Going Home...
That's a good title for this entry. The past three weeks have been 9 flights and 4 overnight train trips, and the highpoint was a visit to a small town were I lived for almost two years. I don't have a particular place that I consider to be my "home" anymore, at least in the common meaning of the word, since I'm quite comfortable in so many places, but this trip to revisit a place that I both loved and hated is probably as close to "going home" as I will ever get.
The small town is Dunhuang, Gansu Province, China. It was really fun to see my former co-workers, to again meet the restaurant owners who were happy to share a drink, and to say hello to the key-makers sitting beside their carts in the crowded streets. A small town in an empty desert, coated with the dust of eternity; every day the women sweep the streets, and every night the stars put back the dust in its proper place.
The town itself is probably only a few hundred years old, but the immediate area has been populated for at least 1600 years, and life in those times revolved around an oasis and hundreds of caves carved into a limestone cliff. 490 of the caves, created over a 1000 years, have been preserved, and are open to the primarily Buddhist tourists who come to see the thousands of frescos and painted mud statues. Most of the caves are entirely covered with art honoring all the Buddhist deities, and the depiction of life in the middle of nowhere. One cave has a sitting Buddha that is at least 50 feet high, and it is amazing to think of the lives and effort and devotion that was consumed to create all the intricate detail of the caves.
The town can be both wondrously and infuriatingly small, but that is the contradiction of life in rural China. I loved to walk the town in the cool evenings, winter and summer, and watch the thousands of people who seemed to be constantly moving. Dunhuang is today the center of a busy agricultural area, and people from the farms were always in the town at night, shopping, selling fruit and produce, standing in line at the one theater to see a vaudeville show with acrobats and dancers and comedic skits that I could not understand. As a desert town, most activities take place outside in the markets, and I enjoyed that, because life probably hasn't changed too much in the thousand years, except now one sees fewer donkeys and can have the choice of either warm or cold beer as one sits under the summer stars.
I had to leave after a few days, and as I walked to the small plane across the flat and empty airfield, I did feel a little sad. I guess its the feeling of leaving home. Maybe, someday....
Dunhuang: entrance to one of the many market areas in the town
An small spring and pool of fresh water in the desert a few miles outside of Dunhuang, called Mingshashan
The cliff and Buddhist caves in the oasis, the Mogao Grotto.
Example of the frescos at Mogao, just a small part of the thousands painted, depicting Bodhisattvas.
(Last three photos are from tourist sites, since no photography is allowed inside the caves; other two are much better than any I ever took.)
That's a good title for this entry. The past three weeks have been 9 flights and 4 overnight train trips, and the highpoint was a visit to a small town were I lived for almost two years. I don't have a particular place that I consider to be my "home" anymore, at least in the common meaning of the word, since I'm quite comfortable in so many places, but this trip to revisit a place that I both loved and hated is probably as close to "going home" as I will ever get.
The small town is Dunhuang, Gansu Province, China. It was really fun to see my former co-workers, to again meet the restaurant owners who were happy to share a drink, and to say hello to the key-makers sitting beside their carts in the crowded streets. A small town in an empty desert, coated with the dust of eternity; every day the women sweep the streets, and every night the stars put back the dust in its proper place.
The town itself is probably only a few hundred years old, but the immediate area has been populated for at least 1600 years, and life in those times revolved around an oasis and hundreds of caves carved into a limestone cliff. 490 of the caves, created over a 1000 years, have been preserved, and are open to the primarily Buddhist tourists who come to see the thousands of frescos and painted mud statues. Most of the caves are entirely covered with art honoring all the Buddhist deities, and the depiction of life in the middle of nowhere. One cave has a sitting Buddha that is at least 50 feet high, and it is amazing to think of the lives and effort and devotion that was consumed to create all the intricate detail of the caves.
The town can be both wondrously and infuriatingly small, but that is the contradiction of life in rural China. I loved to walk the town in the cool evenings, winter and summer, and watch the thousands of people who seemed to be constantly moving. Dunhuang is today the center of a busy agricultural area, and people from the farms were always in the town at night, shopping, selling fruit and produce, standing in line at the one theater to see a vaudeville show with acrobats and dancers and comedic skits that I could not understand. As a desert town, most activities take place outside in the markets, and I enjoyed that, because life probably hasn't changed too much in the thousand years, except now one sees fewer donkeys and can have the choice of either warm or cold beer as one sits under the summer stars.
I had to leave after a few days, and as I walked to the small plane across the flat and empty airfield, I did feel a little sad. I guess its the feeling of leaving home. Maybe, someday....
Dunhuang: entrance to one of the many market areas in the town
An small spring and pool of fresh water in the desert a few miles outside of Dunhuang, called Mingshashan
The cliff and Buddhist caves in the oasis, the Mogao Grotto.
Example of the frescos at Mogao, just a small part of the thousands painted, depicting Bodhisattvas.
(Last three photos are from tourist sites, since no photography is allowed inside the caves; other two are much better than any I ever took.)
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Cool!
Hope that you are enjoying whatever Spring weather you are having. Let me know if you seee that flick. id be curious to see how you like it.
Cheers