Journey Home 4

July 13th, 2012 Q woke up in the early morning, at probably 3 a.m. and thought it was 5 a.m. and so still too early to move around and stir up the hostess. He resorted to his iPod to kill time while I lay awake pretending to be still asleep. It might be another two hours before he got up, and I followed suit. Immediately did L and T even as the latter had stayed in a different room. T in his jogging outfits suggested in a whisper that we go out with him for a walk, which we were also thinking of. On tiptoe we left the apartment where our hostess QH was still sleeping. We each guessed what hour it might be in the elevator and discussed the necessity to adjust the times on our cellphones and wristwatches as we reached the ground floor. To our surprise, the clock in the hallway told us that it was earlier than all of us guessed: it was just turning five a.m. as we stepped out of the building. T quickly jogged away after promising his Dad that he would just follow the pedestrian and so wouldn't lose himself. Q, L and I sauntered along, taking in every noticeable objects. Q comments on the little flower gardens and L looked excited to be on a street so different from what she had ever seen. What really caught Q's attention was some peddlers peddling little two-wheelers with "Fry Cake" shining in red on the greyish white boards. That was one of Q's favorite foods before he left Ch, and for a decade or so, he had been missing it. He followed the carts, and we followed him until the carts stopped two hundred meters away in front of a hospital. Despite his watering mouth, Q decided not to buy anything because he thought those address specifically to the patients could not be high-quality on top of the fact that he had already read too much about food safety in Ch. before he landed--indeed, Q restrained himself from taking any street food and so no "fry-cake" at all during his whole journey in China. We moved on, past some decent-looking gym, some grand hotel, and a very smelly public restroom in between. We'd smelled it at least twenty feet away. L asked what it was that smelled so yukky and Q asked why this grand capital city could not even got its sewage system straight. "It might take another half a century for Ch. to catch up with Am. in this aspect," commented Q. I indicated for him to be calm. He probably did not need my suggestions; for as soon as we were out of the smelly area, he was happily chattering about what traditional northern breakfast food we could have: fried bread stripes, steamed dumplings, soy milk, millet porridge, wonton soup, bean curd jelly with black mushrooms marinated in the mixture of soy sauce, vinegar and green-been flour. As he talked about this, I suggested that we return; for suddenly my stomach ached for all those things he mentioned. Q agreed that we should walk any further away but walk slowly back so that T could catch up. By the time we were near the apartment building, T emerged in front of us, as if out of nowhere. It was a few minutes less than six, though, when we arrived and checked the apartment building clock. We decided to go quietly in and try to sleep another hour or two. As it turned out, we lay awake chattering quietly for another hour or so and happily got up at the sound of our hostess stirring up. Soon