Semester 1

Chapter VI – Techno & Moolah (October 04 - October 11, 2016)

Everything’s good. I’m developing my mental GPS of the city as I don’t really use subway and just go for my bike every chance I get. Since the fucking rent eats up about a half of my scholarship funds, until I hustle my way out of this, I’m leading a proper student life. Going to galleries, cooking like a motherfucker and generally being financially super responsible, so I can blow some dough on alcohol and partying from time to time.

I think I’ve entered the phase when Shanghai really starts to feel like home. I've adjusted to the big buildings, I don’t use Google Maps that much anymore, I found a place around the corner, where I get my Chinese dumplings filled with tofu and some veggies… My throat doesn’t hurt every evening as it used to when I got here. Not sure whether it’s cause weather’s kinda nice or cause my organism just gave up, stopped filtering all the pollution and accepted the fact that I’m probably not gonna live until 70 or something…

I’ve met some more cool people and discover some decent (and fucking expensive) bars. Last week, I got invited to this techno party in Nantong (city around 2 hours from Shanghai) so I spontaneously texted my Macedonian guy and that night we randomly ended up in a club called Wave. The event was organized by a collective around The Mansion. Those guys are mostly international and they reside in an actual mansion close to the Shanghai Zoo where they organize mostly base and techno parties on weekly basis. This was an event for their followers. Free transportation, free entry and hours of pretty cool music. I got back to my apartment around 9 in the morning.

I got my first experience with a vegan restaurant too. The name of the place is Jen Dow and it’s located right next to the Jing’an temple. Pretty cool but I’m sticking to cooking for now.

As for artsy shit, I’ve went to a screening of one of the classic Chinese movies Ju Dou. Guys from an expat website Time Out Shanghai do free screenings once a month in this super poshy restaurant the Glam close to the Bund. It’s quite hard to really follow the local cinematography. Characters tend to act in ways you find super corny and pretty much unbelievable at first... Until you actually let it sink in, open up a little bit a realize that your fucking skeptical bitterness and hysterical individualism might not be the only way to live. Definitely wanna check some more…. I also paid a visit to Art+ Shanghai Gallery (works of Beijing fresh graduates) and the M97 Gallery where they display some street Hong Kong photographs by a guy named Michael Wolf. It’s funny how many of them resemble Shanghai. That’s the cool thing about living downtown. Once you get settled a little, you just relax and you actually notice shit around you. All the little stuff… 

Highlights:

• After a month, I finally received my scholarship (whoop whoop!).
• By some weird accident, I got onto a rooftop of one pretty damn tall residential building last Friday. The view was awesome, beer was there, life was good.
• I finished the book Debt: The First 5000 Years by David Graeber. Please, everyone just fucking read it and end this capitalism bullshit already… I mean that shit.

Picture of the chapter: