Stanley’s blogworld

This morning I looked in my old passport to check when, on which date, I arrived in China for the first time. I knew the three year mark was coming up – the time period that I have been living here for now.
My old pasport has both a Hong Kong and Xi’an immagration stamps, dated 12 May 2005 – the date of my arrival in this country.

This coincidentally is also the same date that the massive 7.8 earthquake occurred on – 12 May 2008, on Monday afternoon.
As I am writing my thoughts here thoudands of people in Sichuan Province are still trapped in the rubble of collapsed buildings caused by the shaking earth. Rescue workers are relentlessly trying to save those that are still alive. It is already clear that the rescue and clean up process is going to take a very long time.

Literally almost all people, all over China, experienced the earth tremors caused by the earthquake. Even here in Nanjing – almost 2000 km away – in the high rises, people had to flee outside because of the violent shaking.
It has made the whole experience all the more real for everyone. Every morning I wake up and remember the recent events is like waking up from a bad nightmare – but I can only imagine what it must be like for those who got caught up in the disaster areas. You can’t help but sympathise with those in trouble, especially when you consider that circumstances could easily have been reversed.
Everyone is following the events on television and are making blood, material and monetary donations.

This has been a terribly eventful year in China so far.
On our (Carrie and me) arrival in Nanjing, in January, it started to snow and continued so that in the end it turned it be the coldest winter in decades. Other areas were worse hit and many lost their lives in the process.
Then there was the violent riots in Tibet and the contreversy caused by demonstrators as the Olympic torch relay made it’s way across the globe in foreign countries.
Not to long ago there was also a quarintine imposed in a local district in Anhui Province, our neighbouring province, to control an outbreak of the Head-Mouth-and-Foot disease that broke out amongst small children last month.

It has to be mentioned that the Chinese people and authorities has shown great unity and determination in overcoming these difficulties. I have a lot of admirance for the way the Chinese people has shown their solidarity during very trying circumstances – in fact all these events has only strengthened the resolve of a nation under siege – the human fighting spirit prevails.

At the closing ceremony of the last Olympic Games I watched on TV as the Greek Olympic Comitee handed over the Olympic flag to the Beijing party. It was followed by a spectacular coriograhped show of dancing and acrobatics by Chinese artists.
This awakened in me the dream to visit China – a dream that I can thankfully say I am now living.
At the time I decided to make it my goal to experience the Beijing Olympic games and that time is approaching very fast.
Being a long distance runner myself, I hope to be in the streets of Beijing on the final day of the Games when the men’s marathon is taking place. I want to be one of the thousands cheering on the runners.
In the meantime I have had many-many rich experience here in China – I will probably try and write a book about it some day – I enjoy sharing some of those experiences here on this blog.

Probably the greatest thing that has happened to me since I arrived in China, was when I met Carrie – to me she is a gift from heaven.
We have been together for a year-and-a-half now and this period has included some of my happiest memories during my time here.

I wrote the above part last Friday afternoon.
Today is Monday, 19 May - exactly one week after the above mentioned earthquake occured.
Last night there was a big fundraiser on CCTV (Chinese TV) and heaps of money was donated by various individuals and organisations.
This afternoon, at exactly 14:28 hours (the time when the earthquake occured), a siren signalled the time to observe a three-minute moment of silence. Chinese flags everywhere hang at half-mast today.