Shanghai Lil's, at 133 Franklin Road in Auckland's Freeman's Bay, boasts the warmest welcome and most striking visual impact I've encountered on the Auckland hospitality scene. Themed on a 1930s' Shanghai opium den, it's the last bastion of live soul. It's quiet tonight, though the music is live and there's a steady hum of animated conversation rumbling beneath the piano and I'm told that the dance floor is known to rock.