Shanghai, stop 12

It's outrageous that noone else has posted from/about Shanghai yet, especially since we have free wireless Internet in the incredible hotel that we're staying at. The St Regis Hotel is arguably one of the finest hotels I have ever seen, anywhere. It truly deserves the six-star rating that it has. The attention to detail here is really noticeable - Valrhona courtesy chocolates, adapter plugs everywhere, fresh flowers in every room of every suite, Bose CD-players, custom mattresses and sheets, 24-hour butler service (who're all unceasingly attentive, fantastically polite and charmingly warm too).... and we somehow have complimentary buffet lunch and dinner at the lobby restaurant that serves an unending supply of gourmet food including sashimi and caviar that we've been enjoying at tables that have monogrammed linen coasters. But enough gushing about the fantastic hotel with the heated indoor pool (24C), hot tub (32C) and 24-hour professionally-equipped gym (with complimentary chilled mineral water and fresh fruit available in a self-service fridge).

This city is really someplace that has to be seen and experienced to be believed. Pretty much the fastest rates of population and economic growth in the world have seen the city blossom (or explode) within a decade into a densely-packed, shiny metropolis of over 20 million that buzzes with the excitement of optimism and unbounded opportunity. Just before lunch we got a special tour of the up-and-coming Shanghai World Financial Center, which will be the tallest building in the world when it's completed in early 2008. Already, construction has reached the 53rd story (out of 104). The Harvard '06 intern who was our contact told me that the developers are not at all worried about finding tenants because office-space is now at about 95% occupancy in Shanghai, which is unusually high for any city. We were all very impressed with the presentations and the scale models of the city region that were so detailed we spotted our hotel and also got a quick tourist overview of all of central Shanghai (Pu-Dong and Pu-Xi).

Right now most people have gone out to explore the older parts of the city (the famed Bund), while I must get back to work with confirming the ticket sales and marketing for the two concerts we will be singing at 7pm and 8pm at the Esplanade Recital Studio in Singapore on Aug 8th. *I'm excited*