I let my phone fall onto the pillow and hug the blanket to my chest. The hotel room is quiet, save for the sound of distant traffic and the water running in the bathroom. Being in Shanghai feels a little like slipping into an alternate reality, but I can no longer tell where real life is: here, in this glittering city, or what I’ve left back in LA.

* * *

When I caught the word shopping on our travel itinerary, my mind immediately lit up with images of multistory malls; banner ads for designer handbags hanging from the ceiling; groups of friends sipping milk tea and swinging their new purchases while riding the glass elevator up to the next level of clothing stores.

It’s not until we’re walking into the thick of the market—no designer handbags in sight, but plenty of floral shopping caddies—that I realize the shopping in question pertains to groceries. If I were the kind of person with a passion for buying fresh produce, this would probably be my favorite place in the world. The market is so massive that it takes up three whole blocks on its own, its shelves spilling over with natural colors: tangerines and dragon fruit and lychees and about ten different types of apples. It would probably also be the best place in the world to get trapped inside; even with the shoppers streaming through the stalls and haggling over carrots, there’s so much food stocked here that I’m sure it would last all of us well into next year.

“You’ll each get two hundred yuan to spend,” Wang Laoshi shouts at us, which is the most threatening way someone has ever offered me money before. He raises his voice further, straining to be heard over the vendors advertising their newly imported coconuts from Sanya. “I’ve forwarded a grocery list to everyone via the WeChat group—you can check it now. We’ve already paid for all the items at their full price, but for the purpose of this competition, we want you to put your Chinese skills into practice through the art of bargaining. Whoever manages to buy the most items with the allotted money wins this round, and you have one hour before we all meet back here. Do not waste the money on anything outside the list. Yes, I’m looking at you, Oliver.”

I feel myself light up as I pull out my phone. The list goes on for two whole pages, and it’s written only in Chinese, making it a little hard to identify what we’re meant to be buying. But it is, ultimately, a shopping competition. If this were offered as an elective at school, I might get to experience for the first time what it’s like to be at the top of my class.