Bicycle Races

So maybe Shelby and Mary and I didn't race along the City Wall, but we certainly biked, and we will be racing soon enough. After class today, our whole group met to go to lunch and bike along the City Wall. We took the (sparkly new) subway and ate at a Sichuanese restaurant. I have had no problem finding spicy food here. Frequently, it's má lá, which means "numb and spicy," a flavor combination I grew fond of back in the US. Maybe taking a long bicycle ride immediately after lunch wasn't the best idea, but none of us seemed the worse for that logistical choice.

Getting our bikes!

Shelby, Mary, and I took a long time to get around the City Walls. How can you blame us when the individual sections are so long that you can't see from one corner to another and the scenery is so beautiful that you have to stop every few kilometers for photos?

I'm finally coming to understand that I'm in China. This city has more people than the states of Missouri and Kansas Combined. I'm just now able to catch fragments of conversation and writing. I'm having strangers ask me for pictures in beautiful places because I'm also part of their experience.

View of the Bell Tower from the South Wall.

That faint line in the distance is the TV Tower.

I wish I had a better way to show you the scale. That building in the distance along the wall is less than the halfway point. Sometimes the walls just seemed to go on forever. The entire set of four is 13 kilometers (about eight miles) long.

This picture kind of just... happened.

My trusty steed.

It was surreal to be somewhere so beautiful. The hard work of riding a bike (something I haven't done in over five years and somehow managed to do well at) felt strangely similar to my Chinese studies. I was getting philosophical up there in the quiet.

I haven't been here long, but I've worked hard. I'm adjusting. And now... it's really sinking in where I am and the opportunities I have. Little by little, I'm learning to see China.

And, even more slowly, I'm learning to see myself in China.