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

Ode to Bamboo

Ode to Bamboo

in honor of my walking friend, Liu Juhua

The peasant farmer harvests slender young bamboo for his garden

while new beans sprout from the moist soil of Jincheng Mountain.

Must the bamboo’s destiny be a stalk for the climbing bean, partner to maturing corn?

This, perhaps, is interdependence.

Nonetheless, I fear for the bamboo forest that is our home, our comfort, our serenity.

I mourn for the emerald bamboo that has not yet grown to see the sun.

-rick, june 2013

Learning Prepositions of Place in 7th Grade

Today we had a fun class in 7th Grade learning prepositions of place - next to, in front of, behind, across from, near, (go) along.  The students love anything that's "kinesthetic" and allows them to move around.  I placed images on the blackboard (it's easy to pull these off the internet, print them in color and have them laminated) and told them a story about "asking/giving directions" from point A (the stoplight) to point B (the post office).  Then, in groups, they had to recreate the story while discussing it in English.  Then a group member was asked to come to the blackboard and tell their story to the class.  The trick is to see which group uses the most prepositions.  This kind of activity gets them speaking in English and using the new vocabulary.  The strategy doesn't always work because they sometimes can't understand my instructions, but they caught on quickly today and did a great job!