Life in Xi'an...

Over the last few weeks I had Brazilian lemonade with a German friend as we talked about her PhD thesis on youth movements, was treated to Italian food by my Indian friend who spoke about love and women since he and his Chinese girlfriend are thinking of marriage, hired a fellow who was born in Hong Kong (and in radio in the Philippines) to work in my company -- one of his projects? Setting up Toastmasters groups in Hi-tech Zone, bumped into a British friend at a coffee shop who is Buddhist and we exchanged ideas on the meaning of life and ongoing support of the earthquake victims in our province, visited a refurbished factory/studio complex in Xi'an to check out the work of a local artist who's dreams have lead him to paint dolphins bursting through ice bergs and discussed creation myth from the Amazon region and it's influence on his process, had lunch with my Chinese little brother who is heading to Nigeria to work as an interpreter on a railway project and shared ideas about the world being one human family, consulted with a Canadian website designer who lives in Shanghai part time when he's not in Singapore about creating a company brand and logo for my little (tiny!) consulting firm ---