Of Any Fig Leaf

I’ve decided to try to read an article in Chinese every morning.  I read the New York Times. skim the Huffington Post and look for what I’ve missed in the Washington Post just about every morning.  I don’t do TV.  And it is therefore an educated person’s obligation to read, to stay aware.  And beyond a certain point it’s a luxury and an excuse to forestall work.

This fall I have ridden my bike to and from the gym.  This means I don’t have to do any “cardio” when I’m there.  I don't miss the boring time spent there on the stair-master, but it was when I kept a thin life line alive with regards to me Chinese language study , as I’d do flash cards on my Pleco app to make the time go faster.  No such activity is possible on a bike.  And this absence of any fig leaf for my Chinese, was beginning to bother me.

So, for the last few weeks, I have instituted a read-a-Chinese-news-article policy to my morning.  If I have so much time to read one more editorial suggesting Trump’s days are numbered, I have the time to see what the news is in the Chinese press.  For a while I was reading the party organ: The People’s Daily.  But often you get bumper-harvest-in-Shanxi stories and I have lately been looking at Tou Tiao for variety: https://www.toutiao.com

Today there was a sad story of a young student at a prestigious university who took her own life.  She’d left a note about the shame she felt, being poor, having no way to make ends meet.  It was intimated she slept with people for money.  Because I have to read the vocabulary over and over to get the able to read the article unassisted her story seemed to drill deeper and deeper into my mind and one considers just how wretched a place like Beijing would be if you had no one to protect you.

Thursday 12/127/18