doc summers on Tiger Mountain

Our travel-study group returned to Texas at DFW airport on Friday evening May 23rd, after an active, intense trip. Most of us were “pretty healthy”, though China’s air pollution had depressed the upper respiratory systems! So: Beijing, Hong Kong, Guangzhou, Xi’an, and then back through Beijing (with an extra night due to an unworkable airport transfer) — what of it all? And what of our presence in Xi’an during the three national days or mourning for the Sichuan earthquake victims? Let me suggest a metaphor for the entire trip, which we had to re-route just before departure anyway. Speaking urbanely, the term protean works (the simpler word is changeableness) from the Greek sea-god Proteus who could change shapes. Or, as D. Wainscott took to saying, “flexibility” in the face of possible diversions, delays, or frustrations. Altogether we could accept surprises and perhaps serendipities, and there were some, even to the last when we spent yet another afternoon and evening of group bonding, unplanned, at the Guo Du (Sino-Swiss) hotel near Beijing airport. Did we get some needed rest, recuperate from some brief illnesses, have an in-house picnic with help from the local grocer, (watch the finals of American Idol, some of us), and get one last look at some stunning contrasts of wealth and poverty, new and old, in Developing China in the neighborhoods close by? Yes, all that. Fundamentally, though, what we had was life, but in uncustomary contexts. That’s travel, and that’s part of the aim and intention for our international programs. We will be evaluating these things more, and I’ll write some more in dialogue with our group members. Maybe some of them will respond to this posting, too.

I’ll get a photo or two up here later today.

So our plan to be in Lanzhou at our partner institution Lanzhou University of Technology will not work this year (no foreigners in Gansu Province), and our international director has us on the Beijing to Hong Kong train — only a 25-hour trip. We can do that. Let’s call it quality time for our group, and an opportunity to meet other rail travelers. Our historical focus will change from Silk Roads ancient and modern to the geopolitical and economic history of a maritime entrepot, the Hong Kong of almost seven million persons. We also get to visit our partner institution in Guangzhou (The Guangdong College of Foreign Languages and Art), just a two-hour train ride after we depart HK. But only for three or four days there, though we will be able to visit some classes, spend time with their students, faculty, and administrators, and visit some key sites in GZ. More later, especially the Travel Study China Report on the ETBU website.