shanghai

Everyday

1. Shanghai is a huge city on the east coast of China, one of the biggest cities in the world, with a famous river front and tall towers. tree →
2. (old, informal) To shanghai someone is to trick or force them into doing something they did not want to do; long ago it meant kidnapping sailors to work on ships. tree →

In the lessons

In geography lessons Shanghai is an example of a megacity and a busy sea port. The verb is old-fashioned and appears in sea stories and jokes: «I got shanghaied into tidying the classroom» means you were tricked into it. The Chinese name means roughly «on the sea».

Examples

• Shanghai is one of the biggest cities on Earth. tree →
• My cousin flew to Shanghai for work. tree →
• Shanghai has one of the busiest ports in the world. tree →
• The Shanghai Tower is very tall. tree →
• In the old story, a sailor was shanghaied onto a ship. tree →
• I was shanghaied into helping with the washing-up! tree →
• Lots of people in Shanghai speak Shanghainese as well as Mandarin. tree →

Note

Write the city with a capital S. The verb is usually lower case and passive: «be shanghaied». Pronounced «shang-HY». The verb is not rude, just old and jokey.