qingcheng shan

[cris]

Earlier this week, I was having lunch with a friend and describing to her how ayun and I had spent a couple of days in Sichuan taking the train out to the countryside to climb this holy mountain called Qingchen Shan. "It's supposedly the cradle of Taoism," I said, "so it's this mountain that's really almost like a vertical park with a bunch of temples

Comments

[strange_quark]

The 2nd photo of the vista from Qingchen Shan is gorgeous.

I don't want to be too grumpy on your blog and I've enjoyed reading your impressions of the Motherland, but it's a teeny, tiny bit offensive that you compared visiting and staying at a Daoist holy site with visiting hollowed-out, post-industrial American cities known for being crummy. I think it's more apt to compare the visit with, say, staying a night at a rural colonial homestead and working in the garden for the day for fun. Equally "authentic" and representative of America as Worcester, but probably nicer and also visited for the sake of historical (if not religious) interest.

[cris]

I think that's a fair critique, P, and honestly musing on the last bit was more coincidental than intentional. The place was gorgeous and the people there were great hosts; I think if anything, what was more coming to my mind was the idea that a traveler's experiences or memories can be as much about how they're interpreting/projecting expectations as it is about the inherent beauty or joy found in a place or time. Sometimes we go looking for something specific and sometimes we're surprised by what we find.

[strange_quark]

Oh, yeah, I understood that it was coincidental -- just pointing out the rather unfortunate comparison that you ended up making. Many times, I think that one's expectations do a huge part of the traveling itself -- the physical act may be necessary, but we derive almost as pleasure from the anticipation and our imaginings (and, conversely, from our memories) as the visit itself. It's nice that you take the time to write the results of your travel up; it contributes to the well of joy that people find from imagining places unknown.