Jack & Bronwyn's Shanghai Adventure

[unless otherwise specified, all photos by Bronwyn Lloyd]

We arrived in Shanghai on Monday morning (11/7): a characteristically misty day. This is the view from our window in the Guoman Hotel:

front window

side window

We had a chance to do some sightseeing the next day, Tuesday, stopping first at the breathtaking Jing'an Temple:

front courtyard

main steps
[photo by Paul Hinton]

Bronwyn & Jack
[photo by Paul Hinton]

Paul Hinton & Tracey Slaughter

Buddha's hands

Buddha

Guanyin

Jack

side temple

amazing detail in the wooden carvings

complexities of perspective

mandala picture

us

Tracey & Paul

Laughing Buddha

And here we back on the top deck of the bus for the city tour:

Jack & Bronwyn

Oriental Pearl Tower

extravagant topiary

Paul & Tracey

& here we all are in the Yu Garden, hunting for bargains:

entrance

lake

dragon

rooftop

We managed a bit of sightseeing later in the week. Here we are at the Temple of the Jade Buddha (which is one statue tourists are not permitted to photograph. It is phenomenally beautiful, though:

back of the main hall

Twin Buddhas

Buddha

reclining Buddha

Monster

back door

intricate goldwork

And if you're wondering why I'm looking like this, the picture below of me sampling a Mango Lassi dessert in one of Shanghai's top restaurants might offer a few clues (the statue of the pig is outside the Jackie Chan Museum, just beside our hotel):

Jack sampling some advanced fusion cuisine

Jack & pig

Ah, beautiful Shanghai!

*

[Addendum (1/8/16)]:

&, for those of you who've expressed scepticism about whether or not we actually attended any sessions at the said conference, please check out the following:]

JR third from right at the opening plenary session
[photos from ECNU website]

JR giving his views on the Chinese novel

JR checks his watch as the session runs wildly over time

Jack Ross, Robert Olen Butler & Mark A. Jarman

Xu Qin: "Story event a tale of literary exploration" (24/7/16)

This latter article, from the China.org.cn website, includes the following passage:

Jack Ross, a New Zealand poet and lecturer in creative writing, said: "For years people thought we belonged to the West. However, the colonial and Maori history of New Zealand has made us neither East nor West. With increased immigration from Asian countries like China, Japan and Korea in the latter part of 20th century, the new generation of New Zealanders are eager to take on their own identities."

So there you go, smartypants! Read 'em and weep.

NZ panel: Tracey Slaughter, Jack Ross, Frankie McMillan, Leanne Radojkovich, Bronwyn Lloyd

The picture above comes from Nuala O'Connor [Nuala Ní Chonchúir]'s literary blog "WOMEN RULE WRITER." She comments:

I really, really enjoyed the panel of New Zealand writers who were as down to earth and vibrant as one might expect. NZ author Frankie McMillan also gave an interesting paper on flash fiction which is having a renaissance in her country.

Thanks, Nuala. You're welcome in New Zealand anytime ...

Shanghai

So Bronwyn and I are off to Shanghai next week to attend the 14th International Conference on the Short Story in English (July 13-16) at East China Normal University (ECNU). The title of this year's gathering is "Influence and Confluence in the Short Story: East and West." Pretty exciting, huh?

Bronwyn's Author photo


Jack's Author photo

If you're at all curious (why would you be?) about the bewildering variety of workshops and panels we're supposed to be taking part in, you can check them out here. The short version, though, is that each of us is giving a reading, is taking part in one of the plenary panels, and is chairing a couple of sessions. I'm also giving an Academic paper on "Settler & Speculative Fiction in the NZ Short Story" (sounds fascinating, no?), and Bronwyn and I are both in a panel discussing Voice in the NZ short story, chaired by our good friend Tracey Slaughter.

The conference will be fun, I'm sure. The prospect of exploring Shanghai a bit is almost equally alluring, though. Pretty much all I know about the city comes from watching (and reading) J. G. Ballard's autobiographical Empire of the Sun, but I can't help feeling that it might have changed a bit since then.

Empire of the Sun: The Bund

The Bund today

Here's the location of the conference:

Peter Potrowl: East China Normal University (2010)

And here's our hotel:

Guoman Hotel, Shanghai

Looks pretty lux, eh? Too good for the likes of us, you'll be thinking, and I guess you're right. We're going to try to make the best of it, though. It's going to be hot (temperatures in the 30s at this time of year, I'm told) ...