When Mirror asked if we could take part in a cleanup event on the beach, I hesitated. I’ve never done this kind of thing before, and it sounds not very interesting to me. “But it’s very meaningful!”, Mirror insisted. “Then OK, let’s sign up”. It turned out to be not a bad idea to do the cleanup as the team leader Jason told us some facts about how plastics are damaging our environment, especially the ocean. And what we could do to turn the situation around. Plastics are so common in our daily lives, but if it’s not disposed properly, it could end up in the ocean. When the fish in the ocean eat those plastics, they could be poisoned. And if we eat those fish, the poison could end up in our body. I couldn’t help but think about a scene appeared in Blue Planet II – a fish was entangled in a net. It appeared to be so innocent. What are we doing to their home? A fish entangled in a net – from Blue Planet II Blue Planet II is a 2017 British nature documentary series on marine life produced by the BBC Natural History Unit. This landmark seven-part series bring viewers face to face with unexpected new landscapes and introduce compelling contemporary stories from our ocean. Over the course of more than four years, the Blue Planet II team have mounted 125 expeditions, visited 39 countries, filmed across every ocean and spent over 6,000 hours diving underwater to bring us closer than ever before to the captivating lives of some of the most extraordinary sea creatures. Blue Planet II from BBC In the last episode of this film called Our Blue Planet, Sir David Attenborough examines the impact of human life on life in the ocean. With evidence of albatross parents unwittingly feed their chicks plastic, mother dolphins potentially exposing their new-born calves to pollutants through their contaminated milk, and even man-made noise drowning out the natural sounds animals use to communicate, many creatures are struggling to survive. Despite these devastating impacts, this film contains an inspiring message of hope. In the Galapagos one scientist has devoted much of his life to saving the largest fish in the sea - the whale shark. In the Caribbean, a community is working to save giant leatherback turtles by protecting the eggs and animals they once took as food. Attenborough is watching a leatherback turtle struggling ashore to lay eggs. A boxset of the Blue Planet II DVDs, with a private letter from presenter Sir David Attenborough, was presented by Theresa May to Chinese leader Xi Jinping during her visit to China on 1 February 2018, expressing the determination to end the plastic pollution with China. We could see how British are committed to save our planet by bringing major polluting countries together. Now, China is the world's most polluted country. We’ve achieved great economic development, but at the expense of our environment. Some kind of action has to be taken and we all could make a small contribution starting from right now. Picking up trash along the coast was what we were doing in our part to save the ocean. Starting from Xichong, we trekked along the coast half way towards Dongchong, then we returned back to Xichong along the same route. Along the coastline, we enjoyed the gentle breeze touching our faces and great views nature offered us. But we also had some bad experiences. On several occasions, we smelled strong stinking smell given off by dead sea animals. We could be responsible for their death, I thought, as the ocean is polluted by us. The dead seal gives off stinking smell. Along the coast, plastic bags, water bottles, and foams are major pollutants. They were must be thrown by hikers and fishermen. To reduce those wastes, our 50-member team is far from enough. We must help to promote the environment awareness of hikers and fishermen. By leading by example, we were hoping that what we were doing would have some kind of positive influence on tourists who happened to pass us by. Some tourists gave us thumbs up and some thanked for our hard work. We are cleaning up the coast. We are getting our hands dirty. Group photo with all the trash we picked. March 3rd, 2018 will be remembered as the day when we made a positive impact on our planet. Green Foot will be remembered as an organization which brought us together.

