Indisputably China's most cosmopolitan city (bar Hong Kong), Shanghai has been welcoming foreign visitors to its streets for centuries, infusing the metropolis with a unique history. Over the past decade the city has recaptured the hearts - and bank balances - of a wealth of foreign investors and tourists, its hedonistic past giving it an allure few cities in the world could rival.Modern Shanghai in fact is being almost completely rebuilt; with brand spanking new high rises springing up everywhere you look - providing the city with a new focus. The past has not been forgotten, though: among the back streets, you'll still find traditional Chinese gardens and temples, just as they were centuries ago or just a few blocks away, the Bund with its Art Deco colonial buildings, evoking Shanghai's heyday (though for most, minus the opium). |
