It is estimated there are 7 Billion people alive on earth, I would like to think there is only one of me. Alas if only that were true. I think we are not unique and whilst we are products of our DNA, it does not make me the only one of me. For all my belief that I have something new and unique to say by blogging, I am not unique and my words are not new......they are just the random words mixed up in my head and then re-arranged into sentences posted on to this blog to make it sound like me.
.... this surely can't be Brighton Beach in late November ......
but it is you know .....
there can only be one SoD for it ....
however, it is not strictly true that there is only one SoD
in the past 7 years I have been to Australia a fair few times ...
but my arrival each time is met with a huge sadness ...
the fact he is not here to greet me ...
despite it being 24th November 2011 that I said my last good bye
oh what I would do to be sat here with him now.....
for just one more day ...
... It has been the best part of 40 years since I last visited main land China, and such is the change I saw on my arrival...... I could have been in any modern western metropolis ...... unlike the industrial town of Dalian in 1980.
Back then, there were very few private cars on the road, , most people were bedecked in Chairman Mao suits and riding push bikes. There was a road side butchers stall with the meat hanging in the open with string from the wooden stall, with the finest pigs head on show.
At the main dept store, we weren't even given real money to spend, just visitors notes ..... and as you walked in ... the most obvious ..... spittoons at each entrance to the store .....
Fast forward 40 years [or so] and the roads are filled with cars ..... even a Porsche Boxster .... KFC's ...... designer stores ....... people fixated at their palms, seduced by their smart phones ...... Micky D's and even a 'fake' Rover 75 ......
A taxi driver was using a smart phone for sat nav and a second phone to have a videochat .... all whilst driving .......
Although the funny thing was no spittoons ...... that having been said traveling in the airport shuttle bus .... the driver snorted up what sounded like a gold watch ..... and must have been hankering after the good old days ...... but instead he wound down the bus window and with a resounding thrup ..... it hit the tarmac ..... loverly I thought .....
I did discover though ...... that I and a chinese taxi driver had something in common. It was only by pure happenstance we should have met as well ..... for my journey to Heathrow, I thought I would buy a new thermos flask. I went to my local Tesco and looking through ... there was a very trendy style fliptop one .... not a flask, not a mug .... but somewhere in between ..... never seen them before, but that'll be perfect .....
Well bugger my old sea boots, as I was traveling in the taxi to the Mausoleum of the Western Han Dynasty of the Nanyue King ...... in between his video chats .... the taxi driver leant over to the other seat ..... and picked up ..... a fliptop thermos flask ... identical to one the I had recently bought ..... who'd have thought it .... a Chinese taxi driver shopping at my local Tesco store ......
Today's SoD was written by David Bowie and Iggy Pop around the time I was last in China .... it is said .... although I was not there to verify it .... that the song was written about a girl Iggy was infatuated with ... and possibly not even Chinese .... I have to admit I prefer the Bowie version ... as much as I love Iggy ... his version is a bit too raw .....
But it got me thinking .... if it was written 40 years ago about a young woman .... then by now, just like me .... a young man grown old .... then so must she ....
