Nanchong Baby

It's been heart-achingly beautiful out, when the morning fog clears, and I've slipped down the steep muddy banks of the river to watch the sunset, and ridden my bike all around the campus looking for love. Shelley and I arranged to meet for a short (but wild) frisbee toss. Mmmm, Sunday afternoon. There were nine boys playing volleyball like they knew how, and I made ten. They let me serve a bunch, and every one flew true, but I didn't get close to the front row, apart from my faithful block-covering 马步. I may as well not have been there since they missed few hits. They set high and the outside hitter cooly switched his cigarette from his hand to his mouth before the approach.

A yoga teacher from India talked about smoking that evening in a first-floor classroom decorated with pink balloons. He confirmed that we (and the boys especially, since they're the smokers in China) know it's bad for us, and then asked why we still do it. Like all the other things we know are bad for our bodies and still do. Like the delicious cranberry scones that I made this morning and shared with Shelley and Phil and Hainan coffee. Two and a half teaspoons of margarine, almost a teaspoon of sugar, and a whole lot of cream in each one. For five years I've been listening to Chinese people, and mainly middle-aged woman, talk to me about food, and health, and I'm starting to listen. 

When Kathi came from Beijing we talked about eating whole foods instead of the derived nutrients and "enriched cereals" we Americans try to pass off as healthful. This time of year people in Sichuan eat a lot of sweet potatoes. Street vendors roast them over coal in a fifty-gallon barrel and sell them when they're so soft and caramelized you eat them walking home straight out of the little plastic bag. People cut sweet potatoes into chunks and steam them along with the rice, piling them into the bowl with the reminder that they're very "nutritious". And rarely more than that; there's no explanation of vitamins or minerals, or fiber, just, "Yogurt helps digestion. Dates are good for women. The chicken broth is full of nutrition. Bitter melon is good for you. Here, have more."