Chenyin Pan's Blog – June 2010 Archive (3)

Leaving the bunch hustled to get on the tricycle, I was plodding along as my head was turning a little dazzle. Breathing had become more difficulty and each puff had taken longer time. I wasn’t so sure whether it was the load I was humping or it was the impact of the altitude that start to get into me. Humping, yes, that’s the word for it, with the North Face backpack full load on my back and an HP 16 inch laptop in front, though the load wasn’t as heavy as the ones Tim…

“Which train you were on?” The young guy in baseball cap, sit aside of me, asked.

“The one from Shanghai,” I mumbled, “that damned 48 hours ride.”

“How come they arrived early today?” He grinned with sincerity, since I really can’t detect any mischief in his sunburned face.

“Guess Buddha sensed my piety to this pilgrimage to Lhasa, so he pushed the train a bit.” Tried my best to be funny under the circumstance, I was satisfied as he giggled…

“That’s the problem of servitude: when you domesticate a member of our species, you lower his productivity, and however little you give him, a barnyard ends up costing more than his worth. For this reason the colonists are forced to stop breaking him in halfway. The result: Neither man nor beast, but the ‘native.’ Beaten, underfed, sick and frightened, but only up to a certain point, yellow, black, or white he always has the same character traits-lazy, sly, and thieving, who lives on…