May 25, 2004
One of the passengers on the boat was Leo Pondelik. He was a Professor of Music when I came to Millikin. Even more coincidental is that he had rented the house on William Street just before us—34 years ago.
We are still in “China” but in the special administrative region of Hong Kong—a free market society in the market socialist China. It’s a Sunday night so the streets are teeming with people shopping. As someone pointed out, Hong Kong people go to China for good prices; mainland Chinese people come to Hong Kong for real luxury goods. The North Face items here are real, which is not true of many of the “North Face” items in China.
Whatever Mainland China has, it has no setting with a location as beautiful as Hong Kong–the ocean and the peak are what the Chinese describe when they say “scenery”–combination of the characters for mountains and water. We will tour the city tomorrow and I hope to have time
to visit the Scout Shop.
I understand my postcards have not yet arrived. The delay demonstrates one of the values of the internet–the connection in real time. If someone were on line when I am (and I’m not on long because it’s expensive), I could answer you in real time. Right now it’s nine am Saturday in Bloomington.