Mid-Vacation post

Well we have been in Shanghai for a total of 5 days now and we are all loving being able to relax and just do anything we want! We have hit up quite a few tourist-y things such as

The Shanghai History Museum
Nanjing Street (expensive shopping district)
Peoples Square Civilized Gardens
Hershey's World
Shanghai Art Museum
A very big, cheap, shopping market.
Shanghai Acrobatics Show

They have all been very interesting and fun. We hit up a new favorite food place here in Shanghai and they even have a branch in WeiHai! It is a Muslim Noodle restaurant. They are homemade and fresh noodles, made right there in front of you, and they taste so good! Pretty sure we can just walk in the shop and they already know our orders, that's how often we go. The greatest part is...it only costs $1.50! For a big plate of it!! Aside from doing all sorts of tourist like things we have been just hanging out here at our hostel. I have never stayed in a place like a hostel before and it has been a great experience so far. We have met quite a few new friends in the past five days and were sad to see them go this morning! Kate, Cami, and I have an extra bunk in our room so we have been having lots of random room mates all week. Our first was a girl from Poland, whose name was also Kate, she is living in the Northern most city in China teaching English! Crazy how that worked out. We didn't really see her much though because she came with a group of friends but she was fun to talk with. Our second and current roomie is Linley, she is an older lady who in from New Zeland. She has been in China for almost 8 months now....teaching English to 1st graders! It is fun to hear the stories of what she has and doesn't have at her school and how she teaches compared to us. Although last night I think she woke up every hour to ask me if I was hearing that noise or this noise or telling me she thought we had a mouse in our air conditioning unit and then turned on the light and made me get up and turn it off! Ah! I really hope she sleeps all night because I do not want to be up all night again telling her that the noises are not mice or gun shots. So we found a old guy who sells DVD's and the greatest chocolate ice cream bars just down the street from our hostel. I got all the seasons of the tv show House for $8!! So excited to start watching them! Today we hit up the fashion markets and bartered for all kinds of stuff. I got a pair of real UGGs (boots) from Australia for $16. These originally cost $148 in the states!! It was a steal! I may go back tomorrow and get the pink pair too :) I also got a bunch of stuff for gift but I won't mention those on here ;) Well we are going on a water village boat tour tomorrow morning bright and early so it'll be exciting!