Arrived mid morning and checked into the Donghu Hotel in the French concession, ate lunch in a Vietnamese restaurant. In the evening we met the photographer Chris has been working with, Wenhao and his wife, for dinner (food highlights were yam cut into straws with some berry sauce, Chinese cauliflower vegetable cooked with spices, fish soup). First impressions of the city: very calm, relaxed, unaffected by the presence of foreign visitors, beautiful fusion of a fading 1930s deco architecture and traditional Chinese buildings, a city of height and lights being constructed by the minute.

Janet Harbord