Stories from the 110K ride

We passed thru Sheshan where Le Meridien has a really nice spot. Unfortunately, getting to there is way too congested now compared to when I first arrived! Whoever is the developer of this area, now they are building an amusement park with roller coaster, more villas and more bloody crazy bus drivers to take passenger from all areas of Shanghai to SheShan. And these drivers do not care about safety. Just cruise at highspeed. Then there were out of town tourists in their cars driving up. Very congested. This area is also the HSBC sponsored PGA golf stop. Everywhere is grand except the road leading to those places. Think of Wascana parkway, the road width with bi-directional traffic with buses and cars non-stop. We almost got nailed couple times. Last time, Audrey got forced off the road by a bus in front of Le Meridien. Umm... why are we keep going there?

Then passed Le Meridien, the road was really smooth. 35K outside of downtown Shanghai we are still under Shanghai Mini-gov't control. And I saw lots of buildings being built; huge ones. And of course migrant workers working... Not sure who would be living in those far flung places. Just before the Le Meridien, there was an Australian villa project. Now Phase 2 is completed. From the look while we cycled, Phase 1 had not many people moved in. I counted 4.

Have no idea where all the money in Shanghai has come from; but we passed a race track. It offered drivers to race with their own cars; Porche, Audi R8, Nissan GT-R, Mini, I saw every walk of fast cars with young kids driving! No older than 30 years old. I had a chat with a Assistant GM at a Macau bank last week, she said it is scary how much money mainlanders are bringing in to deposit. She has seen all sorts. And some were so suspicious, she had to turn them away.

I saw real estate developments everywhere but how much is enough? There will be a point that things will be a bubble. A friend of mine told me on Saturday that lots of hair stylist places with over 100 franchise stores in Shanghai have closed at least 40 to 50 of them since last Fall.

The Central gov't has enacted a law to mandate local gov'ts to report "true" economic statistics.