On 26 February, I got an urgent email from our salesperson David, asking my supervisor to send me to Tanzania for on-site assistance to one of his customers there. His customer is from Selcom, a local telecom company which provides network of point-of-sale terminals. The last time I was there, it’s in November 2015, and I was there to train their software engineer Andrew some basic stuff about our SDK (Software Development Kit). The headquarter of Selcom is located in Dar es Salaam, a beautiful coastal city to the west of the Indian Ocean. I stayed for about two weeks in that city the last time I was there. During my stay there, Andrew took me to the nearby beach and we had a wonderful stroll along the coast which had left a deep impression on me. I was impressed by the pristine ocean water, the winding shoreline and the deep blue sky. I said it’s an urgent email, so how urgent it is? The CEO of Selcom wanted me to be there within 1 or 2 days for their crucial deployment on an NMB (a bank) project. Our salesman David took it seriously and had a talk with my supervisor immediately after he showed up at work on Friday. My supervisor knew this was an urgent issue, so he agreed to let me go. After more than 19 hours of air travel, I was finally here at Dar es Salaam Airport. The temperature here was hot as usual – more than 30 degrees. I followed a group of passengers to the immigration hall and saw piles of people were filling out their forms. I felt a short of breath because of the unbearable heat and congestion in this tiny hall. I went to the desk and get a visa application form. I was familiar with this kind of form since I’d been here month before. I found myself a tiny open space on the desk and started to fill the form. Like the last time I did, I chose travel as the purpose of my stay, then got into the line for my visa application. When I finally got my turn, I handed my form and passport to the officer in front of me. He had a close look at my passport and had a brief review of my form. Then he asked for the purpose of my stay. I told him I just want to travel here. “Where do you want to visit?” he asked again. “Emm… to tour around the city,” I was totally unprepared for this type of question. “How long are you going to stay here?” “About one week.” “Can I see your ticket?” I thought he’s referring to my boarding pass, so I handed it to him. He said, “no, I mean your travel schedule.” Then I took out my e-ticket itinerary and handed it to him. He looked at it then handed back to me. “You’re doing business here,” he said without any expression. “Why are you saying that?” I was very surprised and felt a bit anxious. “Because I saw your movement.” He flipped through my passport. “I have experience with this, and you should be open,” he continued. I felt like a kid caught with my hand sticking in a jar. I didn’t know what to say because I’d never expected of this kind of situation. “So, what’s your job?” he urged on. “I’m a software engineer,” I have to confess. “So, what are you doing here?” “I’m going to provide on-site assistance to a local company here. It’s our customer.” I was totally open now. “You must tell me the truth.” He seemed to be not satisfied. “Yes, what I’m telling you is the truth.” “OK, you’ve to pay 250 dollars,” he said. “No way.” I felt angry about his decision. My mind went blank as I had no experience in dealing with this kind of situation. Watching me agonize over this issue, he offered me another option. “You can choose to pay only 50 dollars, but you’ve to pay me 50 dollars in this case.” “Can I get a receipt for 100 dollars?” I asked. “No, only 50 dollars.” I was thinking if I can get a 100-dollar receipt, then I could ask my company to cover the expense. As I was thinking for a solution, the officer urged me to sign my name on a paper. On that paper, he wrote down 50 dollars as the amount I should pay for visa, which mean I was going to pay him 50 dollars as a return of his favor. After I wrote down my name, I reluctantly fished out my wallet and checked all the cash inside it. Having failed to find a 50-dollar bill, I simply told him I don’t have 50 dollars. “So what’s your choice, or do you want to pay 250 dollars?” he showed his impatience. “You must make a quick decision, there’s a long line behind you.” His constant urging had really driven me nuts. After having waited for a while, he retrieved the paper from me and changed the amount to 250, then pointed to the direction of visa payment counter nearby. I took the paper and stepped aside. In a fit of anger, I squeezed the paper into a ball. Never had I ever felt so frustrated during my business trips before. I found a corner in the hall and tried to calm myself down and find a solution. I reached my phone and tried to call my colleague David, since he’d more experience traveling abroad. The connection was so bad that I only heard him a few words before the line dropped. I was on my own again. I only had about 300 dollars in my pocket, so there’s no way that I was going to give them most of it. The only chance that I could pay less was to try my luck on another officer. There were total of four officers sitting side by side. I quickly filled out a new form and lined up for the one who sit the furthest to that bad guy because I didn’t want to be noticed. Luck was with me – without many questions, that kind guy granted me tourist visa, which meant that I only had to pay 50 dollars. As I was waiting in the line for paying my visa fees, that bad officer recognized me and motioned me to get out of the line and go to him. I realized something bad was coming. He felt being deceived and forced me to pay that good officer 50 dollars as a kind of compensation, or I could face the consequence of being deported back to my own country. It’s been more than two hours since I stepped into this hall and I felt enough is enough. So I paid them 50 eventually and ended this ordeal. This experience may have tarnished the image of this country to me, but warm-heartedness of most of the people I met here so far is something that I could never forget. I still love this country. Love to hit the bars with local people and drink Kilimanjaro.

