Charlie in China: Shanghai Motor Expo 中国会展服务

The Shanghai Auto Show was in town last week. With the credit crunch going around a lot of the international shows ahve been cancelled - making Shanghai the biggest one to take place this year. It was held out in the International Expo Centre in Pudong - near the Maglev train station. As soon as I got off the subway I realised I was in the right place as there were thousands of hawkers trying to sell me tickets and blocks wanting to give me backies on their motorcycles. I'd been warned about the crowds trying to get into the Expo (especially on the saturday-when I went) so in order to avoid the queue I bought a ticket from a tout for just under face value.

The press was predicting millions of visitors to attend the expo over the course of the exhibition - i think most of them went on the saturday at about the time that i visited. It was absolute chaos in some areas and there seemed to be no order what so ever. The hall where the major foreign cars were (Bently, Ferrari, Lambourgini etc) were was absolute bedlam. I can honestly say that I've been in football crowds or concert venues that were more ordered. It was a case of head down, arms out and get through it as fast as possible - meaning I didn't actually get to see the New Porsche, BMW or Jaguar that were uncovered at the show.

this was actually one of the less busy halls

The whole place was absolute overan with people - I don't think I've ever seen as many in one place before and what ever direction I was trying to go in always seemed to be the wrong one. The mess was unbelievable as well:

dan maund will be having kittens at the sight of this

The main reason for going to the show was (apart from seeing some of the absolutely stuning models showing off the cars) was to see some of the Chinese knock off models that I had heard about. I'd heard stories of copied Rollers, Mercs exhbited in hall 1 whilst the genuine articles were being shown in the next building. The Chinese, always better at imitating than using their skills to produce something better themselves, didn't dissapoint. The Rolls Royce knock is ridiculous - I believe action is being taken by the company!