A Walk in the Park

The weather has warmed up considerably over the past week so I decided to take a walk through a park that is a short distance from my apartment the other day. I don't really have much experience with city parks but this one seemed to hold many of the characteristics I have come to expect from the Chinese, namely, a lot of seemingly unrelated things thrown together.

The entrance to the park is a tall, grey wall with a metal gate. It is a good thing they put a hanging Mickey Mouse (I think he lights up at night) on the wall or it would be quite ugly. Once inside, I was drawn to the left where a small lake sprawled and decided to walk around it. One side of the lake is on the border between the park and the town with only a narrow walkway and fence in between. The other side of the fence mostly looked like a site of demolished houses since there were bricks everywhere. On the lake, I saw a couple people in paddle boats and on one of the banks I saw a man drawing lake water to help him wash his motorcycle.

As I was finishing the circuit around the lake, I was surprised to come across a couple of bears. There is a miniature zoo of sorts and, although I didn't get a chance to go in, I saw maybe fifteen cages some with animals and some empty. I don't think the animals are here full time--I think they travel to a town, visit for a while, then move on to the next town.

Next to the zoo is a grassy area with a winding path and several odd monuments. Some of them were odd in the modern-art sense but others were odd because they didn't look like they belonged there at all, especially the Danish windmill. Too small to be real but too large to be for miniature golf, I have no idea what it is supposed to mean. There were some people running around these paths in fatigues and, although I'm fairly used to seeing this now since the students wear them, it turns out that these guys are actually part of the army. Some of them tried to talk to me but my Chinese is still not very good and they didn't speak any English at all so it was mostly an exercise in futility.

A walkway under carved and painted wood (quite beautiful) leads off into a carnival-like area with rides and games and what I assume is like a haunted house for kids given the noises that were coming out of it. I decided not to engage in puke-inducing frivolity on spinning rides for that day.

There is a good bit of nature in the park, however contrived, in the form of trees and shrubs. It seems a good place to take pictures, a fact that was supported when I spotted a newly-wed couple and photographer there. (Just as a side note: her dress was actually quite tame compared to the ones I described previously.) Many of the older people I observed were playing games like Chinese chess aka xiang qi or card games. The general atmosphere was cheerful but relaxed. Unfortunately, for my part, I cannot be totally at ease there because I still draw a lot of attention even with all the available distractions. While on my walk, I had the constant urge to wipe my nose thinking that I surely must have a booger sitting on it. Regardless, I think I'll be spending quite a lot of time in the park during the summer months.