Writing from Beijing, again. Revisiting old friends, old places, old feelings, and rekindling and examining old thoughts. Something as simple and powerful as a smell can return one to the root and seed of gongfu acquisition, if that is how one lived it.
This blog has been very hard to access, likely due to server distance or some other more insurmountable reasons, so just this short note for now.
Beijing, always changing and eating itself, I find this time, feels much more like ten years ago to me than 6 years ago. I don’t notice the omnipresent residential blocks that were sprouting up when I lived here so much now. At that time it was all the noise and construction cranes, but now they are just lived in as they are probably close to running out of room to build them, and forlorn families to kick out of residences to claim land for more.
This time, I don’t really notice them, and I am staying in one anyhow. What I notice is all the things I lived with before, that seem to not have changed very much. Plenty of things HAVE changed of course, but it seems more is the same than I expected. Although the society becomes more modern in very obvious ways, apparently many people who have become modernized are also going to revert to their traditional ways when they grow older. There is still no shortage of traditional culture in Beijing, and of course gongfu is sewn into that tapestry.
I do hope the powers that be can find a way to address their air quality issues because that is a bit terrifying, equally worrisome is the food safety situation. Aside from those issues, it is such an interesting place (for those who speak the language).
I am going to write a lot more about this in the future and also have some photos to share, but for now, a rest and then off to see Shifu again.
