I experienced something that was so different culturally and sensually (sights, sounds, smells, tastes) that it was a little overwhelming. Everything was new and exciting and exotic at first. (Sorry I couldn't post more stories and observations then; I was limited by time and spotty access to a computer). It was all Fantastic and Fabulous! What an Adventure life in China is!
But over the course of the three weeks, my senses began to reattach themselves to my brain. I started to get tiny glimpses into the reality of life in rural China. I began to recognize that I had been experiencing things on a Disney level (not good for an NPR gal).For example, when I first saw how they spread out the grain on the streets of Xi Zhou, I thought it was quaint and I took lots of pictures. The grain dries there as people walk over it and vehicles drive over it, which aids in the threshing process. Ingenious.
But as I started to travel certain roads daily, I saw the same people there, beating the piles with wooden implements, over and over and over (and over and over...). It gets less quaint each time, as you begin to see the effort involved in cultivating a small amount of food.
And it was later still that I noticed how weather-beaten and how old some of the people were that were doing the work. They've been on the hot street, sweeping and whacking and sifting grain for untold years.No wonder they looked at us quizzically as we snapped endless photos of them doing these things. It would be like someone shooting pictures of me cleaning my brushes for the thousandth time and thinking, "How quaint."
So, when people ask me to tell them about China, I'm a bit reluctant because I know how little I know. I want to tell the truth, but I only know a little bit of it. I will continue to share what I experienced if you promise not to extrapolate too far and think that "that's how things are" in China. China is HUGE and varied and fascinating.
