Shanghai Municipality Scenes

14. The Bund

The Bund (waitan) is an Anglo-Indian term for the embankment of a muddy waterfront. Between 1920 and 1965, Shanghai sank several meters. Water was pumped back into the ground, but the Venetian threat remains. Concrete rafts are used as foundations for high-rises in this spongy mass. To the Europeans, the Bund was Shanghai's Wall Street, a place of feverish trading, of fortunes made and lost. The Two tallest building along the Bund were the Bank of China and the Peace Hotel. It is worth a walk into the Peace Hotel to see what once was the glittering palace of the snootiest Brits in the Far East.