Infinite Sadness—Part I

Some forms of sadness go around in circles. They have no beginning and no end. And so it is with my time in China. There hasn't been a day when I wasn't hurting. It's the old curse* at work again.

I was often giddy with the strangeness of it all, frequently frustrated and nearly always sad. But, oh, for all that I have gained! I have gained and I have lost. Is this better than not to have tried at all?

No, I think I'm with the old bard on this.


But just now I can't think about it. When I try to open my mind just a tiny bit it feels so bad that it makes my arms tingle, so at this moment it's best not to dwell on it at all. I'm sitting on a bench somewhere not far from the West Lake, feeling the heat. This incredible heat. Trying to cool down.

And trying not to think.

I was sure that I would see the woods turn in the autumn. Autumn must come, because the leaves on the trees are small. I was wondering whether snow would really settle on the Broken Bridge, and where all the plants and insects would go when winter comes. Because one thing is for sure: we don't do seasons like they do them here.



But all of these things will still be the same tomorrow, and the day after. The cicadas will still whine and people will still eat icecream as they walk through the perspiring woods and stare into the cool, dark mirrors of ponds, occasionally broken by a flicking fish or a falling leaf. However, I will no longer be here to see it. I will be gone.

As I contemplate the scenery during these last remaining hours, it feels as if a part of my world has just died. Only images remain, already fading like a dream that I cannot quite wake up from.

A white-gloved guard standing silently to attention at the approach to the Qiantang River Bridge as the busy commuter buses rattle past, day after day, hour after hour. Just behind him, the Six Harmonies Pagoda reaches into the sky. Hillsides furred with tea bushes. Moss-painted stone lions watching over bamboo forests and lotus ponds. Banana trees lining the wall of Wallmart, as seen from the Yellow Dragon Stadium. The city painted in neon at night.



Quiet streets where I did not dare to take pictures, although I don't think anyone would have minded. People sitting outside, reading papers or playing cards with the children running around among laundry being left out to dry not a hundred yards away from the frenzy of city life. Martial arts in the local park in the morning, aunties dancing in the balmy air at night. The new and the old co-existing side-by-side. 21st century life with Chinese characeristics.

All this time I was watching, anticipating, waiting to see how this city would change with the seasons and how it would gradually unfold for me. But I must not let it touch me. Not now.

For me there will be no more Hangzhou tomorrows.

*When I was a child I made a pact with the devil. I wanted to have adventures, to discover new things, to travel to distant shores.
The devil agreed, but of course He extracted a price. He didn't want my soul, because there is no such thing as a soul. No, the devil is a sucker for entertainment. He wanted to watch me squirm.
He granted me my wishes.
But I could never call a place home.