{"id":4837,"date":"1995-06-02T11:54:00","date_gmt":"1995-06-02T16:54:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/?p=4837"},"modified":"2025-06-08T12:03:04","modified_gmt":"2025-06-08T17:03:04","slug":"a-major-trip-with-minor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/1995\/06\/02\/a-major-trip-with-minor\/","title":{"rendered":"A major trip with Minor"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Reminiscences\u00a0 2024<\/p>\n<p>I said I&#8217;d wanted to get back to China as often as I could.\u00a0 When an opportunity came up to attend the IAS workshop in Beijing, I was interested.\u00a0 When I approached Provost McNew, she stated she didn&#8217;t <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/files\/1995\/06\/ies.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-4846\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/files\/1995\/06\/ies.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"250\" height=\"277\" \/><\/a>realize my desire, and had named my friend Mike Seeborg as the faculty member whose way would be paid.\u00a0 I said if I could get nominated, I&#8217;d pay part of my own way and seek additional grant funding, and that&#8217;s how I got to travel to China with Mike, Minor and Ellen Myers.<\/p>\n<p>Minor was always a treat, whimsical if sometimes unfocused, with myriad interests that were always semi pursued.\u00a0 He was a sometimes collector of (fill in the missing blanks) and one of those interests was philatelic.\u00a0 When I purchased a passport of a British soldier who went from China back to England, with the appropriate stamps, I was so excited I had to show it to him.\u00a0 &#8220;That&#8217;s wonderful, Fred,&#8221; he exclaimed, looking over his glasses.\u00a0 &#8220;I think I have one just like it.&#8221;\u00a0 I never tried to trump him again.<\/p>\n<p data-wp-editing=\"1\">The 1995 trip to Beijing started with a Minor Myers treat: a chauffeured limousine to O&#8217;Hare.\u00a0 Good start.\u00a0 I remember Minor pursued Liulichang with the enthusiasm of Carolyn in a chocolate shop, gushing over the <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/files\/1995\/06\/47-IMG03372.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-4845\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/files\/1995\/06\/47-IMG03372.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"225\" height=\"204\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/files\/1995\/06\/38-IMG03363.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-4844 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/files\/1995\/06\/38-IMG03363.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"200\" height=\"265\" \/><\/a>antique &#8220;treasures&#8221; he had found, while his long-suffering wife rolled her eyes.\u00a0 Ellen freaked out when we were served scorpions, but then, she thought Tokyo&#8211;where you can literally almost eat on the streets&#8211;was dirty.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/files\/1995\/06\/15-IMG03340.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-4842 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/files\/1995\/06\/15-IMG03340.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"200\" height=\"292\" \/><\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/files\/1995\/06\/13-IMG03338.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-4843 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/files\/1995\/06\/13-IMG03338.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"200\" height=\"154\" \/><\/a>When the conference was over, I talked Mike into a train ride to Qingdao, which looked fascinating.\u00a0 We were staying in the &#8220;guest house&#8221; which, to my great joy, turned out to be the former residence of the German Governor General, who had surrendered it to the Japanese after a siege in 1914.\u00a0 A sign on one of the rooms indicated Chairman Mao spent a month there, and I hoped in the future, Mike and I would get the same recognition.\u00a0 What I remember best was being introduced to a Lada, a Soviet bloc car we chartered for touring, and having to push it uphill.\u00a0 Mike, more familiar than I with Eastern Europe, was not surprised.\u00a0 Qingdao was another place that would draw me back several times, for its salubrious seaside, and its still extant German efforts to make it resemble someplace in Germany.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Reminiscences\u00a0 2024 I said I&#8217;d wanted to get back to China as often as I could.\u00a0 When an opportunity came up to attend the IAS workshop in Beijing, I was interested.\u00a0 When I approached Provost McNew, she stated she didn&#8217;t realize my desire, and had named my friend Mike Seeborg as the faculty member whose &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/1995\/06\/02\/a-major-trip-with-minor\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;A major trip with Minor&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[66,85],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4837","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-a-dragon-dance-at-thanksgiving","category-a-major-trip-with-minor-in-1995"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4837","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4837"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4837\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9793,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4837\/revisions\/9793"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4837"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4837"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.iwu.edu\/factrack\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4837"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}