I went to a couple hot spots to buy figures and other manga/anime related goods, here is one of them Wen Miao. Its a bit of an overstatement to compare this area with Akihabara but its the best it is the old lady of otaku shopping in Shanghai and a place you should go to if your there.

Above is a shot of the shopping district. Essentially a regular street that has many small shops along the side. When manga/anime hit a boom period in China in the 80s/90s this area was very popular but has recently had store closures as the popularity has settled and other more modern shopping areas have opened.

This is one of the shop fronts, many shops are simply residences with the first floor remodeled into a small shop and packed with goodies. The family sometimes lives on the second floor, in this picture you can see the father in the bottom corner eating dinner outside with his family.

This is a shot inside the same store, one of the rooms is packed with Gundam models.

Above is another store front with many figures on display.

This is a store that specialized in gachapon machines, they had about 50 in total, all with Bandai toys.

I visited one other place - Otaku Building - which I will introduce later!