I am on my way to China on November 2nd. I will be speaking at a conference in Shanghai.
EARS ON SHANGHAI is a one-day creative industries summit promoting European-Chinese collaboration, with a major focus on music and the performing arts. The event includes a series of panel presentations and roundtable discussions, featuring Chinese and European leaders from the music, performance art, architectural design, media and Internet technology industries.
It promises to be interesting, diverse, and fun. At this event, I will meet many people from around the world , from China and Europe in-particular.
See the conference list of attendees
You may notice a lot of companies, and the government of Finland is a major sponsor of this event.
Finland is now China’s second largest trade partner and important source of technology import among Nordic countries. They obviously take their relationship with China very seriously. I am staying at the Puli Hotel. The design is beautiful, very chic and minimalist, the service is great, and it’s very central. I love the New York “feel” of Shanghai and it’s energetic people. Similar to NY, the restaurants are quite good, and the Chinese food is unlike anything in NY. If I follow the Chinese custom, I’ll be taking photos of the food and posting them.
I also enjoy the City’s proximity to the ocean, with the Bund River shoreline hosting some beautiful architecture. In the same Colonial style river building is Armani and a Jean Georges restaurant .On my last trip to Shanghai, I really liked having lunch at “M on the Bund” on the penthouse floor and overlooking the Majestic Bund river, overlooking all of Pudong, and it’s glorious “Neue” architecture.
The nightlife is quite similar to New York City, but I’m not sure I can hold out into that sphere, so I’ll leave it to a more younger and energetic group of people to enjoy that aspect of the city. But Art Galleries and theater performance abound, and have become a social scene of gatherings.
On a side note, I unlocked my iPhone, and I’m going to try to install a local telephone number SIM card into my phone and see how that works. It may be the best of all worlds as I will continue to use Skype, WeChat, and KakaoTalk, as well as QQ messenger. Social communication…. what a great thing that has become, but Asia takes it to another level.
After two weeks in Shanghai, I will move on to Beijing.
So much to do in such little time.
China is a bigger country than my little calendar allows.
Shanghai Subway Map
