Go in Badgers

So its been a few weeks since I last posted something. I guess it’s time to fill ya’ll in.

So I may have missed the greatest weekend that Madison had to offer. I missed what Scott Van Pelt called the “Perfect October Saturday, with temperatures in the 70’s, with people wearing red in every direction, with brats on every grill, and a hopeful feeling in the air.”



A place, which in 2007 he called the best college town in the country, that went absolutely crazy and stormed the field after we beat the #1 team in the nation, the Buckeyes of Ohio State.
I missed Kid Cudi on Sunday, the Bloody Beetroots in Chicago on Monday (which I would have for sure driven down to with Lee and Jan), and a ridiculous DeadMau5 concert on Tuesday.
At first, I had mixed emotions. I became real homesick, Not for the Dirty Jerz, but for the best college town in the country. Then I came to realize that I really had a great weekend too and remembered that I watched the game the only way I knew how, the Sconnie way.

There is this bar Bubbas on the outskirts of Shanghai in Hong Qiao (kinda like the burbs of the city) that serves up some fine Texas BBQ and plays college football games on Sunday afternoons on a tape delay. I had gone there by myself on afternoon to watch the Wisco vs San Jose State game and really dug the place. When I found out that they were playing the Wisco/OSU game I was elated. Elliott and I dressed up in our ridiculous gameday gear (I ended up getting a Wisconsin red sport coat and red bandana to rock), never turned on my blackberry or checked ESPN.com, and headed to Hong Qiao. He wanted the Badgers to win cause if we beat OSU, his Oregon Ducks would be #1 (or so he thought). We pre-gamed the hell out of the game and got to Bubba’s at 3:30 feeling great. Both the Wisconsin and Ohio State Shanghai alumni associations were there and the atmosphere was unreal. From the return of the opening kick off by David Gilreath for a TD the bar was going nuts with OS-WHO? chants and shit-talking. As the game kept going our way and free Jaeger shots were continuously passed around, and $2 pints were flowing, entering half time Elliott was already eating pulled pork and potato salad with his hands... a great sign the night was going in the right direction. When we finally finished off the Buckeyes comeback with a James White TD, the warm Shanghai night was a blur. We ended up at our stomping grounds at Shanghai House of Blues and Jazz (this time with a couple of Wisconsin alumni that tagged along) to see our friend Max perform with Mike Null and the Soulcasters. We danced the night away with some Australians, and almost fought some Germans. Just a normal Sunday night.

We went back to Bubba’s on Friday afternoon at 12 to watch the Oregon/UCLA game that Bubba had taped for us, and this time brought a bigger crew with us to watch the game. The BBQ at this place is unreal, great sides (despite having no Mac and Cheese or Collards), good portions, and real good mustard BBQ sauce or peppery Texas BBQ sauce to choose from. The game was a blowout, so we explored a little and found that they had 2 sets of bags (they call it corn-hole) and played crazy competitive games of bags for almost 3 hours, all while drinking Dead Guy Ale from Rogue Brewery in Oregon. A real solid afternoon at a gem of a bar in Shanghai.


This weekend a typhoon is currently hitting the shores of Shanghai, resulting in torrential downpours and high winds. It surely slowed us down, but we still managed to get out a few nights. We share our dorms with a program from NYU, but they are in a completely other section so we are all real segregated from each other. Someone over there decided to throw a Baijiu (strong ass rubbing alcohol-like liquor) party in the French Concession on Friday and invited our whole program. We were all really pumped to go, as it was $10 USD for an open bar with 3 different DJ’s playing all night. What we forgot to think of was why we hadn’t hung out with the NYU kids all year, as they party was a big bust. The venue was too small, the DJ was weak, and the liquor was so watered down that you had to put in straight up hard work to get any effects. I may have just been straight ignant too, but if I don’t really like many NYU kids when I’m in NYC, what made me think they’d be any better in Shanghai??

Next weekend is going to be real tight though. We’re going on a weeklong trip with our China in Global Context program (they split the CIEE group into two programs) to Beijing and Anyang. I think we’ll be spending Halloween in Beijing; it’s no Halloween in Madison, but should be fun cause we got a real great group of people in our program.

As much as I miss Madison (or even going down to Iowa City to see us take down another top 15 program this weekend), last weekend was a blast here and we really did the game up right. As I was listening to the Scott Van Pelt YouTube clip with him ranting about Madison on this rainy Sunday afternoon, Elliott turns to me and says “I wish it were last Sunday again.” I do to. It really was a one of a kind day in Shanghai, and an experience I will never forget.