Alex and Liz Martin moved to Shanghai with their family in July 2015 for Alex’s new job opportunity in the automotive industry. Having lived in the same place for her whole life (Ann Arbor, MI), Liz was completely on board and ready to experience something new and exciting. Their two adorable children Allie (3) and Will (5) have adapted quite easily as the family has a wonderful network of friends in Shanghai. Here they tell us a bit about their favorite things in the city…
Our Favorite…
Restaurants
Will loves Little Huia in Jing’an. They have good food, a really nice outdoor playground and great drinks. Parents can relax while the kids can roam free and play on the playground. We also like Mr. Pancake House and Al’s Diner for the kids.
Date Night Spots
Our date nights usually involve our friends, so we’ll start the night with just the two of us and then meet up with people after. Our number one rule is somewhere that doesn't have a play place. We go to Ferguson Lane a lot and try different restaurants there, and we particularly like Coconut Paradise. We do try to go somewhere new every time so we don’t really have spots that we repeat a lot, but we do enjoy meeting friends at Barber Shop and Mayita.
Memory
On our first weekend that we moved here we decided to go to the Pearl Tower and it took two-and-a-half-hour until we were up with the kids. It was a long day, but it was kind of cool. Will really enjoyed it because my son got to walk on the glass skywalk. But, just walking on the Bund in the summertime with the kids makes up a lot of our favorite memories as well.
Places for kids to play
There are lots of goods kids’ sports to play in Shanghai and Will enjoys spending time at Active Kidz Shanghai. For Allie, we go to Jitterbugs, but she is outgrowing the age group. It is only a 45-minute class of music and play for toddlers and it’s a good place to meet other moms. We also meet up at the Grand Gateway play center with friends every week.
Fall activities
We just love getting outside whether it is having a drink or going to Fuxing Park. We have barbecues at friends’ houses because it’s not too hot anymore to enjoy being outside.
Places to travel outside of China
We love Thailand and we’ve been twice to Krabi and Phuket, and both are fantastic. The food is amazing, the people there are great and it’s very cheap. The beaches and the rock formations are really beautiful. We drove ATVs and went white-water rafting, which were really fun as a family. Singapore was also a great family trip because we went to Universal Studios and the water park.
Places to travel inside China
Beijing was really cool to see; the kids loved the Great Wall. We went in November so it was actually kind of snowy, a little dangerous, but it was fun. We’ve also been to Sanya but we wouldn’t really recommend it.
Cultural spots
Shanghai History Museum at the bottom of Pearl Tower is worth the time to go see. If you’ve just moved here and want to understand the history of Shanghai and a bit about the culture, it’s a really good spot for that. It probably takes an hour and a half to see everything, but learning about how it has transformed into an international city is really interesting.
