Where Are All the Old People?

Well here we are in Shanghai again. I didn't expect to find myself here for another extended period of time, but here we are. Our last Shanghai adventure was 4 years ago and it was 6 1/2 weeks long. The kids were exactly 4 years younger, I remember Aiden celebrating his 13th birthday here and just yesterday we celebrated his 17th. How many kids can say they have celebrated 3 birthdays in a strange, foreign country? It looks like a this time we will be coming back again next summer too. Jeff's job has been relocated to Shanghai for 18 months. The kids and I have decided to stay in Woodinville for school so we will live apart for the school year, while Jeff schleps back and forth between Woodinville and China every six weeks or so. It's not ideal, but it is what it is for now.

Shanghai has changed a lot in the past four years. It truly is amazing how quickly this culture is changing. When we were here four years ago parts of it felt very modern and many parts felt like the US back in the 70’s. I kept a blog while I was here before noting our adventures and all the oddities that the kids and I noticed. If you care to read it, or refresh your brain here it is.

http://hollie-shanghai2008.blogspot.com/2008_06_01_archive.html

Parts of it are rather comical; I did feel like we had landed on a different planet at times. I will try to post as often as possible in this blog, but I don’t think I will every day since I don’t think there will be nearly as many fascinating things to post about.

Notice the rows with pieces of paper on top and the adults sitting behind them.

This post is titled Where Are All the Old People? We are living in a rather hip, fast paced area. There are young people everywhere.  Don’t get me wrong there are some old people, but the majority of the people working in the stores or restaurants or walking down the street are very young, college age kids. We made our way to People’s Square over the weekend; it is a local gathering place. Jeff was teasing Aiden that we were going to find him a wife when we got to People’s Square. Aiden and I had no idea what Jeff was referring too, but we soon found out. Apparently, on Saturday’s (or maybe other days too?) the middle aged parents (not much older than me really) meet at the park to try and find partners for their young adult children. It’s like a dating service for parents to interview other prospective parents. They sit in rows with all their kids’ accomplishments and statistics listed in front of them. Then other parents wonder around looking at all the data. There are NO young people in sight, only parents. Very interesting! There are rows and rows of people and large posters with pictures and info under each picture. I have no idea what information is listed on each young adult, but I am very curious what they say because that would tell me what they value. Most of them do not have pictures, which I think is very interesting too. Maybe they are on to something; watch out Aiden, Riley and Claire I might have to interview prospective parents in law in the future.

notice the sheets of paper listing all the eligible "children", while all the prospective parents mingle 

Can you imagine having your child's picture on this wall? It looks more like a missing person's wall to me.

They will use anything to post their info, these are all using umbrellas to  prop up their child's accomplishments and traits.

This was a rather large area, row after row of prospective children. Sorta like a  flea market.