As early as June, I got an assignment to work on project for an African country. Since then, I'd been working like crazy to meet the deadline I was given. After months of hard work, this project had finally reached its final stage, and we were asked to go to Sudan to provide on-the-spot technical assistance. On August 16th, my colleague Joe and I were landed at the Khartoum International Airport. It's such a small airport that it only took us a few minutes from where our plane landed to the terminal building. (I've been to some other airports in Middle East, it usually takes us more than 20 minutes.) And I heard that this was the country's largest airport. When we arrived at Rotana Hotel, we were amazed by its glamor and luxury. This was one of two five star hotels in capital Khartoum. It has anything we want: a gym, a large backyard with well-groomed trees and lawns, and a swimming pool. But living here came with a big price -- we'd to pay over 200 US dollars a day. The backyard of our hotel.Donkeys Are EverywhereThe next day, our customer Mohamed arrived at our hotel to pick us up. On our way to his office, a donkey-drawn two-wheeled cart appeared in front of us coming from nowhere. Mohamed told us that this cart was commonly used to deliver fresh milk to households and this kind of transportation was common in his country. He was clearly shocked when I told him, I've never seen donkeys before in China. Days later, when Mohamed pointed at a donkey by the roadside to bring my attention, I told him, “I’ve seen enough donkeys.” Donkeys were seen everywhere, as the power for a basic means of transportation.A Visit to International ParkOn a sunny Wednesday, since Mohamed didn't come to our hotel, we stayed in our hotel the whole morning. In the afternoon, as I got a bit bored, I searched on Google Map to see if there's some interesting place nearby. On the map, I saw there's an International Park just across the Africa Road in front of our hotel. I was curious about what park looks like in this country, so I ventured out on an adventure. The main gate of the International Park. The Heritage Village in the park. Traditional adobe dwelling in Heritage Village. Traditional dwellings made of mud and straw. Fitness equipment seen in the park. A Chinese restaurant near the park. China House in the park. It’s desolated and abandoned. Litters and grass could be seen from everywhere. I was intrigued and wanted to know what happened to this place, but failed to find the answer on Google. When I was returning back to my hotel, I saw yet another donkey-drawn cart loaded with three boys. The moment I took out my cellphone to shoot a photo of them, the tallest boy jumped off the vehicle and attempted to give me a kick. But his foot was a half-meter short of touching me, he then quickly returned to his seat, laughing with this fellas. I was really scared, but as they moved further away from me, I was thinking: maybe he means no harm, just wanting to show off his kung fu.Power ShortageOne night, when I was doing my work in Mohamed’s office, the lights were suddenly went off and my laptop was shut down (the battery on my laptop was unusable). There was a short silence in the room, then Nabil said, “Welcome to Africa!” We all burst into laughter. I later learned that power outage was very common here even though we were in the capital of this country.Tuk-tuk -- Local TaxiWe usually didn’t have lunch, because we didn’t like local food. So, when darkness fell, we would usually take a cab to a Chinese restaurant, which was affiliated to a Chinese hotel called Nantian International Hotel. We realized that we couldn’t find a sedan car as a taxi, tuk-tuk car was the only means of transportation for us. A tuk-tuk car was taking us to our hotel. This kind of car was literarily anywhere. It could be stopped by a simple wave of your hand in the air. The fares were not charged by meters, so we’d to ask the price before we get on. The local language is Arabic, so we often ran into difficulties when talking with the drivers. Oftentimes, when they were asked the price for our trip, they would reply us in Arabic, and we would asked them to speak English. Still, they would speak Arabic. As we were stuck in this situation, my colleague Joe came up with a brilliant idea. He took out his cellphone and gestured the driver to input the price on his phone. Would the driver input a number that’s too high, we would change the number to a smaller one for a bargain. The haggling would continue for a few rounds until both of us nod our heads. Because of the language barrier, it’s no surprise that drivers would sometime misunderstood us. One particular evening, we told the driver we want to go to Nantian Hotel, the driver was confused and muttered something in Arabic. Joe then told him it’s a Chinese restaurant. He seemed confused no more and indicated us to get on his car. Before we got on, we asked the price. He told us “ten”. We then jumped on, happy with the fare, as this trip would usually cost us 15 – 20 Sudan pounds. Soon, we sensed something wrong – the streets were not familiar to us. When we asked the driver why he took this route, he replied in Arabic. We felt helpless and were feared that something worse would come. Minutes later, he stopped his car in front of a restaurant called Great Wall Restaurant. It’s indeed a Chinese restaurant, but not what we were looking for. We told him that’s not the place we wanted to go, and we told him one more time that Nantian Hotel was the place we wanted. He seemed to know our place now, as he started his car again. A few minutes, he pulled over in front of another Chinese restaurant. Again, it’s not we wanted. We were angry and helpless, we wanted to get off but we were in a small alley and no other tuk-tuks were in sight. The diver seemed to take us from one Chinese restaurant to another, until we find the one we wanted. Not to repeat the same mistake, Joe took out the business card of the owner of the Nantian Hotel and showed the driver the address of the hotel. When the driver seemed confused by the address written in English, we asked a local seating at the doorsteps of a shop nearby for help. We showed the address to that local and said we wanted to go there. He seemed to know that place and told something to our driver in Arabic. Our driver nodded his head and seemed to know how to get to our hotel now. As he started his car again, we told ourselves, we had to trust this guy one more time. Finally, when we were dropped outside Nantian hotel, we felt a huge sense of relief. We just wanted to have a dinner, and what a roller-coaster ride. City After RainfallMohamed once told us it’s the rain season of their city, but we didn’t see any rainfall during the first week of our stay. In week 2, when the rain finally came, we found the roads were inundated with water. After a rainy night, Mohamed sent his colleague Osama to take us to his office. On the way, we saw large pools on the road one after another. The pools would stay there days after the rainfall due to the absence of drainage system. Nabil (Mohamed’s colleague) once joked with me: sun is their best drainage system, as it will evaporate the water in pools. A large pool of water was seen on the road after rainfall. A pool was formed near Mohamed’s office.Street KidsEvery time we were on the road, we would see a group of kids. They moved along with the traffic, with some of them held some goods in their hands – they were the moving salespeople; some without anything in their hand, would take any chance to approach a stopped car and extend their bare hands to people sitting in the car. Seemed that large proportion of children in this country were not attending schools and they’d got much urgent thing to deal with – hunger. A street boy was selling goods on the road.FarewellOn last day of our stay there, Mohamed took time out of his busy schedule, and took us to a tourist attraction – Sudan National Museum, where we were introduced to the culture relics and learned a bit history of their country. He then treated us with a feast. After the lunch, Mohamed took us to the airport. Near the airport, Nahid (Mohamed’s sister) met us and presented each of us a piece of gold jewelry as a token of gratitude for what we’ve done to this project. Joe and I were overwhelmed with emotions and words failed to describe how grateful we were for their hospitality and gifts. I knew deep down that, there’s something worth more than gold – the way they treated us and the bond between us.

