Sweet & Sour

Sweet

Just before I left work on Friday there was this sudden downpour, the type that turns the sky black with rain and clouds, thunder and lighting - the works. And then it was over just like that. So I went downstairs to my electric bicycle with a damp seat even though it was parked under an awning and got on and started on my way home. It was something like 7 pm or close to that. I got to a section of the road that was flooded to the curb with dark rain water and I was going through it with three-wheel carts to the left and right of me, bikes, electric bikes and motorcycles around me. I started to laugh, laugh and laugh and was thinking, my goodness I do so love this city. I do so love Beijing.

Posted in Rob's blog: http://blogs.sun.com/robsblog/

Sour

On my recent trip to Wudang Mountain I was clearly presented with what I don't like about long-haul train journeys in China.

Two men with strong Jiangsu dialects were sharing my compartment of six hard-sleeper bunks, and were about to show me their own talents for comedy. From the moment I got on the train, until lights out at about 11pm, these men had been sitting on the flip-down chairs in the aisle, talking loudly, eating preserved chicken or duck out of a packet, among other things, and drinking from a little bottle of baijiu - non-stop.

I imagined that the background noise of their conversation would stop as the lights went out. Instead, the two sat down on the vacant bottom bunk opposite mine, about 1.5 m from where I was lying down. They put their lap-top on the table, and proceeded to play a computer game - mahjong.

Riding the Chinese Railway: The Good, The Bad and The Ugly by Jalal in www.lostlaowai.com

(China Daily 07/20/2009 page10)