I went to the Normandie Apartments building and inquired about Unit 208. I asked the guard and she didn’t know much, but I was lucky enough to find a long-time resident who was well aware of what was going on in the building, well, surely more than the guard.
She told me the Unit 208 bathroom was knocked down to enlarge the bedroom, as the flat was combined with Unit 207, and together was eventually sold for over 4.6million USD*.
She heard nothing about a box but an old book was found by the renovators, and indeed it was behind a wall in the bathroom. As the book was in English, the workers didn’t see any value in it, and they just discarded it. Luckily enough it is a protected historic building, so while visiting the site, one of the inspectors discovered the book on top of the rubble pile and it was subsequently offered to the Shanghai public library.
After leaving the Normandie Apartments, I went to the real estate shop, which was just few doors away. The nice lady at the Normandie Apartments told me they were the ones who sold the flat, so I hoped they could tell me more about the book, or maybe they knew something about the box.
I didn’t get much information, they just confirmed the book was sent to the Shanghai public library, and no box was found. They gave me the same pictures the lady showed me at the Normandie Apartments, but in higher resolution.
I don’t know if you can make anything out of this because I can’t. It seems the only place that will be able to help is the library. I will update you after my visit…
Follow-up on the Peace Hotel lead
I have an appointment tomorrow with Rose at the Peace Hotel. She told me to meet at the entrance facing the Bund (now closed to the general public). After meeting her I might go directly to the Shanghai library, but before that I will let you know how the meeting went with Rose.
Head to our Discord to check your answers with the community
Notes FYI (not part of the game)
*That’s over $26,000/m² ($2,424/ft²). Shanghai is a very expensive city and the Normandie Apartments are at the heart of the old French Concession which is a prime location.
Article about the 4.6 million USD sale (translated from Chinese)
https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/most-expensive-cities-expats-2020/index.html
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