What prevents me from changing? Why do i experience this inertia, stemming from my own self? IT seems like i love myself and wish me nothing less than the best kindness and wonderfulness possible, and yet i continue to lust after ice cream and ding dongs, and barely ever stretch.... the last time i ran around the block was probably out of necessity (and clearly i don't even remember when that was), and the last time i played basketball was probably a pickup game of one-on-one with Danielle Dennis three years ago.... i must delve ever closer to this issue, and i truly find IT so difficult while in close quarters with Tiffany, for i am simply consistently distracted from my self.... Possibly this may be wisdom in disguise, yet i cannot yet understand IT.... i am working on giving my complete trust over to IT, the trust that whatever is happening around me is exactly what needs to occur right at this very moment.... IT is okay so far, and i am encouraged....
First Slow Train experience, from Qingzhou to Qingdao: IT seems like an inopportune time to sweep the train car in the middle of the ride between stations, when everyone is jam-packed in and standing in the aisles; the train-sweeping guy has a giant pile of people's trash containing everything from cig butts to eggshells, and is pushing IT with his little broom down the center aisle while accruing from under the seats as he goes.... People grudgingly shift around as he unflinchingly sweeps a path right on through.... ***** Now they just came through and took away the emergency hammers that you use to break the glass if shit goes down.... why? Why did they take away the emergency hammers? There's nothing going on and everything is completely normal.... except that.... that's kind of weird.... maybe a little too weird....
Just on the what-if's tip: Tiffany and i, in following through on the plan of going to Huabao's family's house for a couple of days outside of Jiāonán, have made the knowledgeable decision to weather out a potentially-Class-9 hurricane with the family, coming straight for us off the coast of Qingdao.... What could go wrong? This particular monstrous typhoon (táifēng) is supposedly the worst that the area has seen in 60 years, and we definitely had the chance to choose to get on a train and head out of ITs way.... We chose to hunker down out of a desire to pursue close connection with the people of this land; Huabao's family are farmers, out in a very rural area lying a good half-hour bus ride from the urban sprawl of Jiāonán.... They have five pigs, five chickens, a duck, at least three big fat spiders, corn, squash, beans, wood-fired wok ovens, a bed heated by the vent-heat from the oven, a solar hot-water heater on the roof, and are surrounded by simple farming folk in a small village community, which is in turn surrounded by a lot of farmland in every direction.... This sort of environment is slow, earth-based, very friendly, and just the atmosphere that Tiffany and i both love to be in....
So you can understand our decision to follow through with our plan, i hope.... Yes, we could have done the safe and (some might say) intelligent thing, and tell them we would come to visit another day, when the weather was more forgiving.... But instead, we chose to accept the Liu family's hospitality of not only staying with them in their newly-built home (a solid concrete structure surpassing the old brick-and-mud house which Tiffany recalls), but also of sharing with them the experience of living through a giant force of nature, as families here have done for generations, and continued to survive.... IT is a gift, and i have chosen to treat IT as such....
i have no way at the moment to electronically preserve this writing; i have high hopes of coming out successfully on the other side of this venture, and posting this on my travelblog - once i have found a way to access the blogspot.com site that China's government has unfortunately seen fit to block from public use! Until then, i put my trust in the General Powers That Be to keep us all safe from harm here in the Liu family's little village, some 4 km removed from the oceanside and halfway between Jiāonán and Rizhao, and that general health and prosperity continue to be known by all the kind folks around these parts and down all other roads....
6 AM on the nose, 8/7/11 and the first drops of rain fall in a small burst, accompanied by a small cooling gust of wind.... both water and wind quickly pass by....
2:42 PM, the forecast has been updated to the beginning of the rain tonight, the brunt of the storm by tomorrow morning; the day so far is hot, muggy, and and shifts between sunny and overcast....
Tiffany points out that while people scramble around with storm windows at home and fret up a storm (so to speak) in similar situations, no one around here seems overly concerned and life is quite normal and peaceful in the village; even Huabao, who is usually very worried about her and is the first to voice caution, has a fairly laissaiz-faire attitude about us staying here and the whole thing ingeneral.... i get the sense that things will be fine....
6:12 PM, big rain has just started, just as i am waking up from my dreams about the alien syndicate filming in multiple locations which we had to visit to free captive children
10:48 PM, still dry out there.... big rain was for like ten minutes, Huabao called hours ago and said the forecast has updated and the storm will be moving away to the northeast and almost entirely skipping our area! We're supposed to have hard rain all day and night tomorrow, but not straight hurricane-status.... i will take this as a lesson to not get my britches all up in a bunch about things which haven't happened yet :-P
7:10 AM, 8/8/11 - IT is sunny and hot, with not a drop of rain in sight here in the village....
2:06 PM, now hammock-hanging (for the first time in China!) between trees by the lazy river right outside the village, very comfy and gently rocked by the small breezes.... This is not the hurricane experience i was envisioning
10:49 PM, all right, i'm stopping this narrative now because there is absolutely no hurricane whatsoever coming to our area! Zhā yôu!
Well, Five days in Huabao's village of Dongdezhung, frequently punctuated by tons of yummy food force-fed to us by Huabao's mother.... Tiffany drooling over the villager's intelligent farming techniques, me getting sick as a dog for a day spitting water out my butt.... We have been very warmly welcomed here and IT has been a wonderful experience! Moving on to Tai Shan and getting ready to ascend one of the holiest mountains in all of the land....
i just found someone's hair in my Chinese snacky-food baked crunchy corn-pops cake
i just realized, upon my delight in seeing clouds and some blue sky for the third time in a month now, that i really generally take the open clear sky for granted! Large sections of China (apparently) only see gray smog-covered skies, day after day, and that has definitely been our experience this past month.... i must learn to appreciate and love the clear sky more than i have previously known how....
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