Shanghaied

[tikistitch]

The coda of our trip. Wombat Mark, Transformer Andy and Cookie having absconded to Singapore and/or London, Mr. Tiki and I found ourselves with a few hours alone in Shanghai prior to our flight time. We had two alternatives: some cultural enrichment, or the mall.

So of course, WE SHOPPED FOR STITCHES!





We walked through the tropical heat from our snooty colonial hotel to the fabled pedestrian mall, swatting away Rolex twits, and on the prowl for toy stores.



And what did we find? Enough Stitchies school supplies to fill a stationery store (we had to leave the Stitch scissors behind at the airport, unfortunately, as they determined the potential for treachery from round-ended toy safety scissors to be too great) AND some plushies ginormous enough to force a last-minute luggage purchase (in designer orange).


Then caught a taxi to Pudang (and, yes, before you ask, we made our share of tasteless puns regarding the similarity of certain Chinese names to English slang for various body parts and or bodily functions) for one more surprise: when Mr. Tiki and I got into the checkin line at the gate, they made us step aside. Oops! Were we in the wrong line.

The woman at the gate scribbled on our boarding passes. "You're in 2A. You're in 2C."

Say what?

"We've been bumped to first class."

No way!

"Way!"

After a couple (and then a couple more) glasses of a marvelous Malbec, served by a flight attendant who was a perfect ringer for James Bond's Oddjob, we asked Mr. Tiki, "Wonder what the Mongolian sleeper bus guy who whacked me on the head would say if he saw us now?"

"He'd probably honk the horn."

Meanwhiles, got some seriously toxic laundry and a month's worth of unpaid bills to attend to. Also, some of the Stitchies took the long way round and won't make it until tomorrow (knew they'd cause problems in the luggage compartment).