Here ara a few photos from my first days back in Shanghai, courtesy of my new Nokia cellphone camera (my only other camera is a Nikon 35mm, nice but a little inconvenient for today's digital age -- I really must get a proper digi-cam for snapshooting here in China). First is the view from the balcony of my new apartment in the Foreign Experts' Building at Shanghai International Studies University (SISU). This is in leafy old Hongkou District, a section of the former International Settlement on the northern edge of Central Shanghai. The sky is a bit hazy in this early afternoon shot, but clearer and bluer in later shots below (click on photos below for larger image in new window):

Next is a shot from the top floor of Building #1 on the Hongkou campus of SISU, looking east toward downtown Shanghai with the landmark Oriental Pearl Tower in the far distance. This is SISU's older, smaller central campus, most classes (including mine) now held on the newer and much larger campus in suburban Songjiang. Building #1 houses the College of English Language and Literature for which I teach, and which also has a building on the Songjiang campus. Still a little hazy, but with more blue sky than the earlier shot above from the balcony of my apartment:

Another view from the top of Building #1, this time toward the northeast over the campus and the rooftops of neighboring Hongkou District:

...And still another northeasterly view over the campus and its immediate surroundings, extending out to the forest of skyscrapers that is Shanghai:

Here a very hazy view to the west over the campus and down onto the central plaza and fountain where tomorrow I will catch the shuttle out to Songjiang campus for my first day of classes:

Finally, a warning to suicidal passengers on the elevated railway platform at nearby Chifeng Lu station: "NO JUMPING OFF THE PLATFORM AND ONTO THE TRACK":

I really have to feel for those to whom this final warning is directed, but can't help but love the wording: public poetry at its freshest and most surprising. More to come....