Farewell to China

Photo: Confucius and I

I write this as a farewell to Beijing, China and finally open up about a place that I have lived, breathed and experienced. This is more of an introduction at the tip of the iceberg; I am sure that as time progresses with my return home, more details about my life in China will surface. I've included various photos of my stay in Beijing on my blog as well to further document this experience. This entry is important because it has been here that I've found inspiration for all of my poems written–

Reflection By Charles Sapp II

My adventure while living abroad has been memorable and allowed me to grow as a conscientious being. The moment I stepped foot on a different culture’s soil, all expectations drained from my mind down to my feet and exited into the ancient land of Beijing China; this is when my soul searching began.

I imagined China as being like the movies, where old men with long beards and mustaches wearing large sleeved robes and sandals walked slowly with their hands behind their back, while music of erhus, zhengs and dizis play mystically in the background with plumes of incense fog pervading the air like spirits wandering the streets. To one’s amazement Beijing was quite modern and up on times, especially for being a communist country and just recently opening its doors to foreigners.

Living abroad as a vampire is not ideal and I do not recommend it. My fiancée and I worked late nights to mimic the American work schedule which demanded a lot of sheer willpower and sacrifice to our social life and natural biorhythms. Becoming familiar with your surroundings and getting your bearings on track, took time. My fiancée and I had to paste addresses of places in Chinese to a notebook to communicate with taxis to be able to get around. This was a painstaking task, and all throughout one must stay leery since it is known that foreigners are targets of scams and are taken advantage of frequently. We had our fair share of long detours and taken out of the way to raise the taxi fare, not to mention the cost of items in markets are astronomically inflated also.

The food is magnificent, but quite different than the common Chinese food found in the US. It proved extremely difficult to know what to order, just because it said chicken didn’t mean that it was skinless or boneless, it could’ve been the feet, head, knuckles of the chicken or strictly bone. You kind of learn to choose from the menu that had pictures and if it was good, stick with it. We found places that served American food and became the dominant source of food during our stay. There is also the obvious such as the smog, it really lets you cherish the moment when you have clear blue skies, which are extremely rare. Coming from California, it is outside of my comfort zone when making sure that restrooms are not squat toilets. I am a large man without the flexibility and having to utilize a squat toilet is out of the question! I could continue on with a long list of dislikes such as public displays of spitting, but I would like to adhere to the positive experiences.

Looking back, the profound experience that I will take with me forever was the soul searching and I found my soul mate to be 100% compatible, since we literally spent 24 hours together 7 days a week; the longest time we spent apart may have been 2 hours while she went shopping. This is a testament to our relationship and allowed us to endure and experience every side our personalities and character. Not many couples can say that they’ve done so on foreign soil, unless they were stranded on a deserted island, so cheers to us and our upcoming vows of marriage in April, 2009.

Hope Within Humanity

I write this poem while remembering the victims of the Wenchuan earthquake. I have been deeply moved by the amount of emotion that has been pouring from the people worldwide, within tragedy there is still a glimmer of hope and the true essence of humanity surfaces. My thoughts and prayers remain for those still ravaged by the disaster.

By Charles Sapp II

Tattered clothes
and dust clinging to perspired skin,
a face with determination and purpose,
with a hint of grief.

Nature seemed to turn away
and display the effects of neglect.
The purpose almost seems arbitrary,
but the balance of normalcy is forever changed.

Material from the material world suddenly dematerializes
to a faint and soon irrelevant existence.
The hand of a fellow man and the taste of faith,
ensures compassion for the soul
and continuance of the power of love.

The witness of children wiping mother’s tears
to clear, watery blur of distorted sorrow.
Children are messengers for a hopeful future.
Taught to teach the primary ways,
inert or inherent as bare necessities outweigh the forgotten.

Laughter will soon fill the air and journals will be written
and surface to display the common characteristic of humanity
during its finest hours which transcends all cultures.

What Time is It?

I have been cultivating my ideas and expressions for almost a decade and I am finding that it has never become outdated. The intensity and presentation has been stronger than ever and the release is more mature like fine wine, it must age. My question is this:

What Time is It?

Do you know when it is time to relinquish these thoughts? Especially when time is consistently updating the history; we encounter all of the social, political, and economic events that shape societies existence. We are even more pressed on time when we finally acknowledged the environmentalist cries almost 3 decades ago that global warming is real and we must make a change to our behaviors and greed upon resources. Are we too late?

When I first began writing I found an urgency to expel my information to the public, with fears that it will be too late and my message would be redundant; I sat and pondered my "unactivist" approach and lost most hope and became more disgruntled as I watch the substitution of intellectualism for pop-culturalism.

Since living abroad in China, I have recharged my batteries as a writer. I am able to see things from a different angle or perspective—everything is up close.

Recent studies report that China uses 3 billion plastic bags a day, beginning in June they are prohibiting the use of plastic bags. The 2008 Beijing Olympics is a platform to show the world their strides on environmental issues. They are planning to remove 1.5 million vehicles off the road during the Olympics to reduce traffic and pollution. These are proactive solutions for dealing with waste and pollution, especially in a city that is by far the most concentrated place on Earth. As an American I've noticed public announcements to become more "Green Conscious"; is it enough?

When is it time as a collective, do we attempt to become active in our world? Rather we destroy ourselves; the Earth will flourish; however, at the rate we are going as parasitic beings, we may not be able to repair our damages. Hopefully we all remember that no matter what NASA or any space agency is attempting, we only have 1 Earth. So, what time do you have?

An Anomaly in China- Big Black Soul Brother #1

My views of China before I arrived was full of mystery with thoughts of dragons, kung-fu, chow-mien, and wise men with long gray beards and mustaches, circling pagoda buildings and reciting Buddha's mantras of enlightenment.

With these types of thoughts, I too was a victim of naivety and media brainwashing. If this is what I thought the Chinese were about, then what do they think about a brown skin, husky build man with curly hair?

Without understanding of my origination, the first impression is that I am African; until I speak English without an accent. I get the "Ahhh, American… Hollywood". I laugh, we all laugh—briefly. My first day upon arrival; the CEO of my company had his driver pick me up from the airport. He stared at me and shouted "Cha-rowls (Charles), big black soul brother #1…" I died laughing in disbelief from what I just heard, coming from the first person to speak to me in this foreign country; mind you, this was all the English he knew. I knew this was going to be an interesting stay. I have been told that the only reference they have about African-Americans is through sports and movies, and anything other is just a complete fascination; however not all fascinations are of acceptance.

I've been told numerous times that being black is not the reason for the stares, its being a foreigner, an American—or just being fat! I laughed because in America, I am just like everyone else; I can find clothes my size.

The time spent here has been nothing more than a walking spectacle, they are quite curious to see what the big man wants to order from their picture menus (just because it looks like, or says beef, doesn't mean that it is beef—sometimes you must ask what part of the cow). Catching taxis is like wrangling cattle; they stop, look and wave their hands and keep going. The rejection from a taxi is quite often, which is not good when you are standing in the freezing cold. Speaking of cold, I laugh to myself because most people that look like me are here during the summer months but when it gets cold all the tourists leave, I guess to go back towards the equator where its warmer, this could be a reason for more strange looks, they probably ask "why is this one still here?" All in all I will never forget this experience, it has allowed me to reflect on what many years of communism can do to people and how even in 2008, the world can still be caught in time's reflection—the past.