Summer Vacation to World Expo

David and I arrived in Shanghai on the 22nd for the World Expo. During our 4 and a half day stay, a fantastic experience!
These are some of the highlights and common sights of the expo:
- On a lighter note, there were lots of nice pavilions that were actually worth waiting in line for vs. some that completely sucked and had next to nothing inside.... we would go to some just because they had short lines or quick moving long lines, usually to leave not really impressed by anything. The longer the line, the better the pavilion it seemed. Our China trip guide in Shanghai has already booked for us the tickets, and this is much more convenient for us.
- The passport: They were selling these souvenir passports that you would get stamped at every pavilion you went into, of course I got one.
The line ups to get these stamps easily rivalled the line-ups to get into the pavilion, so many people and you need to wait for your turn.

Some of the pavilion highlights included:
- Japan: turning sewage into safe drinking water, robots that play violin and can do other tasks, this sweet virtual wall that allows you to interact with it as if it is a touch screen computer: opening up screens were the TV will be, having a calendar, changing the backgrounds, pulling windows open bigger and shrinking them down for multiple screens- it was really cool. They also introduced the Canon 3D camera, flooring that generates power by people walking on it, and little electric one-person standing vehicles.
- Italy: one of my favourites, it was just really cool inside. There were walls of pastas, wines, mannequins in tailored beautiful clothes, roses hanging from the roof, sculptures hanging off of walls, and entire band hanging vertically on a wall. It was great. There were
ferraris and race cars, and miniatures of famous buildings, loved it!
- Korea: saving the world through dancing and magic
- Hungary - the introduction of a new shape?
- Canada: VIP access.
- Latvia: we thought it would suck - and the line did suck - but inside there was a big tube where people flew up and down in a wind tunnel... so that was interesting... hahaha

There were lots of other really good pavilions - lots of shows, tons of screens, creativity was definitely on high for the creators of these pavilions.

We normally got to the park around 9-9:30am and would leave around 10:30-11pm. long days of standing. Our feet, and low backs were in rough shape every single night. We saw a lot but didn't come anywhere close to seeing the whole thing.

The Expo left me with some mixed feelings. I really think it a good idea to visit China at this time, during the Expo, as you may have more experience than a single China tour. The Expo was excellent, so many peculiar things to watch, and so much to learn and experience. Some Chinese people would take photos of me when we were waiting in the queue. People who had the decency to ask first I would stop for a quick smile and keep going.
Tomorrow we get our visas for Vietnam, and Friday we start our adventure there! This week will be spent doing some touristy things in Shenzhen and hopefully catching up on some much needed sleep.