china dispatch #4 - street scene

I'm waiting and waiting for Catherine to come back to me.   She's in San Antonio now, where we fly her back every two months for medical treatments.   She'll be back Tuesday, and I can't wait to see her.

I felt sick all day yesterday, so when I finally got up I just went down to our little neighborhood street to read and have a bite to eat.

The street isn't particularly traditional in its architecture.   Earlier, I compared it to a hutong in its tone, but it's definitely newer than that.   And yet, as I looked around, I saw the ghosts of old China all around me.   It was about eleven o'clock.   Groups of people were gathered around the tables that every restaurant had out on the wide sidewalks, chattering loudly, old pudgy men with their shirts off, teens bunched up together.   A stream of people flowed past, commenting on and being commented on.   The several Mongolian grills smoked up occasionally, sending huge fogs of mouthwatering smoke to everyone near.

It's interesting.   I'd always pictured myself getting overwhelmed at some peak on the Great Wall, or getting teary-eyed at a Beijing opera, or at the sight of the spectacular Temple of Heaven, perfectly rigged as it is to inspire as one approaches.

But this is where it happened:  suddenly the sight before me glowed with meaning, and with the weight of six thousand years.   The workers just off of work, gnawing at skewered meat, the young boys watching the girls go by, their girlfriends snapping at them, the boisterous sound of laughter and argument, the big old trees sending their leaves down to the concrete, the lady silently hunching over her bowl fooping noodles into her mouth length by length, the wafting pentatonic sound of a single flute coming from somewhere to dance around the cell phones' tinny pop, the taste of an unknown vegetable, buttery and garlicky in my mouth, the feel of cheap bamboo chopsticks in my hand, the blue and red and yellow bricks lit by paper lanterns and bare bulbs hanging from wires — this is where China sang to me.