Music Street

This afternoon we went in search of a guitar for G-man so we naturally headed for Jinling Road or "music street in downtown Shanghai. In China, as in Japan and Korea, stores of a given type are often concentrated in certain districts or streets. If one is looking for books or stationery in Shanghai you'd go to Fuzhou Street. For trendy clothes you go to Huaihai Street. For musical instruments it's Jinling Street. Only trouble was, I only had a rough idea where Jinling Street was because I had walked up the street only once and over two years ago and the map I had with me didn't list the names of all the streets - including Jinling Street.


We walked up and down and right and left in a grid east of Peoples Square and south of Nanjing Pedestrian Street without luck. We stopped off at a Wagas for a refueling lunch before setting off again for one last try - this time south of Yanan Street. And there it was, Jinling Street running west and east and crammed with musical instrument shops specialising in everything from pianos to Chinese folk instruments like the pipa. In the second shop we found a helpful young fellow that sold us a beginner's guitar for 300 rmb. The price tag on the guitar said 350 rmb but he came down easily to 300. We could have pressed for more but I wasn't in the mood - after all, he was friendly and helpful and not pushy. That alone deserves a reward. Now I look forward to listening to guitar sounds coming out of the room next door for a couple of years or so.