Our hotel in Kunming
…But I’ve been struggling to find something to write here about my experience. That’s not for a lack of material to work with, it’s simply that I don’t know how to organize my thoughts on the events that happened! I had an incredible experience with new friends making music in a community where Western opera isn’t well known, and we’re all better for it, I can tell you that much.
I learned an incredible amount about myself, about making music, and about how I fit into the world while I was gone. I also learned that in China, drivers DO NOT yield to pedestrians, so your life is in your own hands the moment you have to cross a street. I also learned that one really doesn’t want to ingest the water, because it will make him or her sick (as it did to many of us after we had an unfortunate encounter with a DELICIOUS salad that was apparently washed in tap water).
My best idea is to write about the things I did in the best ways I can think to group them: my trips to the Buddhist temple (which was by far my favorite place in terms of what I visited while in China), the Stone Forest (a tourist attraction akin to visiting … the Grand Canyon?), the vocal experience I had … the feeling of being on parade any time I left the hotel … et cetera! Hopefully you’ll get some stories you enjoy.
