1.What makes a great Tour Leader?
At Culture Shock, we are trained to be great tour leaders but I think that not only the training counts. The final personal touch is always an extra that will make the tour special, and that’s the reason why all the tours will slightly vary depending on who is leading them.
I think that being a great Tour Leader also consists on not only guiding your guests but also making sure not to lose them in the “mazy” old town, constantly maintain a great ambiance within the group, and provide a very special insight of what the local Shanghainese life looks like being a link between local population and foreign guests.
2. 3 things that represent the REAL Shanghai?
- Local food: 本帮菜 (Ben Bang Cai), including traditional Xioalongbao (小笼包) and Shengjian bao (生煎包) at any locally famous restaurant or why not at some Shanghainese people’s houses, you might easily get invited to join for lunch while wandering in the authentic old town!
- Diverse architecture styles as a display of Shanghai not-so-long but rich history: Shanghai Shikumen houses, the old town red wood houses, the former French Concession style lane houses, the former British Concession style big buildings, the Art Deco style, the modern skyscrapers in Pudong, and so many other buildings you get to run into when you wander in Shanghai.
- Shanghai dialect: If you pay attention while you walk in very local areas, you will hear people talking a language quite different from the official proper Mandarin Chinese you usually hear on the plane or in a train station. This language that sometimes sounds like a loud Japanese dialect to foreigners is actually the local Shanghai dialect that is commonly used by older generations. Learning a few words of it will always be a free pass that will take you to the most local and hidden places.
I love Shanghai for its convenience and modernism, obviously for its food and warm-hearted inhabitants, but more than that, Shanghai is for me a perfect example of a peaceful place where people from all around the world and from all the social-classes managed to cohabitate.
4. How important is it to speak Chinese while discovering the city?
Speaking Chinese allowed me to easily make Chinese friends and be deeply introduced to the local culture by them. I think that speaking Chinese is a way to show your respect to Chinese people but mostly a way to reassure them as they may tend to fear being exposed to foreigners without being able to communicate. Speaking Chinese clearly opens the door of a hidden world in China and might help you get some better deals sometimes!
5. My most memorable tour was...
I think that all my tours were memorable for one single reason: they were all unique. Of course the itinerary and the comments are all the same from one tour to another but the local people we run into, the discussions we have with them, the ambiance we have in the groups always vary and that’s what makes Shanghai Culture Shock tours so interesting to do, even after a year as a tour leader!
Working as a Culture Shock tour leader really helped me to embrace the local culture even more and made me realize how delightful and satisfactory it is to share a part of Shanghai on a bike, and being able to leverage my knowledge to offer a unique and memorable experience to my guests.
I think that interacting in Chinese with them, asking them questions and sharing about your own life in all due respect is a simple and efficient way to make friends with them. I must admit that as a foreigner, it is never too hard for me to befriend with local people.