On and on just another brick in the wall

finally the great wall. i was still awe-struck even though i have been there before.  the giant wall made of bricks and rock just snakes along the mountain ridge for as far as the eye can see. the decayed wall from hundreds of years ago gives out this strange "lord of the rings" vibe. i felt like i am one of the characters in the novel.  the other strange sensation is that it is very likely some of my ancestors had worked on part of this monster.  philosophically, i guess this is the essence of the chinese mentality: inside of this thing is us and everything is ours, and outside is everyone else. we would like to keep the things just the way they are inside, for good or for bad.

TianJin is another city about 150 KM away from China.  a newly opened bullet train can get there in 30 minutes (at 333 KM/h), which is even faster than getting across the city of Beijing itself. i took a day trip with my uncle, aunt and her husband.  most interesting thing we saw was a house mosaic'ed with various type of china, vases, plates and broken pieces and so on.  the house itself has a unique Gaudi feel to it.