Non Arkaraprasertkul visited Shanghai for the first time in 2006 when he was reading for his master's in architecture history at MIT. He was struck by the way that the city's century-old neighborhoods, namely lilong, continued to accommodate their residents in contemporary times amid urban changes.

Thai Non Arkaraprasertkul has conducted multiple research trips in Shanghai.

"This is it, this is what I want to study," the Thai student announced, dumping his previous research interest in Philadelphia.

Since then, he has returned to Shanghai for multiple research trips, and settled into a lilong compound from October 2013 until last November to conduct field research for his anthropology PhD at Harvard.

Currently a research fellow at New York University Shanghai and Fudan University, the 33-year-old has written extensively on Shanghai's housing and urbanization, traditionalism and the sense of home.

"I could be at Harvard right now writing my dissertation and finishing my PhD, but the problem is there are only a small number of people interested in this project at Harvard, while here everyone talks about housing, lilong, and preservation," Arkaraprasertkul said.

GT: It has been nine years since you first encountered lilong. What do you identify as the biggest changes in Shanghai's lilong-scape?

NA: Lilong back then were interesting to me, but I didn't realize they would become heritage sites. Now they are. The Shanghai government is starting to realize that, if everyday one lilong gets torn down, that in 20 years, if we want to see a lilong we'll have to go to museums.

GT: You lived in the Jing'an Villa lilong community for more than a year to do field research. Why did you choose that site?

NA: People talk about it all the time without knowing where it is, so I thought there must be something interesting about it. I came back in 2012 and spent a whole week in Jing'an Villa. I talked to the people and thought it was like a world in itself. The population is so diverse - people have a different way of life, different goals in life, and all these are housed in the amazing architecture of Jing'an Villa.

GT: You call ethnography a full-time job and some might assume that, like most full-time jobs, it can be less exciting over time. What parts of lilong still surprise you and keep you wide-eyed?

NA: There are so many things going on. I discover new things every day. When we go to a new place, we tend to assume this is the way things are. But in fact there are a lot of layers of history that these people have dealt with over time. These are things that make ethnography a wonderful full-time job. At 6 am, I would get up and go to the market place in the lilong with the old ayi who lives next door so I can see how she lives her life. At lunchtime, I go to different houses to eat lunch with residents. I play with the kids in the lanes. When the sun is setting, I walk around the lanes, observing people coming back from school, parents coming back from work, and grandparents hanging out. I then go back to my room and write for 3 or 4 hours. Every day is a meditative process and there is never a day I miss writing.

A bird's-eye view of Shanghai's lilong communities Photos: Courtesy of Feng Jie and Sue Anne Tay

GT: You have argued in your papers that Shanghai's lilong preservation is about the architectural façade rather than the community culture. What cities have done a good job preserving both?

NA: London and Paris have been doing a great job. Paris has kept the old city the way it was in the 16th and 17th centuries, and built a new city outside completely. London fills in inside the city, but then again there are new areas that are completely different, while the area around the River Thames is still the way it was thousands of years ago. The blending of modernity and history is what makes London and Paris amazing, because you get people who actually live there because they love to be there - whatever crisis hits, they won't go anywhere because they love the city. By tearing down the lilong, it's like removing all the elements that make a city a city out of the equation, and that's not good because you are turning Shanghai into a city that is more like Shenzhen, where there is no history and when things go wrong people just leave.

GT: When will we get to read your dissertation (in anthropology, a dissertation is a published book)?

NA: I cannot imagine myself writing a book that no one else wants to read. That gives me a lot of pressure, because if I want to write an amazing book about Shanghai that everybody wants to read, it has to take a lot of research, work, time and courage too. Shanghai changes so fast - the moment I publish the book, everything will have changed. These are things that make me feel I would rather publish small articles than a book. But at some point, I hope, either the end of this year or early next year, I will have a full draft of the book.

I have spent so much time in Shanghai, so many people have been so kind to me providing information, and I get a PhD out of this knowledge. I have got to give back to them and make use of the knowledge they gave me.

This is a lifelong project. I don't think I can leave Shanghai. Even if my next position is not in Shanghai, I can at least spend every summer here so that I can document whatever started here in 2014 all the way to the last year of my life.

In 60 years from now, if I am still alive, I might be writing about how I was wrong in 2014.