Shanghai was so humid that the glass on the bus windows had fogged up entirely. Niamh couldn’t read the number nor the destination.  She wasn’t sure what to do next.

The last time she had asked someone for directions back to her Chinese host family’s apartment in Shaanxi Bei Lu, she had been directed to the bus station and put on a coach to Taiyuan in Shanxi province. It took her a week to find her way home.

She really needed to work on her tones, she decided.

Shǎnxī, not Shānxī, she whispered under her breath.

Sometimes China just made her feel very tired indeed.