In the early morning of Saturday, August 1, I got up earlier than usual. I put a backpack on my back, and had a tripod on my shoulder, and headed towards Shenzhen North Station. From there, I was going to take a train to Xiamen, a city which I'd never been to. The journey took me about four hours, and I was lucky to get a seat near the window of the train. I plugged earbuds into my ears, and started listening to music. While my eyes kept looking at the outside of the window, I was thinking about how we're going to meet and how we are going to spend our times together. Just two days before this trip, when I'd made my decision to go there and meet Ron, I called him and told him my schedule about the trip. I asked him if he had time to meet me that weekend. He said: yes, we could meet at Saturday afternoon. So, at Saturday afternoon, half an hour before the scheduled arrival time, I got a text message from Ron. He said he's waiting for me at the Xiamen North Station. He gave me a brief description about his precise location and the clothes he's wearing, just to make sure I didn't miss him in the crowd. Ron was certainly recognizable as he's the only foreigner in the crowd. Ron asked me if I was hungry. I said not so much. He gave me an IC card, with which I could take public transportation in the city. I followed him to a BRT station where we had our bags searched before we got in. When we were on BRT, Ron started to take out his iPad in order to show me the pictures he'd taken while he's on his holiday in Canada just a few weeks ago. Some of those pictures I'd seen before, because he had already shared them on Moments. As he was sharing pictures, he talked about things that were shown on pictures. I could have met him a month earlier, before he returned to Canada for his vacation. When I first expressed my willingness to meet him a month ago, he said it's a good idea, but he's busy preparing for the trip back home. Then, I said, I could wait till he comes back. He revealed some of his plans for his vacation, and showed me pictures of his tent with which he's going to camp in parks in Canada. He promised to show me more pictures as he goes on vacation. So during his travel back home, when he visited a new place, he could post some interesting pictures on his Moments. Every time I saw those pictures, I'd know he'd a wonderful time there, and I'd be happy about that. I told him I wanted to visit Gulangyu, so as soon as we got off BRT, he brought me to a ferry where we could buy our ferry tickets to that island. When we got close to the counter, we were told that tickets were only sold to Xiamen citizens. There's another counter nearby that sells tickets to outsiders, but it's closed and I was not sure when it would open. It's a bit sad that tickets for locals and outsiders are sold separately. Left with no options, I asked a staff standing nearby, how can we get a ticket. He said we could buy it on Wechat. Then I told Ron that we could first go to find a restaurant nearby, and during our lunch, I could buy our tickets on Wechat with my cellphone. As we were having our lunches, I was scrambling for our tickets online. Since all tickets were sold out for this afternoon, I bought two tickets for Sunday afternoon. That afternoon, we went to Xiamen University, since I was told that its campus is very beautiful. At the gate, there's a lineup, most of people in the line were tourists. When we finally got in, I was shocked to find that it's more a tourist attraction than a university. Looking around, I saw people were shooting pictures of the school buildings at the lakeside, leaving behind them trashes on the ground. With booming tourism, comes business opportunities. I even saw several peddlers were selling selfie sticks in campus. I couldn't deny the beauty of the campus, but I had to keep myself constantly reminded that this is a place for learning while everything around me tried to tell me otherwise.Xiamen University In the next morning, Ron and I were met nearby his apartment. Since we were quite close to the sea, he took me to a beach where we could take a stroll before we took a BRT to the ferry. As we walked along the beach, Ron told that this long stretch of sand beach was once nonexistent when he first came here years ago. The sand was dumped here only in recent years to create this artificial beach. As we were walking past a group of young people, a guy greeted Ron with a hello. Ron said hello back. The group then went away, with smiling on their face. I told Ron that he's popular here, then he told me another story. There's once a driver went so far as to get off his car to say hello to him as he's walking on the sidewalk. When he said hello back to him, it turned out that he didn’t have anything to say anymore. "Maybe that's all what they've got." Ron laughed.Beach we walked along When we landed on the island, we didn't know where we should start exploring. I told Ron since he's been here several times, he could be my tour guide. He suggested we first take a look at the map of the island, then we could decide where to go. So we went to a map near the ferry, and he asked me where I wanted to go. I pointed my finger at Zhengchenggong Memorial Museum located at the center of the island, then northward at former U.S. Embassy. "How about these two places", I asked him. To which, Ron agreed.We started our exploration from the northwestern tip of the island, then made our way to the center in search of the Memorial Museum. We didn't find the museum there, instead, we went to a forest where there were a variety of birds. There, we shot a lot of pictures of different birds that we'd never seen before. We spent a lot of time in front of a waterfall, a place where we could see many birds flying around. I asked Ron to sit on a bench in a shelter, so that I could take pictures of him against the waterfall. It turned out to be a great setting as we reviewed our pictures on camera. We also took turns to shoot pictures of each other standing and sitting on a wooden bridge. The next place we went was called Sunlight Rock. It's said that if you don't go to the top of that rock, you've never been to Xiamen. Maybe, that's why so many people were visiting there. I thought the top would be very high, but when we found that we could reach the top without breaking a sweat, I was not that impressed. On the top, we could get a bird's-eye view of the whole island, and it's also the place where we got quite a lot of memorable pictures. Top of the Sunlight Rock When we got off the Rock, we started to find our way back to the ferry where the exploration got started. As the sun went down, we boarded a ferry and said goodbye to a piece of land where we spent our most memorable times together.Overlooking the city on Sunlight Rock

Ron is a semi-retired Canadian, who now works in Xiamen, Fujian province. I wanted to know more about him, so I started a conversation with him on Wechat. Originally, I just wanted to know more about him, but the conversation turned out to be a shocking revelation about our higher learning. Here's an excerpt of our conversation.ME: Do you teach in Xiamen?RON: No, I was offered several jobs but for me to take one the school would have to fake a university degree for me. I never completed university. ME: Yeah, you need a decent degree to get into teaching.RON: I could teach or work in jobs that require university degree in Canada, USA or UK as my dual Citizenship (Canada & UK) and work experience allow thatME: But in China, it's different.RON: The sad fact is any degree allows you in to teaching in China, regardless of the subject or school. It is really meaningless and apparently 50% of the foreign teachers do not have degrees the schools fake them. I was interviewed by a school in Hangzhou and they told me I was the most qualified applicant for their Business English Teaching position, but we agreed that we did not want to fake a degree so I could take the job.ME: Is it easy for you to fake a degree here?RON: Yes I met four foreign teachers that had fake degrees, two of them told me they were working for the school for more than a year before they knew the school faked a degree for them. My 11 years as a practicing and Certified Project Manager gave me the skills to do the job. However though I am qualified my PMP oath and morals do not allow me to break the law like that.ME: It's shocking that schools could help them doing that kind of thing. It just shows the corrupted education system in our country.RON: I do not blame them or judge them, if I was in their position I might have gone that route too. Since I can live on my retirement money I do not need the money, however it would help me travel more in China if I could work there and earn travel money.ME: I sometimes think of ways to work in foreign countries so as to better their language and culture.RON: You have a degree right? Then it is possible especially with your English skills to obtain foreign opportunities.ME: I got a college degree but the school I attended is a mediocre one.RON: That matters less than what you do after you earn the degree.RON: To me the real shock is that the system prevents qualified people from taking the jobs legally. So when the school runs out of qualified applicants who do they hire? Unqualified people with degrees that are looking for any work;Qualified and motivated people that do not have degrees;Native English speakers that are willing to bend or ignore the rules.I did not realize until too late in my career that the main reasons that foreign opportunities for me were rare was because I did not have a University degree.ME: Yes, degree is important in China. For most of corporations here, degree outweighs working experience when they need to find employees.RON: Degrees are important for foreigners to work legally in most countries. However the U.S. Green card program also recognizes Work Experience and responsibilities on the job to qualify as equivalent to having a degree. If China was that advanced in their policy I would have been teaching in Hangzhou for three years. Instead I am enjoying the beach, cycling, travel and language exchange while I am in China.ME: It's sad that our system prevents someone like you to work here.RON: Only because of the law probably encouraged by universities. But that is the reality so I accept it. It denies industry and schools from obtaining some of the most qualified and motivated teachers though.ME: Ultimately, it's the talent that's important, and having a degree does not mean that someone is talented.RON: Yes talent, motivation and patience . The great thing for me is I have a strong belief in mentoring, tutoring, giveback to the community, so I am enjoying tutoring Chinese people one on one that are learning English and now getting instruction and practice in Chinese. I cannot change the world, but I can give a hand up to a few people and help them change their life, while learning and enjoying life myself.ME: Yeah, that's the right attitude towards life. I agree most of the things you've said.

