A Shaxi-Lense

Kelby

Today was another eventful day for the Sisterhood. Per usual, we woke up at 7:00 this morning, sat in bed until 7:50, and then met Mrs. Waterman for breakfast at 8:00. After breakfast, Iona, Elizabeth, and I all went back to our room, got dressed, packed our bags, and prepared ourselves for a day in the outdoors.

Evan (our tour guide for Shaxi Village) decided to take us for a hike up to some Buddhist temples. The way up to the temple was definitely the hardest part of the hike. Not only were we hiking upwards, but the altitude was higher than any of us had ever experienced (more than 2,000 meters).

The scenery was beautiful. We encountered multiple pavilions, what seemed to be a shrine, and a tomb placed on the hill of the mountainside. The trail leading us to the summit was cleared on the side of the mountain, so we had to make sure not to deviate more than a couple steps.

We finally got to the temple about 2.5 hours into the hike. The temple was everything you’d think it would be: remote, breathtakingly gorgeous, and rich with history. The temple contained multiple carvings of kings at the time of its birth, approximately the year 800. Evan then told us the temple was not discovered until 1949. Mrs. Waterman was amazed by how long it took for someone to find such a marvelous place.

The hike down was much easier, as well as more entertaining. Towards the beginning of the hike we encountered a shrine with no one to be seen. On the way down, however, we met a family from Chengdu. There were three boys: Ian, Evan, and David. Evan’s mother was adamant about all the boys speaking English, as it was their homework to practice speaking our language during their school break. I had the pleasure of talking to Ian about school, Evan about sports, and David about anything that came to his mind (his English was the best despite him being the youngest). At the end of our conversations, Evan’s mother asked if I could take a picture with the boys - of which I did - and proceeded to thank me for talking to the kids. The Sisterhood continued walking down the mountain and back to the village. On our way back, I turned to Mrs. Waterman and said, “Language is so cool.” She then replied, “Isn’t it!”

At the end of the day we walked 11 miles, 16,000 steps, and for 4 hours. We befriended 7 new faces, encountered a dozen more, and were able to do so all in a day’s work. But the numbers do not tell the whole story.

Sitting at the top of the mountain, I could see thousands upon thousands of trees; however, due to my perspective, I could not make out a single tree in the distance. Only the trees directly in front of me were the trees I could see the best, or make out as individual trees separate from the rest. This hike finally gave me the epiphany I needed in regards to perspective, of social and physical proximity. The boys I met today could not live further away from me than they do now, nor could they speak a language more different than mine, yet we were able to have conversations about our lives and find similarities between the four of us. To put this day in perspective, I’d say it’ll always be a large tree I can forever find in the distance.