Public Transportation

Public transportation is important to a lot of cities.  In China, there is a sophisticated system that has been developed in many cities. Buses, trains, taxis, subways, and other vehicles that I really do not know the names of.  I have never been on a subway before I went to Shanghai.  It was an interesting experience for me.  I learned quickly that in big cities, public transportation becomes very crowded which can be troublesome to those who are not used to it.  I felt overwhelmed at first but I soon felt more comfortable with it.

Subway ticket in Wuxi, China

What I learned about taking the subway and the train is to always keep your ticket.  Tickets could be a card, a paper ticket, or even a plastic token.  Do not lose your ticket because you will need it to exit the station once you are at the location you need to be.   Train tickets have valuable information and it is helpful to know some Chinese to fully understand what it says.  You can at least understand where you are going, the platform, the seat and car numbers, and the time the train will leave.

If you do not speak Chinese, most of the time I was able to know where my stop was due to the helpful voice on the loudspeaker translating the Chinese to English.  It was helpful to know where I was going though, Yu would sometimes not tell me where we were going (surprise dates were always fun), or would tell me and I got confused to the many stops that sound similar to it.

Yu had a special transportation paying card for Shanghai.  It was great to use the card to pay for the bus, train, subway, and the taxi rides.  I was so shocked that the card was able to pay for all that.  My metro card only pays for the bus and the light rail.  Yu kept saying, "See, China is better!"

I was able to ride a few time on these taxi-like vehicles that is like a cart and a tri-wheeled motorcycle in-one.  This kind of transportation was cheaper than a normal taxi cab.  It is usually under $1 USD per person.  It was a great way to travel the around town. I had never been in one before nor have I seen them where I have lived or visited in the USA.

In the motorcycle taxi.

The train was the main rail transportation where you are likely to have a seat.  There was times in Shanghai when we were unable to find a seat.  In the subway most of the time in busy cities you are not going to find a seat unless it is in part of the town that is not so popular. Some lines was not as busy as others.  It was great that all the cities we were going were connected in some way with transpiration.  

The train ride to Nanjing.