As usual, when the weekend approaches, there will be some links about outdoor activities emerge on social network. An organizer nicknamed Uncle Tudou put on a link called Trekking Paiya Mountains on Wechat. Many people followed up, and I was one of them. When I signed up for the activity, I was dragged into a Wechat chatting group immediately. There were over a dozen people in this group and they were discussing how to meet on Sunday and how to prepare for this event.Uncle Tudou suggested that we should have a picnic in the mountains and everybody seemed to agree on this issue. But the problem was that we've to bring so many things to the mountains, like food, fruit, gas, cooking utensils, etc. Undeterred, Uncle Tudou took the challenge and put himself in charge of assigning each one of us a task of bringing something so as to share the burden. While males were assigned to bring heavy stuff, females got things that were easier to carry. Since the Uncle Tudou knew that I had a DSLR camera, he only asked me to bring my camera, and appointed me their photographer. I was glad that I got this job to do, because I love shooting pictures, especially when I was in the wild.We were told that we got more than 12 kilometers to cover and the highest altitude could reach about 700 meters. That was not an easy task especially considering the hot temperatures of that day. Since no one in our team walked the route before, it's not surprising that we got lost a few times. But when we got lost, we held together and didn't panic. Few of us had downloaded a map on their phone, so they could have a reference to directions. But the map was not precise enough and it showed some problem to locate where we were on the map. The first time we got lost, it took us more than half an hour to find out ourselves to be lost, and another half an hour to return back on right track, thanks to a guy we met on the road who pointed us the right direction. The second time we got lost, we were already in the mountains, and we were on our own since no one else was there. Some guys again tried to locate ourselves on the map, but failed time and time again. We walked back some distance and had some rest, while Uncle Tudou was busy on searching for the right direction. Before he came here, he had read some travelogues about other's trip to this area. Some travelogues had a brief description about how to make choices when trekkers met a fork in the road. He cross checked on those writings and tried to find some clue. Eventually, we backed up some distance to a fork, and took another road--we were back on track again.March to the Mountains IMarch to the Mountains IIThe first half of the trip was grueling because of the sweltering heat and the absence of wind. We were all sweating profusely and had no choice but keep on walking until we could find a stream, where we could start picnicking. About half way up the mountain, we finally found a stream and the water was crystal clear. We had a quick survey around the place and found that it's a perfect place for picnic. We dropped our backpack on the ground and washed our hand and face with the cool water in the stream. After a brief rest, we started setting up cooking gears. Some brought vegetables to the river to be cleaned while some others were preparing a pot of soup. I knew what I was supposed to do at this very moment--this moment should be captured in camera. I held my camera and started taking pictures of them preparing, cooking and eating food. When they had smiles on their faces, I wanted them to have a lasting memory of those moments.Into the woodsPicnickingAfter the picnic, we were once again back to life. The rest of our hiking was much easier as the higher we got, the views were getting better and most importantly, the wind was getting stronger, which helped us to cool our body temperatures. We had a big celebration when we finally reached the highest peak of the mountains with the altitude of 707 meters. We celebrated the victory with a feast on a watermelon and a Hami melon as we all believed that they were the sweetest when having them on the peak. As we were tasting melons, we didn't forget who carried them all the way to this height. The guy called Mr. Feng who pulled off this feat earned himself the title "hero". Our hero carried those two melons weighing more than 15 kilograms up to 707 meters high singlehandedly and never complained. Several times, he was asked to share his burden with the rest of us, and he said no every single time.Vertical ascendingVictory aheadOur team was never short of heroes when I saw boys extending their hands to girls to relief them the burdens on their shoulders, and when I saw a guy reaching his backpack for Band-Aids because a girl just got her feet cut.Hami melon for celebrationWatermelon for celebrationOn top of the world

