3 Best Sights in Shanghai, China

Built by Swedish shipping magnate Eric Moller in 1936, this massive villa resembles a fairy-tale castle. It's a surprising sight when you come down from the pedestrian bridge that leads from Jing'an into the Former French Concession. Inside is a rather gaudy hotel.

The secret meeting on July 31, 1921 that marked the first National Congress was held at the Bo Wen Girls' School, where 13 delegates from Marxist, Communist, and Socialist groups gathered from around the country. The upstairs of this restored shikumen is a well-curated museum detailing the rise of communism in China. Downstairs lies the very room where the first delegates worked. It remains frozen in time, the table set with matches and teacups. Ironically, the site today is surrounded by Xintiandi, Shanghai's center of capitalist conspicuous consumption.

A daughter of the prominent Soong family, Soong Qing-ling (also known as Madame Sun Yat-sen) was first a Nationalist and then a Communist. Her sister Mei-ling married Chiang Kai-shek, who was the head of the Nationalist government from 1927 to 1949. This three-story house, built in 1920 by a German ship owner, was Soong's primary residence from 1948 to 1963. It has been preserved as it was during her lifetime; in the study are her 4,000 books and, in the bedroom, the furniture that her parents gave as her dowry. The small museum next door has some nice displays from Soong Qing-ling and Sun Yat-sen's life, including pictures from their 1915 wedding in Tokyo.