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Good morning. I am in Wuhan, China at Wuhan University teaching American Cultural Studies and a workshop on English poetry, or I should say poetry that is written in English. I am planning to write daily (or almost daily) blogs about what is going on. And most importantly I want to include poems written by students. Wuhan is sort of like the MIT of China: lots of physicists walking around (you can’t throw a stone without hitting one). So the poems you read will be mostly written by young scientists studying in some field of science.
I flew into Beijing on July the 6th, did some sight-seeing with my colleagues, 30 professors from the States, New Zealand and Mexico, and then took an all night train from Beijing to Wuhan.
It has been raining every day since I’ve been here, almost a constant downpour. I have never been in anything like it. Soon it is going to stop, to be hot, over 100 degrees. The steam will be rising from our bodies, the grass full of little insects biting, the air mosquitoes, the night sky bats flitting and eating. Despite all this, and the sweat constantly dripping from me like a leaky faucet, I like Wuhan very much; it is one of my favorite spots on earth.
You will notice in the photos that there is a beautiful polluted sun over Beijing at 5 in the morning, a mysterious young man holds the door open to the Forbidden City, the Great Wall is great, students are always running late for class, this one among umbrellas, and Chinese students treat the American professor with a lot of respect.
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Home movie 1: The Forbidden City
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Home movie 2: The Great Wall & the train ride from Beijing to Wuhan
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