The pics to go with the stories...
The modern Chinese, very hospitable, bright, talented, I look forward to working with them...
And the previous generation, a man with a mountain of memories.
An old woman from far off lands whose face showed her walk in life knew many sorrows, yet her feet decorated, hand embroidered with care...I didn't want to be obnoxious and get up close for a picture of her face -- would make me an obnoxious gawking tourist. So I took these pictures without aiming, from my hip, camera slung over my neck. Her face, told of a thousand tragedies, perhaps her feet even more so. I followed she and her friends along, noticing that a few of them held their husbands hand, loosely, tenderly, as though love alone had pulled them through, together, through the passage of life, and burden.
The ever present troops.
Tian'an Men Square and the woman who ran up to me, put her arm around me for a picture, holding on to her hat in fierce wind.
The school girls before they saw me.
The girls after they saw me and screamed and came running. I am actually in this picture. Center. Also in orange. Maybe my orange shirt was the attraction?
The Great Wall -- or the part that could be reached before road construction blocked our passage to the entry further down.
These next pictures show the climb, whereby everyone got sore knees and feet, as we had to race up for lack of time (but were later told that the discomfort was from liver failure or stomach ailments, requiring herbs)...the Japanese girl on the right wore Mickey Mouse shoes, and her toes were bleeding by the end. The Hong Kong woman (on the left above, middle below), who I'll stay in touch with. She and her husband were great, and very funny.
And the challenges of language: (I certainly could never learn Chinese. How they read that script, I'll never understand! If I tried, I can't imagine what errors I would come up with!!)
This was at Chinese Tea House, which includes performances of Chinese poetry, puppets, acrobatics, etc. Including a performance whereby a man dressed up to symbolize a bad monkey told a story. The bad monkey apparently made a MESS of Heaven, not a MASS. But the Pope would be proud of the Chinese monkey.
I had some absolutely DELICIOUS food when in Beijing. Minus the Fido. Most of it was incredibly, wonderfully good, presented so carefully. So this one is an unfortunate error...
All in all, excepting the Mad TV version of Great Wall tour guide and Chinese Medicine, the Chinese were so hospitable, caring, I made new friends, had delicious food, learned some history...a great visit. Now I gotta get rid of some jet lag!!
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