上海人 or Shanghainese is a project about the financial center of China: Shanghai, and more importantly, about the 26 million inhabitants of this always-moving megalopolis. It is said that there is always something new to discover, from a coffee shop on the corner of a street that replaces another one to another huge mall that no one visits anymore if it wasn't for the restaurants: everything is changing fast. Yet, there is a vibe of tradition and history, a feeling of peace despite all the "kuaidi" (delivery men) racing in the street when you walk in the city center. The old houses and residences and the elders of Shanghai let us glance at how it was a few decades before they disappear in this wish for perfection and modernism.
Street photographie
I only know how to approach a place by walking. For what does a street photographer do but walk and watch and wait and talk, and then watch and wait some more, trying to remain confident that the unexpected, the unknown, or the secret heat of the known awaits just around the corner.
Travel
Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.
Qinghai
Our stay in Qinghai was short but full of experience. We started in Xinning, its capital, and visited the Kumbum monastery, also called Ta'er Temples, one of the most important places for Tibetan, only second to Lasha. After the cultural refreshment, it was time for a trip into the Qinghai grassland to visit Caka Lake, where salt was extracted.
Guangzhou
September 2021, travel to the hot and wet city of Guangzhou in the Chinese province of Guangdong.
Gansu
The region of Gansu is separated into two very different climates. In the north, Dunhuang is famous for its oasis: Mingsha Shan (Croissant moon), and the Mogao Caves of the Thousand Buddha Caves, where monks dug for centuries, around 500 temples. Driving South, we can see the northern part of the Great Wall and one of China's most preserved fortresses: Jayuguan. Heading to Lanzhou, the province's capital in the South, we visited Zhangye's treasure: Danxia, or the rainbow mountain.
Xitang
Watertowns are old cities or villages crossed by multiple canals and rivers. There are many Watertown close to Shanghai, but most of them are crowded places where old buildings have been modified to showcase a lot of tourist shops that can be found everywhere in China. Xitang is less crowded, even though there is the same kind of shop. Most of the streets are what you would expect from such a place.
Chengdu
When you think about Sichuan, two things come to mind: the pandas and the spices. Chengdu has multiple infrastructures to breed and rescue pandas to help increase its population in the wild. Food. Sichuan. It would be best if you were ready. Sichuanese eats very spicy food that will numb your mouth. Besides that, the city is lovely to have a stroll in the multiple temples and cultural activities that the city has to offer.
