Shaoxing has favorably impressed me. Walking out of the train station I found not a refugee camp enclosed by unnavigable fencing and a taxi queue seven miles long, but a virtually empty square that gave effortlessly onto the street. A subtle but significant difference.

I started my investigation in the gathering dusk crossing over stone bridges and checking out traditionally-styled tea houses in the "old" part of town. It was the closest I've come to finding that Jiangnan feeling I've been after for about 10 years now. I feel like I trekked the entire city tonight. Through strangely well-kept neighborhoods built in traditional style to deep canals with no railing edging main streets. I ran into a weird group of people and partied with them for a few hours. They were these Iranian textile traders, their local business partners and the interpreters who were all students at the Waiyu Daxue. We piled into a bar called Paulaner (um, no relation), where we proceeded to get to know one another. "Two years I've waited for your country to attack!" the older Iranian told me. Then he kissed me. Obviously, they are not so strict in the whole "no booze, no ciggies" thing when they are abroad: they were tanked by the time things wound down at midnight. We are all friends for life now, of course.

A side note: pound for pound, inch for inch, I'm going to put Shaoxing girls up against those from any city in China. There's an across-the-board quality that you just can't find elsewhere, not even Shanghai. I texted my girlfriend that, who is Shanghainese and she texted back:

江山如此多娇，引无数英雄竟折腰

What a girl!

Tomorrow: Lu Xun.