When a Pine Cone Falls

When a Pine Cone Falls

Winter brings a stillness sought by those who beg time to reflect.

It brings calm that creates space,

Vast opportunity to explore desolate reaches where most dare not walk.

Howling wind and chill keep them at home.

There was a time when I’d do those winter weekends on the Cape,

Guest of a hermit friend who found joy in it, too,

Always welcomed by cedar wood crackling in the cast iron fireplace,

 A stew or soup on the stove.

Quotidian outings found us combing desolate dunes,

Serenely searching droppings of birds of prey,

Their recent meals discovered in dissected remains,

Scat found buried in windswept sands.

We’d stoop and pick at winter’s nature,

Marveling at the hardiness of sea grape and grasses,

Gathering up that which had singular beauty.

Such wonder we shared in those cycles of life revealed on winter walks.

What does it mean

When a pine cone falls?

                                                                                  -RF, January 2015

[Gone now, my hermit friend, but not my love for him and the lessons he taught me.]

Meeting Feng Bo in the Dalian Fog

Just prior to starting my new teaching assignment in Chongqing, located in southwestern China's beautiful heartland, our director asked if I would "fill in" at a sister-program in Liaoning Province (bordering North Korea) for a teacher who had become ill.  The assignment was at Dalian Medical University, so it was an attractive idea.  I was sad to leave Chongqing behind, but off I went.

Dalian sits on the seaside, so skies were clear blue and the air was fresh.  Students were studying medicine, nursing, pharmacy and laboratory sciences and, like anywhere, they had varying degrees of interest in learning English.  Nonetheless, graduation from university in China requires a successful score on the College English Test, so we had to "teach to the test" and focus on the appropriate skills, all the time trying to make language learning interesting and fun!

I'm back in Chongqing now, having returned after six weeks in Dalian. I happily jumped into the teaching here on the day after my return, moved into a 12th floor tower apartment and, once again, savored my favorite and spicy Chongqing noodles.

Here's a narrative poem I wrote before leaving Dalian.  It speaks of stillness, friendship and Chinese culture.

Meeting Feng Bo in the Dalian Fog

I went for a walk last evening in the autumn fog that was settling over campus. 

How peaceful this place is, the stillness, so utterly devoid of noise!

Perhaps it’s the quietest place I’ve ever been in all of China.

In the dark of night, only the chug-chug of the fishing boats could be heard.

Soon a lone student peddled by on his bike.

He glanced, did a 180, then rode over to my side.

My best guess:  he wanted to practice his spoken English.

We chatted as he explored the depths of his memory, pulling out some impressive vocabulary.

He asked if I knew Kyle; I said that I didn’t. 

(Apparently Kyle was once an English teacher here, now gone, leaving my bicycle friend no one whom he could practice with.)  

He lamented, "Others make fun of those who chat up foreign teachers."

Who can explain the shyness of young students?  Who can explain jealousy? 

Xue Feng was his name, but his parents call him “Feng Bo.”

He explained how families add “Bo” to the end of a given name, a familiar way to address a young child. 

It slips off the tongue easily, we agreed.

With credit to the romantic loveliness of the Chinese language, he added: 

“'Bo,' first tone. It means ‘wave’, like the sea," as he pointed over there.

Aware now that all I could hear was the sound of waves coming in from that sea, waves crashing on the spit of sand to my back, I was reminded of the peacefulness of the now.

Feng Bo rode on, and I was again alone in the fog…..but not lonely.   [rf, october 12th]

Lotus Swaying in the Breeze at Crooked Corner

China's largest lotus garden, covering 28 hectares and hosting 200 varieties, sits at the southern end of Hangzhou's Xi Hu.  It's poetically named, Lotus Swaying in the Breeze at Crooked Corner.   I spent an idyllic day here reading and reflecting.

Stone Bridges of Xi Hu - Hangzhou, Zhejiang

Hangzhou, the provincial capital of Zhejiang in China's southeast, was the southern capital of the Song Dynasty nearly one thousand years ago.  Famed for its lake of  classical beauty, Hangzhou is my first stop on a summer long journey to some of China's ancient cities and cultural sites.  My planned three night stay was extended to five nights, simply unable to pull myself away from the hills, forests, parks and lotus gardens that make Xi Hu (West Lake) so incredibly attractive to the traveler.

Enjoy these pics of Xi Hu's stone bridges where I've spent days wandering and exploring.

Lunar New Year in Viet Nam

Saigon, January 30th

It's the middle of the day.  I've had two lattes while reading a John Steinbeck novel and I'm still not certain how I'll spend the day.  I give myself permission not to care.

It's festive here in Saigon this week.  Red lanterns abound and beautiful yellow mums and kumquats adorn every shop and mini-hotel.  Little red envelopes attached to blooming trees bear best wishes for the Year of the Horse.  Some shops and restaurants are beginning to close, allowing workers to rush home to their ancestral villages to rejoin family for this special celebration.  Still, the city bustles with activity and lights, so many lights.  It's the lunar new year celebration, the most important festival of the year for Vietnamese, Chinese and many other Asians.

Across the alley from my third floor hotel room sits a Vietnamese man on a his balcony before an altar festooned with images and icons and offerings.  He places sheets of inscribed paper and items of clothing in a burning barrel, probably cleansing his life of the present and past, preparing for a successful 2014.   Maybe this is good wisdom for those of us too attached to the past and the present, too attached to what we have and must have.

May this be a Happy New Year for all beings.

Winter 2014 in Shandong

Sitting in my sixth floor room, overlooking the south gate of our campus, I marvel at two small golden gingko leaves I keep in a plastic bag taped to the wall over my desk.  These are reminders of places visited in China.  One was collected from a pathway in Kunming near the university. Another came from our campus at Yilong in rural Sichuan, I remember, from a tree under which little children laughed and joyfully played in the fallen leaves one autumn morning in 2012. Once brilliant green on branches of stately trees, the precious golden leaves hold generations of history in their now dried veins.

That was autumn a year ago.  Here we are in winter, the year 2014, and in Shandong Province.  My first semester has finished at the university.  The students have moved on to homes afar for their reunions with family and celebrations of the lunar New Year festival.  

I've stayed back for a week post-finals, so I can walk the beach along icy waters nearly alone.

Soon I, too, will leave for some travel and visits with friends in Viet Nam and then in America.......but not before posting gingkos to my blog and rejoicing in another great year on the road!

A Day at Wangjianglou Bamboo Park, Chengdu