Cola light problems

Day 2: 11 October 2005

We woke up early and it took easy. Went down for breakfast around 8.30 and it was alright. I had two omelettes and four toasts.

We went for a walk to the Chinese department stores at Nanjing Road. I have reached this theory that the Shanghai traffic don’t seem to use the indicators and honking the horn instead. Also, when standing in front of a red light and are about to turn left or right – the red light will be ignore. Something to bear in mind when you have a green man and are due to start walking. Check everything before leaving the safety of standing at the pavement. But it is good fun to watch the traffic and see how they drive.

The Nanjing road is a wide, spacious pedestrianised road and different shops. Everything is colourful and a lot to take in. Boyfriend and I stand out and we get a lot of looks, point etc and unfortunately we also seem to attract street hustlers that want to flog their watches, bags or whatever. They approached us at a regular basis and at the end it was very annoying. I had not expected this level of it and it was disappointing. One woman approached me and really got into my personal space. But I do live in London and kept my hand firmly on my handbag. Boyfriend bought me a really cool pair of sunglasses at Heathrow which are mirrored so people can’t see my eyes.

We continued to walk down to the Huangpu river and the Bund area. This is where the colonial buildings are and on the other side of the river are the modern skyscrapers. An interesting mix. It is a touristy area with a nice promenade and we had lunch there. The place is called M on the Bund (No 5) and had a western feel to it. It had a review on display saying it had the feel of All One Bar at Putney London.

We strolled home through the back street and there is where I came to this, for me, startling realisation. All the Cola light (Diet Code) on display in different stores are out date !!!! The way I read it, they all expired in Aug 2005. Pepsi has a huge market share but I am a Diet Code addict and I will not settle for anything else (It is after all my right to have Diet Coke/Cola light anywhere in the world – so promised by the Coca Cola Company). The Cola lights I bought yesterday were out of date and I poured them out since they had a funny/ bad taste to them. Today I had to stop at McD to get my Cola Light fix and it was alright. Diet Coke and Cola light taste different.