Vehicles scramble for space along a narrow, nondescript street in Kaifeng, past a three-storey building with a special place in China's history. It was here former president Liu Shaoqi died in terrible pain on November 12, 1969.
The house has been converted into a museum in his memory and left much as it was when he was there, for the last 27 days of his life.
The cavernous structure, with high ceilings and little light, was built in the 1930s as a branch of the Agricultural and Industrial Bank and used as a government building after the communist takeover in 1949.
A photograph in the museum shows him smiling and healthy on an official visit in September 1958 to Kaifeng, a rural town in the agricultural plains of Henan and the national capital during the Northern Sung dynasty (1111-1279).
But when the Cultural Revolution began in 1966, Liu became a target of criticism. Two photographs show him at a 'criticism session' in Zhongnanhai with Red Guards in the background, his face taut and angry.
In 1967, Jiang Qing, Mao Zedong's wife, expelled Liu from the party and stripped him of all his official posts.
In October 1969, China was put on a war alert, because of a possible conflict with the Soviet Union, and the leaders and officials were ordered to scatter to different parts of the country, in case of attack, the museum guide explained.