Old Shanghai

Today was museum weather. So I went to Shanghai’s main museum. It had an interesting collection of traditional clothing and crafts from China’s indigenous peoples – or as China calls them, minority nationalities. The collections of ancient jade carvings/sculptures and the porcelain were also good. So many beautiful things! I had a look in the painting gallery for paintings by Dong Qichang, the artist who was the subject of research by the woman I met in the forbidden city in Beijing. I only found one painting although he was named as one of the influential figures in a description of the art of that period.

When I came out of the museum it was drizzling but much improved from the morning. I went for a walk further along the Bund from where I was yesterday. I wanted some photos of the older buildings. The one on the right with the clock is the former customs house. There’s a small chance that my grandfather was in that building at some point when the ship he worked on stopped in Shanghai but perhaps not if the customs officers went to the ships. During one stop here he bought a large, intricately carved, camphor wood chest for 200 cigarettes. My parents have it in their house.

I’ll be spending all day tomorrow on a train to Guilin. On my last trip I changed buses there but didn’t spend any time in the city. I’m very happy to see that the forecast for Guilin on Monday is 18C and sunny!


(I've now caught up and added entries for my time in Xi'an earlier this week.)