Shanghai or Bust

After Mt. Zijin, we ate lunch at one of Nanjing's best hotels. My hosts and my husband eagerly slurped down prodigious quantities of raw fish with wasabi and fried eel. ("Raw fish with wasabi. Very delicious," O would say.) I coddled my still recalcitrant stomach with soup and innocuous-looking bread. (This was Friday; I got sick on Tuesday. My appetite didn't return fully until about five days ago, and I've been rapaciously hungry ever since.)

We parted company with C after lunch, who had to catch a flight to Guangzhou. We got into a van and our driver, Mr. Wang, drove us the three-and-a-half hours to Shanghai. It was raining.