Spring into Summer
Pretty is the tea they serve Spring in China is a time when most teachers enter a workaholic phase. It is also the time of the black tea. High up in Shandong's Laoshan Mountains, experienced pickers work nimble fingered to bring us curative, black, Shandong tea. Time has been divided carefully, like tea leaves, between Qingdao and Beijing, then back to school, running up, down, and along the corridors, trying to locate classes that are last minute changing…students rushing along with us, puffing on sweet-smelling cigarettes. And as we rushed, spring went wild with flowers trilling and singing, tumbling down, entwining with other plants, going anywhere their tiny branch fingers can go - a form of social flower consciousness. Midnight flowers Roadside flowers in Beijing Zhou Gu Jing - celebrated brush painter The other day I leant some words in Chinese to describe Qingdao flowers: Savage, 狂野 - Kuángyě, Willful, 任性 , Rènxìng, Restive: