SHANGHAI
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Lovely Shanghai: Hope your ready for us!
-After a big day of travel Sam arrived in Shanghai early, around 4 in the morning and Brian would arrive around 5 a.m.
-When Sam walked into the Chase and Jake's apartment they were both completely faded on the couch......I tried my best to wake them but Chase just looked at me, rolled over and went back to sleep....I then went over to Jake and could not wake him either......Their roommate Zach opened his eyes and said hello before fading back out as well....What an amazing welcoming! .....As I gave up trying to wake them up Chase Jumped off the couch realizing what had just happened....He filled me in that they had been attempting to stay awake all night to greet us but totally failed.....I bet it had something to do with an empty bottle of Bacardi 151 on the table next to them.
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-Brain showed up a few hours later and we proceeded to celebrate our arrival with some awesome Cali burgers(China's knock off version of In 'N Out) and a few beers.....All of the guys took off work to enjoy the day!
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| JUMP for JOY?! |
-On our way into the city we took a psychedelic light tunnel under the bund river.....We then hit Morton’s Steakhouse happy hour for some awesome, free filet mignon sandwiches with purchase of a martini....What a cool place with such an awesome view!.....We made moves to another bar where we ordered some drinks and then realized how expensive they were and bailed....We then went to the Flying Elephant Russian Vodka Bar where we proceeded to drink lots of vodka and get sloppy in our classy suits.....this is when we lost several people....Scott Mc Daddy ended up going back to the cougar den....Nice work! ...We then hit some late night dumplings that were mind blowingly good and then Jake took us to one more bar to meet up with his Indonesian girl friends.... We called it a 'morning' around 5am. Good start!
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| HMMMM.....Steak and Martini's |
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| Scott and Jake taking in the view! |
-We woke up late and chilled out at the dudes DANK apartment.....Zach gave us his tixs to Midi Music Festival and his GF Mandi took us around for the rest of the day....We hit another awesome dumpling spot then we went to the festival.... It was pretty cool and the last band Tong Ya rocked out as the closer....It was a good time dancing around and watching every Chinese person sing along to all the words.
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Midi Music Festival!
-Afterward we went back to the crib to nap out until the other guys got back but we did not awake until 7:30am when Jake came home....Apparently he 'blacked in' on the subway around 7a.m. with no wallet or dress shirt or any idea of how he ended up on the subway.....Guess he had a chuxx night!
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-That morning Sam decided it would be a good idea to try to play on their intramural LAX team.... turns out it is way harder then he thought and he totally sucked!.... We then went to Brownstone for a block party and some free food.... After which we wandered to a cool little house where a guy had a bunch of super cool 16mm Kung Fu movies and equipment..... It was time for a few beers and more dumplings at Chase’s favorite place.....Once again SUPER DANK!...We cabbed it home and chilled out for the remainder of the evening.
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HMMMM.....DUMPRINGS!
- We Woke up late again and Scotty Mac came over around 12 to show us around the city....We went to his crib and chilled out on the rooftop where we soaked in some awesome views....Then we went for a cruise around the city and checked out the museum for modern contemporary art....There was some really cool stuff....They had sick carvings out of stones and crystals and some sweet paintings as well!
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Suns out Guns out!
Scotty's rooftop, Shanghai |
-It was then back to Scotty’s rooftop for sunset.... after which we cruised back to Jiangsu lu to chill and hang for Scotty's last night in Shanghai.....After a couple more beers we called it a night. Peace out Scotty it has been DANK!!
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| SICK VIEW! |
-To start out our day on the 24th of April we ended up hangin with Zach because he decided not to go to work...CHUXX!...He swooped us some Jenbeng's for breakfast which cost less than a dollar and are a egg/crepe combo thingy with some veggies inside....Later when Jake and Chase got off work they took us to a super dank Szechuan restaurant where we destroyed!!.....We then joined our friends at the Camel Bar for some western trivia....Sam and I ended up trying to walk back home but got quite lost in the beautiful French Concession but found a cab to take us the rest of the way.
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| LOVE my Szechuan!! |
-April 25th 2012 Brian Carl Swenson’s GOLDEN Birthday!!!...Sammy and I cruised around the French concession and found the Feiyue store and swooped some new kicks.....Then cab’d over to the bird/flower market to meet Chase and wander around....Next was the antique market to find Brian a SICK Ninja sword....He probably looked at several hundred before finally he found the right one! ...We then cruised back home to meet back up with the crew.
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BANZAI!!!!
-Chase, Claire, Bobby, Sam, Jake and the birthday boy went and ate his birthday dinner...Chron Beijing duck!!!... OMG!! It was good!... So good!
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| Succulent Beijing Duck! |
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| Who's got my Peking Duck Sauce? |
-We went back to the crib and everyone started to get Brian drunk off Bijou....Then Sam and I went out on the town looking for fun--and fun we found... We drank another little bottle of Bijou and we were ready to rage!
-In the first bar (Zapatas), we found out it was free booze from 2-4am....Brian ended up on the bar with the hot dancing girls as they poured massive amounts of Ta-Kill-Ya down his throat...We were then bouncing off the walls and really getting going...We then met some fun girls who took us to the Windows bar and entertained us for the rest of the night as we danced and stumbled around.... After a few more drinks Brian was no longer around and Sam was off on his own.
