364 days at Peking

‘…A Squash vine grew beneath a towering tree.
In only twenty days it grew and spread and put forth fruit.
Of the tree it asked: 'How old are you? How many years?'
Replied the tree: 'Two hundred it would be, and surely more.'
The squash laughed and said: 'Look, in twenty days, I've done
More than you; tell me, why are you so slow?'
The tree responded: 'O little Squash, today is not the day of
reckoning between the two of us'
'Tomorrow, when winds of autumn howl down on you and me, then shall it be known for sure which one of us is the most resilient…’

Nasir Khusraw

Above is how I started my very first post.

I've stayed in this foreign land for almost a year... a year on 1st June to be exact.

I have met many new friends on this ‘journey’... including a blogger quite dear to me... better known to all here as Allied... I had the pleasure of meeting her about two weeks ago on my trip to USA.

You have met Shubby Doo and Flying Snow.

Here, I have tried to hold true to the fact that I never wanted this to be my ‘boxer rebellion’ despite the fact that this in itself is a secret society. This escape has been somewhat of a ‘battle’ because unlike ‘the boxers’, I have constantly worried that this incarnation of me would not be impervious to blades or invincible against the ‘fire spears’ of foreigners

Despite my fears, in this ‘Peking’, I have tried to stay true to myself.

Have I succeeded? I guess only The Good Shepherd truly knows :-)

So for the simply fact that in 364 days I never actually chose to ‘escape from Peking to Xian’, I'm going to celebrate this occasion by saying ‘Happy 1 year anniversary’ to this blogspot.

Blogville has been a rich experience to remember...