It had been three years since I had been back to Shanghai. I'm Chinese, but I live in the UK, and unfortunately, because of the pandemic, I was stuck overseas for a long while. Finally, I returned home. As I casually leaned out of my balcony in downtown Shanghai, a city of lights unfolded above and beneath me. Though I left only three years prior, I often feel like I've been away for more than a decade–COVID-19 came and went, the Russo-Ukrainian conflict left the world on the brink of an all-out war, and my parents bought a new house on the east side of my city.

For those who don't know Shanghai, the best way to illustrate the wealth divide would be that the West is poor, and the East is rich. This city’s outline is informed by where the industrial sectors are situated—mainly near the port of the East. I lived in the humbler sections of the West side for my first thirteen years, so I was no stranger to dilapidated buildings - not yet painfully smashed down and rebuilt by cranes. Standing here on my balcony, my eyes glazed over with nostalgia for what it used to be. That’s when I remembered the spring onion pancake shop next to my school all those years ago. 

My school is inconspicuous. Each morning, I would walk from the main road into a smaller lane and head down a bottleneck alleyway. At the end of it was my school. Although surrounded by traditional housing, my school was westernized with its cleanly trimmed grass and neatly manicured ivy shoots. Every Tuesday after school, my friends and I would head onto the main road to fence together. However, fencing was rarely the highlight of our days; instead, it was the small spring onion pancake shop. 

The alluring scent of fried spring onions at the alleyway entrance always drew us in, and we would end up next to the shop. It was a small shop with a traditional plastic awning and an open kitchen where sizzling pancakes were always displayed. The place was run by an amiable middle-aged father and his young daughter, and it was so popular that a perpetually long line waited outside.

Upon approaching the shop, our eyes lit up. Often, our parents would hand us sums of pocket money that we could pool for pancakes. Sweaty palms, searching eyes, and hunger pangs—that's what I remember feeling every time we waited in the queue. Finally, we were pushed to the front as the daughter yelled, "Next, please!"

"Could we have four spring onion pancakes, please?" my friend would yell.

"That would be six RMB," she would shout back, smiling at us.

 
A dollar for all that! My friend would fish in his pocket for some bent notes his mother gave him, and in return, we received the pancakes in brown paper bags with red engraving on top that read: Shanghai Delicacy. In no time, the oil would seep through the thin paper, but we didn't care because if the first bite melted our craving, the second would be pleasure, and the third would be ecstasy.

We trudged back to the street, munching on our pancakes, completely self-absorbed by the delicacy. Tuesday afternoons passed like that for many years, and my naïve self thought these wonderful times would never end. However, I understand now that impermanence fashioned these beloved memories. When I returned from the UK, I traveled back to my school, but the familiar, wafting aroma did not greet me at the lane's intersection and the main road.
The spring onion pancake shop was gone. Like it was never there. Razed to the ground just like every shop before and after will be. In its place stood a series of industrial buildings. At that moment, my thoughts first went to the pancakes, now a nostalgic memory, then the father and daughter—I hope they are doing alright. Beside me, the cranes were working again. Even at 7:00 am, they executed their senseless demolition.

I never saw the father and daughter again. I haven't tasted a spring onion pancake since, and just thinking about it makes me hungry. However, it's midnight now, so I probably shouldn't wake my parents with my cooking attempt. So, instead, I stare at the sea of lights and stunning skyscrapers. I wonder: how many spring onion pancake shops stood in their place ten years ago?

As I ponder, I can't help but realize that the essence of beautiful moments lies in their transience - perhaps the thought of the pancake shop would have never surfaced in my mind if not for its disappearance. However, now, with the memory etched into my brain, I mourn the shop; I mourn all the once beautiful neighborhoods in Shanghai that were destroyed for the erection of infrastructure; most of all, I mourn the loss of my naïvety: my hope that everything would stay the same.

Now, I turn my back on the sea of lights and step back into my apartment; I could add a happy ending here and say I've come home. However, change is slow, and I haven't.

Yet.