Shanghai Sights Trivia Quiz

When it was completed in 1994, this television tower was the tallest structure in China, a status it retained until the World financial Centre (which can be seen in the cover image - it's the skyscraper that looks as if it has a handle at its top) opened in 2007. It is one of the world's iconic tourist attractions, both to view and to use as a place to look out over the city - the 15 observation decks spread through the tower are well used.

The spherical platforms connected by column sections containing elevators were designed to resemble a string of falling pearls, falling from heaven onto the Huangpu River - itself symbolic of the jade plate described in the poem "Pipa xing" that provided the creative inspiration for the design. The various observation levels incorporate features that include an indoor roller coaster, multiple museums (and souvenir shops), a revolving restaurant and a hotel. Several levels have glass floors to increase the spectacular view of the city.

In the cover photo for this quiz, you can see that this is an impressively tall building. Indeed, it is considered a megatall skyscraper, meaning it is over 600m high - 632m, to be precise. At the time of writing this quiz, there are only four such buildings in the world, and this ranks third, behind Dubai's Burj Khalifa and Kuala Lumpur's Merdeka 118. Not only is it tall, it has super-fast elevators, keeping the trip to the top short and sweet, with a top speed of 20.5 m/s. They were the world's fastest until 2017, when Guangzhou's CTF Finance Centre opened with elevators capable of covering 21 meters in a single second. According to the publicity from the manufacturers, you can get from "the second-level basement to the 119th floor in just 53 seconds."

The most striking feature of the building, aside from its height, is the spiral form, just one of many sustainable innovations in the project. The spiral (which is a feature of the outer glass facade, with the inner glass facade a standard wall covering) helps to decrease the building's susceptibility to wind shear. The double glazing also provides thermal insulation that reduces the need for heating and/or cooling. There are around 300 wind turbines located in the facade, which produce about 10% of the electrical needs of the building.

Inside, there are effectively nine different buildings stacked on top of each other. These have different functions: the lowest level is mostly shops and restaurants; then come five levels of office space; a hotel area with spa and swimming pool; the top three sections include a range of restaurants, function rooms (including a ballroom and a concert hall) and observation decks.

This Garden of Delights backs on to the City God Temple, a folk temple honoring three of Shanghai's city gods: Huo Guang (d. 68 BCE), Qin Yubo (1295-1373) and Chen Huacheng (1776-1842). It is part of a tourist precinct that includes the Huxinting Teahouse (the building on the left of the photo) and the Yu Garden Bazaar.

The garden was built between 1559 and 1577 by Pan Yunduan to both honor his parents and be a comfort to them - hence the name. It originally was a complex of gardens, incorporating rock formations, pools and pavilions that were used for many significant public performances. Over time it has suffered periods of neglect and damage during war, but the garden was restored during the 1950s and opened to the public in 1961.

The current arrangement of the garden involves six main subgardens, each with its own distinctive contribution to the overall concept. One such story is that of the Exquisite Jade Rock, a 5-ton rock that stands over 3m high, with a structure that looks to be more hole than rock. It is said to have been retrieved from the Huangpu River after the boat sank that was carrying it to be used in the imperial garden in Bianjing, sometime in the first half of the twelfth century. The description of the rock itself refers to the 72 interconnected holes, arranged so that water poured in at the top will flow out of each of the holes to create a fountain; conversely, if you light incense at the base, the smoke will rise to billow out of all of the holes. (I haven't been able to find a photo of this happening, or someone who can attest to having seen it, but that's the story.)

As the name of the temple suggests, it is known for the presence of several jade statues of the Buddha. The first two were brought back from Myanmar by a monk named Huigen in 1882, who raised the funds to build a temple in which to house them. These two statues (which were moved to safety during the 1911 uprising in which the temple was destroyed, and returned to a newly-built temple in 1928) were a large sitting Buddha, and a small reclining Buddha. These can still be seen in the Jade Buddha Hall.

The Great Hall contains, as is customary in a Buddhist temple, a number of statues and representations of Gautama Buddha and other buddhas (the term for any one who has achieved enlightenment) along with other worshipful figures. They include a sculpture called the Three Golden Buddhas, which has representations of Shijiamouni (Gautama Buddha) in the centre, flanked by Amituofo (revered in Mahayana Buddhism) and Yaoshi (commonly described as the Medicine Buddha). There are also twenty gold-coated Devas (protective deities) around the interior walls, and 18 gold statues of the arhats (the original followers of the Buddha, who have attained enlightenment). Near the northern entrance is a large golden statue of Guanyin, the bodhisattva (seeker of enlightenment) associated with compassion, accompanied by his acolyte Sudhana.

The population of Shanghai, in a 2012 census, described themselves as 87% followers of traditional Chinese religions or atheists, 10% Buddhist, 2% Christian, and 1% other - including Muslims and Jews. Of the Christian groups, Roman Catholics are the largest presence, and Shanghai has the largest Roman Catholic population in China. Catholicism arrived in Shanghai in 1608, with the arrival of the Italian missionary Lazzaro Cattaneo,

A Roman Catholic church was built in the Xujiahui part of Shanghai in 1851, but as the congregation size outgrew that structure, a new church was built by French Jesuits between 1906 and 1910, and dedicated to the founder of the Jesuits, St Ignatius of Loyola. Its original altar was imported from Paris, arriving to be installed in time for Easter Sunday in 1919. Seating 2500, the church became a cathedral in 1960 when the seat of the bishop of Shanghai was moved there from the smaller Cathedral of Saint Francis Xavier in Dongjiadu.

