learned that one adventurer purchased a box of Godiva chocolates to share with the entire group. Yummy!
As we arrived at the site for the evening's show, ERA - the intersection of time, Stanley observed yet another building that reminded him of Epcot. It looked just like Spaceship Earth, only buried half into the ground. He then learned that this is where we were going to see the show.
The show was “simply amazing,” as Dusty says often. It was kind of like La Nouba, but really showcases everything that is unique to Shanghai. Nathan and Stanley were jumping for joy when they saw 8 motorcycles going really fast inside one wire ball. Stanley got to meet the performers and all the Adventurers had a photo made with them. After the show many of the Junior Adventurers attempted balancing a bowl on their head. Guess what? Stanley learned that the bowl balancer had worked at...Epcot. Yes, that's right.
Stanley had traveled around the world and back to China all in one day. It was an exhausting, but very fulfilling day of fun.
