The EXPO of Shanghai, to few kilometers of the tourist and economic center of the city, is located in an enclosure of 520 hectares of surface next to the Huangpu river, in the districts of Puxi and Pudong. Nevertheless, beyond the pavilions of the exhibition, more than 200, Shanghai it abre his doors to the world to attract the attention of million tourists who, for the first time, travel to China looking for to lose themselves by the many wonders that this Asian jewel hides.

The visit to Shanghai, well-known like the “Eastern Rep it�, can be a good opportunity to know the country. The city is an example of that mixture of tradition and modernity that can be observed in any place in China, and that takes to the visitor, on the one hand, to enter itself in a millenarian civilization and, on the other, to embelesar itself with its vanguardista potential. And it is that China conjugates perfectly past and future, being impossible not to be made an impression by his many resistances.

Happened
The old city of Shanghai, formerly surrounded by a wall, continues being a place of great interest for the tourists, since regusto local so remote of the foreign concessions conserves that. The beauty of the Chinese traditional houses, with its wood frameworks of red color, and the Yuyuan Garden (Garden of the Joy), unique vestige of the past precolonial of the city, is their main attractiveness. Between the landscapes of the garden, designed in 1559 during the Ming dynasty, they emphasize the Wall of the Dragoon, the Bridge of the Nine Curves (constructed of this form to frighten to the spirits that only goes in line straight) and the Tea House Huxinting, in center of a small artificial lake. To his around, the bazaar of the gardens Yu, a pedestrian area filled with side streets and stores of memories, that they try to recreate the Chinese old architecture.

Present
To the west of the city, the pedestrian street Xintiandi, located in the district of the Old French Concession is located: today, the fashionable zone of Shanghai. The houses, called “shikumen�, conserve the old woman brick walls and the original roofing tiles, nevertheless, its interior is designed glamor of a modern metropolis yet, combining of this esthetic form the European with the Chinese. In this area, with a built surface of 60,000 meters squared, the stores of luxury of the great international marks, restaurants of design to take tentempié to average afternoon or a cocktail before dinner agglutinate, among them the one of Jackie Chan, and discotheques for the relieved pockets more. Taking a walk by their streets also authentic small palaces of the colonial time or neighbor houses of the same years can be seen.

Future
The modern district of Pudong, to the other side of the Huangpu river, is the vanguardista image of Shanghai, with tens of skyscraper, between which it emphasizes the World Financial Center, popularly known like “abrebotellas�. This prodigy, of 492 meters, is the third higher building of the world and its viewpoint also (in plant 97). Closely together, to little meters of this wonder, are more two giants: the Tower Jin Mao, that measure 421 meters and have 88 plants, and the Tower of Television Rep it of East, with a height of 468 meters, that remembers an inverted hypodermic syringe. In order to contemplate the view of the Bund, the economic option is to raise of gratuitous way the bar of the Hotel Grand Hyatt, that is in floor 87 of the Tower Jin Mao. And to arrive until Pudong, the most exciting form to do it is to mount in the psychedelic train of the Bund Tourist Tunnel, that cross a river by a decorated underpass strident and colorful neon lights.

By day
The Place of the Town (also denominated Renmin) is the greater public place and the political and cultural center of Shanghai, with a total surface of 140,000 meters square. Their location, in the heat of heart of the city turns, it into one of the concurred neuralgic points and more of the city. In the place is a great park in that they are placed, besides a zone of small attractions, important and very modern buildings, like the City council, the Center of Exhibition of Urban Planning, the Great Opera house and the Museum of the city, reinaugurado in 1994 and considered the best museum of China. It will recognize it easily because one is an impressive circular building of 10,000 meters squared, that it includes most important of the divided Chinese art in 11 categories: bronze, ceramics, painting, handwriting, sculpture, furniture, made, seals, currencies, art of ethnic minorities and ceramic Zande Lou.

At night
The landscape more beautiful nocturne of Shanghai is the Bund (name that gave the British to the zone of the levee of the city), that measures 1.5 kilometers and it extends from the Waibaidu bridge to the Nanpu bridge, in the south. Here, when falling the night, the tens of high buildings raised, mainly, during the period between 1873 and 1937, illuminate along the Huangpu river offering a panorama of most showy. A stroll, at least until the pyramidal building del that leaves the boats that cross to the Pudong, allows to close by see some of the most emblematic constructions of the European colonial stage like, for example, the Development bank that, when it was constructed in 1921, said that it was the best building to the east of the Suez Channel; the Customs of Shanghai, the Peace Hotel with a pyramidal ceiling of green color or the Bank of China.

Of purchases
Nanjing Road is the commercial street par excellence of Shanghai, where banks, offices, restaurants, coffees, the premises of fast food, supermarkets are alternated, electronics stores, boutiques fashionable, outlets and department store. It is located in center of the city, in the district of Huangpu, and crosses Shanghai of this the west throughout almost six kilometers. Concretely, it begins in the Bund, the Peace Hotel, it crosses the Place of the Town, and finishes in the Temple of Jing Ì?an, although the known section more is the one than it is between the streets Xizang and Henan: 1,200 meters of pedestrian street and neon lights, that they attract more of a million tourists daily.

Data of interest

How to arrive. Shanghai has two airports, the one of Hongqiao, to 18 kilometers of the Bund, for domestic flights, and the new one of Pudong, to 30 kilometers and at where the majority arrives from international flights. The fastest form to go to the center, in only eight minutes, is called Maglev, the quickest train of the world - it reaches the 420 kilometers per hour.
Visa. Besides having the passport in force, a visa is needed entrance. It can ask for it in the Consulate of China in Madrid (91 741 47 28) or in the one of Barcelona (93 254 11 99).
Currency. Renminbi, or currency of the town yuan. You will see writing it like “RMB�. Approximately, a Euro is equivalent to 10 yuanes.

Language. The Chinese mandarin. “Nor hao� means hello and “Xie xie� is thanks.
Climate. Very warm in summer. The 40 degrees can be reached.
Lodging. For all the pockets. In fact, modern hotels to economic prices exist.
Transport. Shanghai counts on two very modern lines of meter and recent construction. Hill between 2 and 4 yuanes. Very recommendable.
More information. In www.turismodechina.org. As far as specific information on the Universal Exhibition, it visits the official Web www.expo2010.cn.