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| Waterfall of TEQ! |
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| Happy Birthday to ME!!!! |
-When I (Sam) showed back up to the apartment around 5:30am Brian had made it home safely and found a interesting place to sleep--the center of the living room floor...I tucked him in with his new ninja sword and some shoes to keep him warm (what every good friend would do) and passed out myself. Good times!
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| Happy Birthday to ME???? |
-April 26
th 2012…I awoke very confused…..I was
lying on the floor and there were shoes, beer cans and my ninja sword scattered
all around me….I have no idea what happened but all I could surmise was that I
had a awesome birthday!!...and according to sammy I did!
-I was super hungover for the most of the day but eventually
collected myself and went with Gidian and Sam to the “Fake-Fake” market where
we purchased some gifts and had some fully tailored custom suits made….SO
SWEET!!
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| Fake-fake but better! |
-Later that evening we attended their intramural Dodgeball
championships…it took place in dowtown shanghai and this would hopefully be
their 4
th championship victory!
-When we arrived at the gym we proceeded to shotgun some
beers with the team and I set up my camera to record the win…but unfortunetly
they lost the champs 3 games to 2 and to add insult to injury Chase futher
injured his knee.....BUMMER!!!...we went with the team to one of their favorite
post-dodgeball watering holes to drown their sorrows in some beer!...better
look next season!
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| Chase: posted up after his minimally invasive ACL/Meniscus surgery |
-The next day we woke up super late and mauled some morning
dumplings!!...then proceeded to hang out with Foz and Gidian b/c they both
decided today was not a day to work…we spent the afternoon trying to get to the
rooftops of some buildings to take some pics but were quite unsuccessfull!
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| The view from Gidian's deck! |
-We then met up with chase and Claire to go out and try a
Thai restaurant that Claire had to review for her job…it was good but not as
good as Thailand!...rented some movies and kept it pretty mellow for the
evening!
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| Chris Powers! Keepin' it mellow! |
-Got up a little earlier today and swooped some tickets from
Claire to attend X-Games Asia….She hooked it up with 3 Media Passes for the
event…SOOO SICK!!!.....on our way there we ran into a chick from LA named Katie
and hooked her up with one of the media passes!...she was stoked and so were we
because she smuggled in a bunch of beer so we could stay hydrated all day!
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| Little rippers getting some hangtime! |
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| Checking out the Halfpipe prelims |
-While chilling at X-games, we watched skateboarding street, Big
Air, Halfpipe and Moto X big air…..then headed out to go find some more
dumplings to eat!
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| TWEAKING!!! |
-Later we met up with Zach, Gidian, Jake, Chris and Foz and headed out
to the bar that jake designed which was called the Apartment and was on the
roof of a building that housed a bunch of other bars….then hit up probably the
coolest club we went to in shanghai called the Shelter, which was a stairway
that went from the street down under some bars to a tunnel which led to the
club….apparently it was an actual bomb shelter which is pretty cool!.....We
then proceeded to grab some food at a late night noodle spot and Chris passed
out mid-bite so we put a bowl of soup on his head which held there for at least
30 seconds…SO HILARIOUS!!...before we knew it the sun had risen so we decided
to cruise out and head home.
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| Sunrise over Shanghai; We saw a lot of these! |
-Day 180, Sam’s last full day…we kept it pretty mellow
during the day and then went out with the dudes again to a place called Club 88…it
was a fun dance club where we proceeded to get super rowdy with these Chinese
dudes who were way too drunk so they gave us half a bottle of scotch whiskey
which then got us way too drunk…we called it a night around 4a.m. and went back
to their crib to watch the Denver Nuggets Playoff game!
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| Partied Out! |
-Sammy packs up and gets ready to roll out to the airport…we
went with jake and Gidian to a BBQ
outside of town and that’s where we chilled with Sam until around 5 when
he had to makes moves to the airport to end his trip with a Flight into
LA…peace out Sammy!...It was GOOD
ONE!!!
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| Casual Icing on the Shanghai Subway! |
-Over the next few days without Sammy, I was on my own during
the day but at nights it was still just as rowdy!
-I went to another music festival for free thanks to
Claire!...it was called Strawberry music festival, I went with Jake and his
Indonesian Lady friends which was super fun but music festivals in China are
much, much tamer than in the states
-I went back to some of the markets and cool stores to
swoop some more gifts for friends back home….I found an awesome gold piggy
bank, some very cool Feiyue shoes and several rad soccer jerseys…hope my friends
like em!!!
-On my last full day in shanghai, I went to the largest
skatepark in the world which is called SMP skate park…To
my surprise it was almost completely empty except for a couple Russian kids who
I befriended by giving them the remainder of my Volcom stickers…I ended up
chilling with them for the afternoon and followed them around the city a little
bit to a few different skate spots and managed to grab a photo or two.
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| Russian dude: Hardflip over the triple set! |
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| SMP Skatepark...with no one around?! |
-For my last night I went out to dinner with everyone to a
SUPER BOMB Szechuan spot and then Jake, Shirleen, Zach and myself went out for
one last rage session….we went to C’s, Windows and one more bar that I forgot the
name of to start out the evening but these places were relatively empty so we
pounded some Bijou and went to a serious club called M-2…this is where shirleen
and Zach left Jake and I for the evening where we proceeded to get rowdier and
rowdier…before long we had met some south African girls and went back to club
88 and danced our faces off until morning....We bailed at sunrise when
Jake remembered he had to work at 10a.m.
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