After the two-day exhibition, it's time for us to relax and have some fun. We had a small discussion on where we should go in the coming two days before we pack things up and go home. My colleague Shilin proposed that the first day we should go to the desert and ride the camels, and we should spend the next day touring around the city and visiting some famous scenic spots. The rest of us thought that's a good idea. So on May 14th, after the lunch, we started our trip to the desert. When we arrived at the desert, we were asked to get into a specially-designed SUV, and this SUV would take us to a camp in the heart of the desert. As soon as we buckled our seatbelt, a roller-coaster like ride began. Safari was more adrenaline-driven than we could possibly think of. There were many occasions where I thought our vehicle would overturn and we would be suffering serious bruises. Luckily, that never happened to us. But others might not be as lucky. Half way into the desert, we saw a vehicle tilted to one side with one side of its wheels totally submerged in sand. Our driver wanted to tow it out of sand. So we got off our vehicle, and stood back with our fingers crossed. A guy standing beside me greeted me by saying "Nihao", I looked at him perplexed. He asked me, "Which part of China do you come from, are you from Guangzhou?" I said, "No, we're from Shenzhen." He then said he's an Iranian and he loves China. And then, he started to sing a popular song in China--"Little Apple". That surprised us even more.The tilted vehicle on safari.As soon as we arrived at the camp, we saw two camels standing not far away from us. It's my first time to see camels, and they were taller than I had imagined. We got closer to camel and wanted to have some pictures with them. My colleague Spring motioned me to take some pictures as she stroke different poses in front of a camel. After a series of photo shots, it's time to ride this thing. While Shilin and Spring were mounting a camel, I shot a series photos of them--I wanted to capture every moment of this new experience. When the camels started to walk, I ran past them in order to take pictures in front of them. I could tell you: it's really hard to run in the sand and it's especially true, when you're holding a heavy camera and want to outpace a camel. When Shilin got off the camel, he urged me to have a ride too, and he would be my cameraman.My colleagues were riding the camel, while I was the cameraman.After the camel-riding, we entered the big camp, where we could find a table to sit at and have some rest. Right in front of us, there's a big stage. We were told that there were live performances there by the time the darkness fall. So we sat there, waiting for the performance to start. At this moment, a middle-aged man approached us and put some narrow-necked flat bottles on our table. The bottle, filled with fine sand, was a work of art, featuring a camel and the writing "Dubai" on each of its two sides. We knew immediately that he's trying to sell them to us before he could open his mouth. Initially, he offered a price that was too high. We haggled with him over the price for a long time. Finally, he gave in, and agreed to sell us at the price of 40 yuan for each piece. Three of us eventually bought 13 pieces in total.We were gathering around our dinner table.What we didn't expect was that this camp could offer us a buffet. The food of choice included rice, pancakes and kebabs. I put a little of each of those in my plate and returned back to my seat. As we were having the dinner, we were treated with local dances and stunts. What a beautiful night!The local dance.The next day, we were on a tight schedule to visit some of the most iconic places in the city. The driver who's going to take us tour around the city happened to be a Chinese from Heilongjiang province. He had been here for as long as eight years, so he knew the city like the back of his hand. On our way to every place we were going to visit, he'd be introducing us to that place with a lot of facts, background stories and anecdotes. That had made our journey more enjoyable even though we spent a lot of time on the road.We first visited two seaside resorts: the Jumeirah Beach near Burj Al Arab Hotel--the only 7-star hotel in the world, and Palm Jumeirah--one of the world's largest artificial island. We stayed briefly on Jumeirah Beach largely because of the unbearable temperature (up to 50 degree Celsius). We stayed on the beach for no more than ten minutes to shoot some photos against the backdrop of Burj Al Arab Hotel, then we had a swift retreat to our car. Me on Jumeirah Beach against Burj Al Arab Hotel.Riding on a monorail to Palm Jumeirah. Ahead of us is Atlantis Hotel.Then we went to the Dubai Museum, where we got a glimpse of the city's modern history starting from the 1930s and got to know how the city came into being out of a piece of desert. After that, we visited the Gold Souk and Spice Souk, where large quantity of gold and spice was traded daily. As the sun was going down, we reached our final stop--The Music Fountain. Across the water, we could see Khalifa Tower, with its spire shooting straight into the sky. The lake promenade was crowded with people as the fountain show was about to begin. At 7:30 pm, the show began as the classic song "I Will Always Love You" by Whitney Houston started to play and water started to dance to the music. When the song reached its climax, the water was shot into the new heights, and the audience was screaming with awe. We were visiting Dubai Museum.Walking along the street of Gold Souk.Burj Khalifa Tower--world's tallest manmade structure.Music fountain show.That's our last night in Dubai.