The cathedral was badly damaged during the Cultural Revolution, and closed for twelve years from 1966 until 1978, when it was reopened and restoration commenced. Nearly 50 years later, restoration is still in progress.

This neo-classical building is located on the Bund (the protected historical district of Shanghai that runs along the western bank of the Huangpu River), right across from the region of skyscrapers we visited in the first two questions of this quiz. HSBC stands for The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation, the company that constructed it between 1921 and 1923 to serve as the headquarters of the bank's Shanghai branch. It served that purpose until 1955, when the bank moved to smaller rented premises, and handed over the HSBC Building to the government. Its name was accordingly changed to The People's Government of the Municipality of Shanghai Building (Municipal Government Building for short), and that name is still sometimes used, although in 1995 the city offices moved out and the Shanghai Pudong Development Bank moved in.

The building originally featured two bronze lions at the entry, one roaring to symbolise active protection, the other quietly representing calm security. During World War II the Japanese who occupied the city removed the lions to have them melted down, but they survived and were returned after the war. They were taken away again during the Cultural Revolution, before finding their latest home in the Shanghai Cultural Museum. When the SPD Bank took over the use of the premises, they installed replicas.

Built in 1927, the Custom House stands next door to the HSBC Building, a corner of which can be seen on the left of this photo. These two buildings are considered iconic images of the old Shanghai, standing as they do across the river from the new region of skyscrapers in Pudong.

The Custom House was built on the site of an earlier Chinese-style one constructed in 1857 to be in a more convenient location than previous ones. This was replaced in 1891 with a Gothic structure that had a five-story clock tower flanked by three-story wings. This was demolished in 1925, and the current neo-classical building constructed, with a clock tower modeled on London's Big Ben. The five bells were cast in London, and shipped along with the clock workings to Shanghai.

Not far from the Bund is the People's Square, where the Shanghai Museum was relocated in 1996. The collection of ancient Chinese art and other significant cultural artefacts was founded in 1952, and became the beneficiary of many donations from wealthy citizens, leading to steady growth until the Cultural Revolution, which resumed after that decade. The collection outgrew the original site, and Ma Chengyuan, who became the museum's director in 1985, organised the funds to build a new one on a site made available by the municipal government. Ongoing costs are provided by the Shanghai Municipal Culture and Tourism Bureau.

The building, designed by Shanghai architect Xing Tonghe, is meant to recall the shape of the prehistoric Chinese cooking vessel called a ding (a well-known example of one being a prized exhibit in the museum), a cauldron with lid that stands on legs and has two handles. There are five levels, housing eleven permanent exhibition galleries and three halls for temporary exhibits.

We started with the skyscrapers that represent 21st-century Shanghai, and we return to finish the city tour with more contemporary sites. Shanghai Stadium, built specifically to host football (aka soccer) matches, opened in 1997 in time for the Eighth National Games of China. It was the venue for the opening ceremony of the 2007 Special Olympics World Summer Games and some of the preliminary football matches of the 2008 Summer Olympics - the final being played in Beijing.

The image shows the stadium as it looked in 2008 (before extensive renovations between 2020 and 2022 increased seating capacity from 57,000 to 72,000). On 7 August Australia and Serbia played a 1-1 draw and Argentina defeated Ivory Coast 2-1; On 10 August Argentina beat Australia 1-0 and Ivory Coast was successful against Serbia, 4-1. Following the third round of Group A matches (in Tianjin and Beijing) Argentina and Ivory Coast proceeded to the knockout stage. Ivory Coast were knocked out in the quarterfinal round by Nigeria; Argentina went on to win the gold medal, defeating Nigeria 1-0 in the final.

The Shanghai Disney project, located in the same precinct as the skyscrapers from the start of the quiz, was approved in 2009, and construction began in 2009, with the theme park opening in 2016. It opened with eight themed areas, and plans for expansion - in 2024 a zone based on Spider-Man was announced to be in the works.

Unlike most Disney parks, there is no steam railroad around the perimeter, and the center of the park features the Gardens of Imagination, a set of Chinese gardens which include a wall with a mosaic featuring Disney characters incorporated into the Chinese zodiac. This is one of the ways in which the park tries to include a distinctly Chinese character in Shanghai Disneyland. Another is the exclusion of some of the familiar themed areas which the government thought might smack of cultural imperialism, including Space Mountain, Frontierland and It's a Small World. Main Street USA, which is usually the first area you encounter on entering, has been changed to be Mickey Avenue, an introduction to the full range of Disney characters.

Other themed areas include Fantasyland, featuring the iconic Sleeping Beauty Castle whose image was used here at its entrance, and an Alice in Wonderland Maze, along with the Peter Pan's Flight ride. Dumbo the Flying Elephant, often found in Fantasyland, has been moved to the Gardens of Imagination. Treasure Cove includes several attractions based on the 'Pirates of the Caribbean' films; Adventure Isle offers a white water rafting experience; you can see Buzz Lightyear in Tomorrowland.