Paulaner Christkindlmarkt (Pudong)

Over the last two weekends, I have visited two of the various Christmas markets in Shanghai. Two weeks ago I went all the way to the German Christmas market at the Paulaner Hofbräu (Expo) in Pudong with colleagues. The weather was fabulous with warm temperatures and blue sky, the entrance fee very reasonable (30 RMB) and we got a mulled wine for that. They had lots of arts and crafts stalls where we bought many presents and the food was good and quite authentic (pea soup, various sausages, crêpe and even Currywurst). We spent quite a long time there looking around the stalls and enjoying the sunshine.

Afterwards, we had a look inside The Ritz-Carlton and the Shangri-La in Pudong which had beautiful decorations in the lobbies and then went for drinks at the Shangri-La bar upstairs and to our delight it was happy hour and the tasty cocktails with an amazing view over Shanghai’s famous skyline were cheaper than the average mulled wine down at the Paulaner Christmas market.

 

Would I go back next year though? Maybe, if I need to buy presents.

Christkindlmarkt, Jing An district

Last weekend, we went to the Christkindlmarkt in the Jing An district with friends, which was such a hassle to go to (on three different metro lines) and took us about as long as going to Pudong.
The market was super, super tiny, had only one mulled wine stall, about three crafts stalls (of which one was nice) and very limited food choices. The hearty foods (Döner & Balkanwrap) were disappointing and the men got stomach cramps afterwards, while the crêpes were an absolute delight and they even used real Nutella. The atmosphere was nice though, as there were predominantly German expats and even a few people at the stalls spoke German. Would we have gone there in a couple, we’d probably have left after about 20 minutes, as there’s not much to do or see. However, as we met a group of friends there and had mulled wine all evening, chatting to Christmas songs in the background, it was really fun. Apparently as it was a Saturday, most people made their way to the bar next door after the Christmas market closed, but we didn’t make it that far, as we arrived in the early afternoon.

Would I go back next year? Yes – in a big group of plans, arriving later and with the intention of going to the after party.

My biggest delight that day was that when we couldn’t find a taxi straight away, we stumbled upon a bar with a sign “Hamburg-Shanghai”. It was really cosy insight and we drank some hot tea to warm us up after standing in the cold for hours and the waiter was very friendly and flagged down a taxi for us when we left.

– Her