When I was still working in my office last week, my uncle called me and told me my father was with him and he wanted to tell me something, then he transferred me to my father. I was a bit surprised and expected something urgent.Instead of first asking me how I was doing on my job as he usually did, he went straight to ask me if I could transfer him ten thousand yuan immediately because he just lost his job and wanted to go home raising chickens to earn some money. He explained further that he went to Zhejiang province with my uncle to be a shoemaker, but things didn't go well as planned. "Maybe I'm too old to be a shoemaker, and I'd be take a train back home tomorrow," he said in self-pity."But I thought you are in Changsha doing some construction works, why would you go to such a faraway place?" I asked. "Right from the beginning of this year, our construction team has got less and less contracts, which means that I could get a lot of days off. But I couldn't wait, so...""Dad, you need some rest," I interrupted. "You're now in your fifties, and should consider your retirement. Now, I've grown up and would never ask you for money anymore, and neither would my sister as she's got her own family. So, why you're still in such a hurry to earn money?" I tried to persuade him to take things easy and stop his intense laboring. But I knew I had little chance to get him persuaded. He's born to be a farmer and late on, a migrant worker, and that root runs deep in his mind. When I was little, he told me a lot about his childhood, mostly, about the tough times the he'd been through. He was born into a poor family and as the eldest child in his family, he had to do the most family chores. He said he couldn't remember how many times he fell asleep on ridges of paddy fields as he was tending cattle, because he's so tired. He wanted to have a good education as he saw that it's the only way out of poverty. But he'd so many things standing in his way. He got cattle to herd after school, and he got odd jobs to do in order to keep his family away from starvation. However, despite of all those distractions, he did well on his study. When he was eventually enrolled at a local prestigious high school, that's the moment when he saw a bright future ahead of him. But soon, that hope was crushed by brutal reality. He almost went into tears when he recounted the moment when he walked into his classroom one day, barefooted, as his teacher and all classmates stood up in shock. It's a cold winter and there's a heavy snow outside. That class was cancelled as some of his classmates rushed home to get a pair of shoes for him. He was too poor to be able to afford a shoe, how could he afford his books and tuition fees. After attending just a few class in high school, he left his beloved high school and became a full time farmer. So many years have passed. Gone are the days of cold winters and starvations. But my father will never forget those tough days in his childhood. He knows, better than anyone else, that we should never take the comfortable life we're now living for granted. That's probably why he's restless till now.

Last week, I bought a DSLR online, and it cost me roughly a month's salary. I've never given it a second thought when spending the money, not because I'm a big spender, but because I was quite sure about the joy it could bring me when I'm shooting in the field with it. I'm not setting myself to be a photographer, but I know what it takes to be a shutterbug, and I'm working on it.Before I bought my camera, I only had a rough idea of how the Single Lens Reflex camera works. So I downloaded a lot of photography tutorials online. Those tutorials had introduced me to the basics of photography. I'd learned how to make a photo properly exposed through the manipulation of the so called Exposure Triangle: aperture, shutter speed and ISO. Learning how to control these three elements in different light conditions is essential to the mastering of photography. Aperture not only affects exposure, it also plays a key role in depth of field (Depth of field refers to the range of distance that appears acceptably sharp). The larger the aperture, the shallower the depth of field your image becomes, which means that while your main subject is in focus, the objects in background will be blurred. The photos I'd be mentioning in the following paragraphs will make heavy use of wide open aperture to create shallow depth of field.To put my knowledge to test, I asked several friends of mine to go with me to Songshan Lake in Dongguan, because I heard that the scenery there is beautiful. It took us more than two hours to get there, but it's worth it: we were like in a wonderland, surrounded by acres and acres blooming flowers. I lowered my body to take close-up pictures of different flowers with wide aperture. Below are the photos that I took on that day.Camera settings: 120mm, f/5.6, 1/200s, ISO-100Camera settings: 120mm, f/5.6, 1/200s, ISO-100Camera settings: 18mm, f/3.5, 1/800s, ISO-100Camera settings: 200mm, f/5.6, 1/100s, ISO-100Camera settings: 130mm, f/5.6, 1/320s, ISO-100Camera settings: 60mm, f/5.0, 1/320s, ISO-100Camera settings: 180mm, f/5.6, 1/200s, ISO-100Camera settings: 50mm, f/5.0, 1/100s, ISO-100On my way back to place where I live, the big red lanterns hanging over my head got my attention. I stopped, took out my camera, and captured that fabulous moment.Lanterns on Chunhua Footbridge at the intersection of Shennan Blvd. and Nanshan Blvd.Lanterns on Chunhua FootbridgeLanterns on Chunhua FootbridgeChunhua Footbridge

Just two days away from the lunar new year, I boarded a coach along with my luggages. It's already late afternoon, and this trip would take me more than two hours. I was exhausted, because just two days ago, I stayed overnight on a slow train from Shenzhen to Yueyang for my friend's wedding. Then I took another train from Yueyang to Changsha -- my home city, after the wedding, and I was still not yet home, only closer. After spending yet another night at my sister's home, I was finally on my last leg of trip home.As the coach hurtling towards my home village, the sky was getting darker and darker. Through the window, I saw a row of buildings, with the same tiles and outer appearances, standing alongside the road, where paddy fields once lay. In the past, I could recognize the location of a fork in the road, where I should get off the coach and take a different path towards home by foot, by looking at houses of our fellow villagers at distance. But now, a row of new buildings blocked my sight, and those buildings were of the same look. It all rendered my mission of identifying that fork impossible. It's not until my intuition told me that I should go no further did I stop the coach, only to know that the coach had run past that fork roughly 300 meters. When I got to the fork, I saw my dad standing there, anxiously waiting for me. He's afraid that it could be hard for me to find the path leading home because of all those changes our village had undergone over the year. So he wanted to be a unique sign in my eyes that could guide me towards home. But because of the darkness, I didn't saw him through the window while my coach was passing him by.