Kids and families show up in force at CNS-organized community event
A go-karting competition at SIC Kart Land in Jiading District.
The Shanghai International Circuit Kart Land witnessed the ascent of its perhaps youngest racing stars on Saturday afternoon at 5:40pm when Caleb Zhang, 8, from China; Holland Risenhoover, 16, from the US; and Hammadi Djamal Eddine, 4, from Algeria, placed first, second, and third, respectively, in a family go-karting competition.
City News Service, Shanghai's one-stop information and service platform committed to making life in Shanghai easy for expats, hosted a community event for Chinese and expat families. The young children, strapped up in a double-seat kart next to their parents, or teenagers old enough to veer in a single-seat kart, were taking part.
Brendan Carroll, an Australian expat volunteer who lives in Jiading's Anting Town, the location of SIC Kart Land, cuddled the young children and gave them the confidence to make their "winner's speech" in front of cameras.
Kids ready to race
Brendan Carroll (center) uncorks a bottle of champagne in celebration. From left: runner-up Holland Risenhoover, winner Caleb Zhang, and bronze medalist Hammadi Djamal Eddine.
"I just cut my corners right, doing what I could," said Holland Risenhoover, the big brother of the Risenhoover family, whose members defined themselves as "mostly an art family playing music and instruments, yet surprisingly found out they are also good at racing cars."
The Risenhoover family from the US
Emma Hansen, eight, described herself as someone who came from both Zimbabwe and Germany. She went to the event with her Zimbabwean mother and German father.
What's the difference between riding a kart and driving a regular vehicle?
"The speed, for sure, karting is great fun," remarked the father, Kay Hansen.
"And in a car, the weight doesn't matter," he laughed.
"At the Formula 1 track, this is the first time we've tried karting as a family," said Elyster Ngatibaye Hansen, mother.
Emma Hansen (left) and her pal
The event's 40 participants came from China, Zimbabwe, France, the United Kingdom, the United States, Algeria, India, Germany, Indonesia, and the Philippines. They were from Chinese and expat families in Huamu Subdistrict, Jinqiao Town, and Zhangjiang Town in Pudong New Area, Hongqiao Subdistrict in Changning District, Yichuan Road Subdistrict in Putuo District, and Xujing Town in Qingpu District, all of which have vibrant international communities.
A group photo at SIC
Dalai Time museum tour
The Dalai Time Museum, located on the lakeshore of Anting's township square, was the other stop for the group of expat and Chinese families on their CNS family day, as Saturday also marked International Museum Day.
Carroll, a museum volunteer for nearly a year, led the group through the museum's collection of clocks and their tales.
Humans have invented various timing instruments from ancient times, such as those based on their awareness of the sun's and stars' periodic rise and fall. Sundials, for example, are often made of a thin piece of metal affixed to a flat surface printed with numerals that tell the time by casting a shadow on the surface as the sun moves across the sky.
Sundials like a projection sundial and a polar sundial are on display on the sundial island outside the Dalai Museum.
Sundials do not work on cloudy days or at night; thus, mankind invented water clocks, sand glass clocks, oil lantern clocks, and candle clocks.
The Dalai Time Museum, a non-profit public-welfare museum named after its patron, Li Dalai, a clock and watch collector born in Anting, houses approximately 2,300 artifacts from various nations and centuries. The collection includes 1,596 intricate clocks and watches, as well as 446 phonographs, music boxes, and mechanical pianos.
Carroll demonstrated the movement of a Dent clock tower, manufactured by Dent & Co Ltd in 1865, the same company that built the Big Ben in London; Cuckoo clocks from the Black Forest region of Germany; some mysterious clocks, disc-style orchestrion that can be triggered to play by the drop of a coin; and a Dey time register from the 1920s, among other exhibits.
Brendan Carroll, an expat volunteer from Dalai Time Museum, explains the mechanics of a tower clock movement.
The drop of a coin can activate a disc-style orchestrion.
"I had no idea there was such a place in China. Shanghai has several museums, and this one is particularly pleasant and surprising. I am overjoyed to have discovered it," said Nicolas Coster of France and father of 11-year-old boy Wu Jingjun.
"The Time Museum is incredible. We learned how the mechanisms worked. We saw all kinds of clocks, lantern clocks, sundial clocks, and clocks from other nations," says Niraj Kumar Bhavarlal from India and father of 7-year-old son Kavish Jain.
Expat and Chinese families in front of Dalai Time Museum
Algerians Hammadi Amine and Baba Hamed Latifa attended CNS Family Day on Saturday with their entire family. They were able to care for their three young sons, Eddine, Youcef, and Moncef, while also enjoying a tour of the time museum and finishing in the top three in the karting race.
"The event was quite beautiful and well-organized. It was really interesting to see the time museum and then go karting with the family. It was a good opportunity to meet both the foreign and Chinese communities," said the father, Hammadi Amine.
He and his family now live in the Yichuan Road Subdistrict in Putuo. The community staff called them to let them know about Saturday's event.
"We have very nice people who take care of the community, well organize events, and always check on how life is going on with our foreigners," stated Hammadi.
Carroll, an expat volunteer who invited other expat families to Saturday's community event, said he feels like a native Chinese person and shows them around the region, which is cool.
"It's good to come here and understand what we have. Anting, Jiading is a fantastic area with its automobile industry, facilities, parks, and museums. People have told me that they didn't understand how much was with them before; you can tell by their expressions now."
The gathering was the first offline community event since the Shanghai International Community Info-Services Alliance was established on April 30.
Shanghai International Community Info-Services Alliance is committed to improving links between Shanghai's international communities and the city of Shanghai.
