Flooding.

Yesterday was the celebration of yet another Iowa summer birthday.  Fighting off a cold, I left early at 10:30, I emerged from the basement joint to find the streets flooded.  It had been an hour tops since I had entered Pyro's and within that time the water had collected and had risen to mid-calf level.  I ran back inside to alert Shanti to bring her camera and we began a short documentary of the chaos.  (Reporting live from Beijing, flooding in the streets, as I get closer you can see the waves rolling toward us.)   Spectators crowded the sidewalks, but cab drivers continued to slowly push through the milky coffee colored water.  

I know I said when the Iowa River flooded, I would not trust the sanitation, but the water of China, well, you really could grow an extra arm.  

This, however, is what happens when Beijing tries to emit missiles into the air to tame the air pollution, by making it rain.   

Just as different and unique each interior of a cab is, lace, seat belts with missing clasps, etc.,  so are the men, occasionally women, who drive inside them.  Today we rode with my favorite driver of the summer, by far.  Although we had been told that most cab drivers of Beijing would be taking English language lessons to prepare for the large mass of foreigners entering the city, in our experience, we had found this to be very untrue.  If they knew hello, it was a great surprise.  Yet this driver made an effort to speak English, but this wasn't the reason of his charm.  My respect for him came when he pointed at Nick, sitting in the front seat, and said you beautiful.  Fearless, he grabbed Nick's credentials and focused on his picture and said, this not.  Diane and I giggled in the back seat.  This guy was funny.