post twenty-seven in which I travel to M50 and Yu Yuan Garden but end up collecting memories of past rainstorms

This past weekend was highly productive: I went shopping, bought new glasses (crappy though they may be), visited M50, the Urban Planning Museum, and Yu Yuan Garden area.

M50 is the art district of Shanghai. It's a block of art galleries which are more representative of present-day China/what I see in China -- paintings of construction work, building cranes, large Chinese faces peering at you from behind counters, and paintings mocking the Party with pacifier-sucking Mao's. Anyway, it was refreshing to see modern art not reminiscent of Communist themes.

Urban Planning Museum had a room solely dedicated to a model of present-day Shanghai. There was also a floor of pictures from the early 19th century - it's amazing how much Shanghai has changed. The photos from the 1940s showed wide streets with people sitting on curbs in front of small shacks - now it's all skyscrapers and malls.

I just saw the most amazing lightning bolts hit the very top of the building across from I work (it acted as the lightning rod). That's actually a lie. I thought about all the times I have seen rain and lightning and thunder and I can remember some specific memories which were more impressive than now.

1. June 3rd, when my family was celebrating my dad and grandmother's birthdays and the most insane lightning/thunder storm started. We shut off all the lights, lit some candles, and drank tea/ate dessert while watching massive lightning bolts shoot across the night sky. There was one about every second. It was the most amazing storm I've seen.

2. Rain reminds me of the time my mom and I went to DC to get my passport renewed and the cloudy sky was intimidating us all day, though actual rain was lacking. We made it to all the touristy stops in the National Mall and when we had an hour left before our departure time, it finally started raining. By that time, the museums were closed as well (it was around 5PM), so we made our way to the airport, happily unscathed.

3. Back when I used to go to Latvia for the summer to visit my grandmother, I would meet up with my friends every day at 4 and we would run around the neighborhood. We would play badminton, soccer/football, go to the beach, play this weird game similar to squash, or just sit around and talk. Summer, however, brings unexpected rainstorms, so there were always days when we found ourselves running to the nearest entrance to some flat to play cards (some weird form of poker or durak).

4. Bermuda rainstorms are really nice. Salt water, wind -- very pleasant.

5. That whole month or two of rain that began in March/April of this year - not pleasant.

It looks like the rain ended - maybe ?