Thursday 7 August 2008

Preparing to return



As everyone is no doubt aware, the earthquake in China did not, appreciably effect this province. It remains in the news and more information can be found here, in China Daily . It was interesting to see the unifying effect that this had, and, unlike the Hurricane Katrina fallout, there was a much bigger focus on dealing with, and fixing, the problems than with with fixing the blame. It is what it is, a major natural disaster no one seemed to be trying to turn it into a tool of political advantage. Activities that just take time, energy, and resources from where they are needed.


I have been preparing to leave for the summer and have been packing and sending things at the post office. Zeneta asked that I ship both Giant bicycles. I have put them on the train to Zhengzhou. I still do not know if they will be able to fly with me. If they do not, then He Zhi Qing will bring them back to Xinyang.


I only managed to go on a couple of weekend rides this spring. I think part of the problem is that I have been too busy with the extra classes. I did manage to go on two rides. It turns out that both rides were to places that I have been to before. However, they were still enjoyable.


The first of the two I went on was to the restaurant on the top of the hill. It is a nice ride. I really didn't know where we were going when we left but when we turned through a village, I have been to before, I immediately knew where we were headed.




After lunch and hopping around on the rocks the owner of the restaurant wanted a picture with me. I think he didn't realize that I had been there before.




The next week we went to the waterfall place. This time we didn't try to pack our bicycles over the ridge into the next valley. Instead we rode back and had lunch in the town we had passed through on our way to the waterfall.




Some people wanted to rest for a couple of hours after lunch. I left with the people that wanted to get going. On the way back we rode at a much more sedate pace than we had used going out.. At one rest stop we pulled into a persons yard who had a nice concrete table and benches in his yard. He was trimming his flowers and we got to talking to him. It turned out that he had recently ridden his bicycle to Shanghai.




He let us into his courtyard and we got some fresh water (boiled, of course). He also recommended the side road that ran beside his house as a good alternative route to Xinyang.




It turned out to be a concrete road about three and a half meters wide that snaked through a number of farms and villages. Ultimately it ended in a small village that was somewhat unique for what I had seen in China. The buildings were single story. The road also met a dirt road there, which we followed the rest of the way back to Xinyang.




My packing is done and I leave in two days. I will use tomorrow for final packing and on Tuesday I will get my pay and head for the train station.