West market - a warm afternoon in late summer

 The sign reads (Right to Left) 'Great Tang West Market'.  On either side is an image of an Apsara - a Buddhist angel in a style typical of the fusion of eastern and western images connected to the ancient silk road.  The building is actually a hotel - I had a look inside - but there definitely was a West Market on the West side of the Tang Dynasty capital, Chang'an, in the early part of the first Millennium.  It was the eastern terminus of the multiple silk roads and for centuries they traded with Samarkand, Baghdad, Constantinople, Rome, etc. Hence the image of the camel with exotic musicians aboard.  I had a coffee in Starbucks, had a wonderful chat with a teacher from Texas and then wandered around.  There is a fine museum, but it is closed on a Monday.  Most of the buildings are entirely commercial - selling expensive luxuries from all over the world.  I looked at beautiful carpets, jade carvings, silk and jewellery.   On one of the upper levels I found a small Tibetan shop.  the staff consisted of a Tibetan man with a guitar and an attractive Chinese girl wearing a baseball shirt.  We quickly established that they spoke no English.  I asked if I could look around and they invited me to have some tea.  The Tibetan wall hangings (Tankas) are very colorful and traditional; about what you would expect.  I wanted to make some kind of contact with them because I feel Tibetans in general can use all the encouragement they can get.  He seemed to like that I greeted him with 'Tashi Dele' and palms together in the traditional fashion, but communication was pretty slow after that.

 The tea was excellent and they were interested that I could put the photo on Facebook.  Feeling pleased and a little embarrassed I promised to come back.
These days I have plenty of time on my hands.  In contrast, the city of Xi'an continues to bustle by me ceaselessly.  There is a Chinese phrase for all the movement which translates as 'car (or cart) water horse dragon'.  This is used,with a lot of poetic licence, to indicate that there's a stream of busy traffic.  I, however, have time to contemplate the purpose of my existence within the multitudes.

As well as being frenetically busy, the city is not very clean; the air seems dust-laden.  Incredibly, on the bonus side of the equation, I have some wonderful Chinese friends who keep sending me messages to make sure I'm OK and to give me useful advice.  Much of the advice concerns eating.  Probably there are some unfriendly Chinese people, but I never meet them. There is no doubt that many people want me to stay in Xi'an.
Eventually, I will have my own apartment and an electric motor scooter.  At present I am making connections and creating a life for myself; much as I did in Taiwan.  In Taiwan it took 6 months; here I must be patient as I'm still only halfway through the first month.

Thought for the day: The past is like another country - the fact that we cannot go there does not imply that it does not exist.  Einstein proved that time is a dimension related to the first three.  Xi'an as a city has been taking such trouble to raise echoes of times gone by.  To me, the fact that people are just guessing about what happened here centuries ago in the Tang dynasty is irrelevant.   If the past does not exist why do I find it so fascinating?