It Is Not Just The Summer Heat That Lurks Ominously Under The Surface

Two weeks ago, we experienced temperatures touching into the 80’s and I felt the sense of foreboding, usually felt in May, that accompanies thoughts of the sweltering hot summer months here in Xi'an. Summers here are not what they are back in the lush green Isle of England and, though still a relatively young and healthy chap, I have, during them, found myself subconsciously acting as a rather efficient sweat producing machine. Here I was in March already concerned about what lay ahead.

However, only a few days later and with talk swirling around about dust clouds drifting off the Gobi desert, the skies darkened and everyone one came across had some kind of sinus problem to sneeze about. The pollution here is something, I believe, you get used to, but every now and again it comes up and hits you. Temperatures during the rest of the week steadily decreased and by the weekend, this was reminiscent of being back in Britain, it was raining.

Now, it doesn’t often rain, so it is sometimes quite pleasant to close the windows and curtains to the local street vendors cries and the murderous noise emanating from the newly fabricated building, just yards from my home, that now houses a KTV (karaoke) studio, and to retreat inside. Not to mention being happy to escape from the weekend masses that gather ten deep at bus stops and who jostle for position on street corners, hoping to stand out in some way from the crowd when the next taxi driver passes by, red light lit. There are also all the children in bookshops and the husbands joining wives in coffee shops, giving these places an unusual sense of busyness, that can be happily avoided.

However, the days of sunshine had managed to fool the poor shrubs and trees into offering us a branch or two of fresh buds and even a few light coloured petals in places. They say here in Xi’an that we really only have two seasons Winter and Summer, as Spring and Autumn are dashed through so quickly we are always seemingly being faced with the harshness of freezing winter, or baking summer temperatures.

I am not sure how true that is, as the last couple of years, we have had reasonably enjoyable autumnal evenings and a plentitude of spring mornings. However, these last few weeks the poor plants have been left confused and battered by the onset of summer and an almost immediate return to winter. We may have trouble enough dealing with this situation, the old plants, without the prize of consciousness and the consequential awareness of circumstance that it entails, must be pretty confused indeed.

However, to see the blossom on a sunny day after the bleakness of a polluted Xi’an winter is quite something, but to see the fresh growth of spring being splattered and dashed by the rain and wind is less uplifting indeed. Tomorrow, though, is another day here in Xi’an.

Finally, with reference to life on the playground this week, I have, as my Chinese has improved, begun to talk a little more with the kids at the various schools I teach at, this week a new lad came over and introduced himself to me. He was probably about grade 3 or 4, so about 10 or 11, he didn't seem a particular earnest young boy, just your average kid running about like all the others and then throwing out a couple of questions in my direction, as he passed by on the way back to class. However, his second question, after asking where I was from, was whether Britain would help China or Japan when they have a fight. I diplomatically shrugged my shoulders and replied that I was not entirely sure. In China, you quite quickly gain the sense of the loathing for Japan that exists not simply under the surface, and get used to it, but occasionally, just like the situation above, you observe the odd circumstance that concerns you.