Mornings in Zhabei, Shanghai are always shrouded in soot and moisture from the Huangpu River. Lin Jinyan carried the rattan food box, walked slowly on the bluestone road, and turned into a narrow alley called "Crack Lane".
The alley is no more than a hundred steps long, and is lined with low brick and wooden houses on both sides, with mottled gray walls and creaking wooden doors. To outsiders, it looks like an ordinary slum alley, even more dilapidated than elsewhere - the gutter in the middle of the road is clogged all the year round, exuding a vague musty smell.
Only knowledgeable people know that this musty smell may occasionally be mixed with a trace of rust, saltpeter, or other weird smells that do not belong to this era.
