“I very love it”

*posted by Amy*

Taoping 11- July

The water came back on!

Other than that, however, today was not too exciting. Breakfast, more congee, break off into groups after a small group meeting. Since I have been volunteered to organize this group, I decided to work on an analysis of the vegetation of the new town compared to the old town. We received some plans for how the town was supposed to be built, and there was a large number of trees to be planted, so that gives me hope, but as I said before, the new town wasn’t able to be completed, so it doesn’t have much tree canopy, and consequently feels much warmer than the old town. I tried to do a little work on the computer today, but I have found myself emotionally drained from being here. This town, as charming as the town is, and all of its inhabitants, gets me down. Walking through rubble, seeing the damage daily, seeing the blame game and the lack of planning in the plans, the propaganda about the old town not being damaged; it gets to be too much. I felt today was a good today to be kind of sluggish. So I sat around the courtyard and drank coffee and talked to the TA’s and professors about design suggestions we can over the villagers. I’ve been getting some good feedback, and I think our group can offer a lot of positive ideas for the villagers. Again, I won’t bore you not design-heads with the nitty-gritty, all you others we’ll talk ad nauseum when I get back.

Today marked the end of the trip for two of our faculty members; Manesh and Bob. They took off today after lunch, and already I miss them. Those two are like the Odd Couple. They are great friends, but they are always arguing about something. I really like talking with them as well on solutions to the problems Taoping is facing. Bob’s specialty is natural hazard planning, and Manesh focuses on more cultural aspects of cities and towns. They really were hilarious to watch bicker and knit-pick over words. We’ll miss there endless banter, to be sure. The day seemed to roll by, with people in my group checking in with me to make sure they are working in a “right” direction. The model for Chinese students is, I admit could totally be wrong on this, to ask what they should do, get the response, and then regurgitate the design using what they were told. This is kind of weird, because in our classes at UW we are constantly taking info and bending it into something unrecognizable from whence it started, constantly questioning everything we’re told along the way.

Another interesting fact of our American education is we take for granted environmental planning. We are immersed in thinking of ways to reduce, if not try to reverse, the human impacts on a site, that these concepts don’t exist in other places, for example Sichuan University. Yesterday, I mentioned maybe we try to reduce the overall footprint of the streets, to allow more open spaces, and more rainwater not to wash straight into the river. Later that day, the students want to break up the concrete and plant grass in between paving stones. Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s great to get these kids thinking about removing dams from rivers, restoring vegetation to streams, instead of having poured concrete walls, and even thinking about suggesting the village use green roofs in new construction. We will have to see how it all shakes out, but it seems promising.

Late in the afternoon, Josh and I decided to go for a walk up the road that leads out of town, and follows the smaller of the two rivers, up the valley. We hiked only for a half an hour or so, but as we did, we came across some amazing farms and orchards, we even found some fabulous white peaches that had fallen off the tree, super ripe, super sweet, and super tasty. We turned around because I had to get back to meet with my group, and that meeting ended up falling through, since no one had remembered it, or others were busy interviewing locals.

After dinner, one of the Sichuan students stood up, and sang a song. He did a great job, and then the cafeteria turned and started shouting “Jason, Jason…” He was stumped, and then some announcements were made including tomorrows agenda. We will be going on a hike, optional, to the top of the ridgeon the opposite side of the valley from Taoping. The hike will probably take two to three hours up, and then we will visit an historic tomb site dating from the Han Dynasty. It should be fun, and the views should be spectacular. After that, we are going to have a traditional lamb roast, with Qiang dancing and song. Now I should say, we were told lamb, but in Chinese the words “lamb” and “goat” are the same word, so it might end up to be goat. After these announcements, Jason stood up and said he would sing Sinatra’s “Fly Me to the Moon,” and he did a good job, only having to stop at the part when he sang “…and kiss me” because all the Chinese students started to giggle. He did great, though, and I have a feeling we might be singing more at dinner.