One week, 3 cities, and 135,657 steps later, and I am back with my host family in Zhuhai. The first thing they said to me when I got back: “Tessa thin black.” I guess I’ll take that as a compliment ?
This past week has been one of the most incredible weeks of my entire life. The students at No. 9 had to take their final exams, so we could not be at the school with them. Therefore, we took this week as an excursion. We visited Beijing, then Luoyang, then Xi’an, and saw many of the famous and historical sites at each destination, such as the Forbidden City, the Temple of Heaven, and the Terra-cotta army. As the week went on, I found this trip to be not so much avacation at all, but rather a period of discovery, growth, and better understanding of myself.
My first realization of this week comes from our exploration of the complex culture and rich history the people of China share. I thought that I had seen some pretty spectacular things in my life up until now, but exploring these cities and meeting the people during this week redefined what incredible meant for me. I have never experienced such wonder and awe as I did over these few days. I especially could not believe how advanced and beautiful some of these structures were when they had been built so long ago.
Take the Great Wall for example: it is over 2000 years old and one of the most magnificent and impressive things to ever exist. As I stood at the 14th tower and looked out over the breathtaking mountains and landscape, I couldn’t help but wonder how it was possible to build this all without the technology we have today. Or the massive Buddha at the Longmen Grottoes: I could not wrap my mind around how this was really made by humans so so many years ago. And the story behind all of these places made each site even more intriguing and left me wanting to learn more.
Visiting these historical sites put many things into perspective. The human race is capable of so many amazing things- so much more than we know ourselves to be. How can we become part of these stories?
In addition I have grown so much in my ability to trust others and have learned how important it is to have a sense of trust established between a close group. In the past, I have had trouble placing my full trust into the hands of other people and have thus often done things for myself and by myself. In China, however, it has been very different, and during this week especially, I recognized this. In previous weeks I had been comfortable with the area and knew what I was supposed to be doing, but now I had none of that and I couldn’t speak the language in the slightest. Thus I placed all of my trust completely in the Chinese speakers and had faith that they would guide me in the right direction (especially with the subways) to our destination, speak to the store owners for me, and figure out how to purchase which kind of tickets at the museums. In the hutongs especially, when I’d lose myself in the magnificence of the colorful cultures hidden in each nook and cranny, they knew exactly how to get back and on track again to the hotel. I cannot thank them enough for all this. A little trust can go a long way; sometimes even 11.9 miles in one day :)
Finally, I have come to begin to understand what it truly means to live in the moment thanks to this week. My instinct everywhere I went was to take lots of pictures. There is nothing wrong with that at all; in fact, it is encouraged so as to remember the moments and cherish the memories. Don’t get me wrong, the amount of egg selfies I took is unreasonable. But I overheard a conversation some students were having where they were talking about how they do not take many pictures and instead observe so as to soak in the moment more. This made me realize how not present I was being in thinking that making pictures would make me more present. If I could just take a step back and observe, I would realize that the best moments happen when you least expect them, like riding a bike on the city wall singing Ariana Grande at the top of my lungs, or sitting in a restaurant cracking up over how hungry we all are that we can barely tell the waiter our order, or pulling up to the wrong hotel in the taxi when we are already slightly delirious and thinking our hotel has been robbed, or even just looking out the train window at the beautiful sunset as we drive by. It was these uncapturable, unexpected moments that made each day so memorable. These go by unnoticed if one does not live in the present.
I know that that is a broad term, and I don’t know how else to describe it, but I do know that this week, I was able to figure out how to do so. I hope that I can carry this forward into these last two weeks.
