Shanghai Vixen

Sitting at a Cantonese teahouse, working away, waiting for Yellow Concept to finish her meeting so we can do an interview for my column. /have drinks and complain about men. I am at this teahouse because the cafes on nearby Nanjing Dong are no longer open. They are - were - the lovely and historic Donghai and Deda, Shanghai-style Western restaurants opened in the 1930s. Donghai was especially lovely, unchanged for several decades and still a popular neighborhood destination. The signs in their windows say "closed for rennovation" but in contemporary China "rennovation" is a euphemism for demolition. As I was informed after I inquired at a nearby shop selling Deda's signature cakes. Sad. I hope the Art Deco edifices that contained them will also not be thus "rennovated". But, who am I kidding? The skanky Shangkies - ethnic Shanghainese Hongkongers - will be "rennovating" all of us into oblivion in pursuit of profits as fast and dirty as a ye ji. Standing in Adidas' offices on the 37th floor of Ganghui, awaiting an interview this afternoon, I looked out over southern Shanghai, and could spot the GaoWan Xiaoqu, my lane, even my house - low rises now archaic in the forest of fugly highrises. Soon to be gone as well. This city is the only real home I have ever had, but will I still want to stay when everything I love about the place is gone? Rather like my relationship with Jifu - which I stayed in long after he had ceased to be the person I had fallen in love with. Have been drinking again; I find that my willpower is limited, and if I expend it all not drinking, eating very little, and exercising a lot, I cannot get any work done. The point of not drinking for a while, apart from retraining my habits and to lose weight, was to be more productive writing-wise. So far that has proven counter-productive. Bleh. But, back to good-girlness tomorrow...until the holidays that is. The film that prompted my rant last night was "Knocked Up" - which I couldn't finish. The whole premise, the attitudes and values it embraces and promotes, were too offensive for me to stomach. I may do a separate post elaborating why, but right now I still am squirming from the squick of it.