Actually, my California trip is part of my journey which I called "Into the West", because apart from driving by myself in the south California area, it also included the group tour around the vast intermountain region, Rocky mountains and great plains. Here I'll just record the part that reminded me of something in American history.
In the first a few days, I stayed in San Diego. As the birth place of California, San Diego still has a strong Spanish colonial atmosphere, which can be seen from those mediterranean-style buildings. After spending hours lingering along the seashore and passing the long-stretched naval base several times, I went to visit the USS Midway. If you have ever watch the drama Miss Saigon, you can imagine the scene that the helicopter took off from the U.S. embassy and flew towards this aircraft, after The Last Night of the World. Yes, Midway is the one performed the task Operation Frequent Wind in 1975. It was also sent to Jeju Island in Kwangju Massacre and served in the Persian Gulf War in 1991. Now all the dust of all the events has settled, Midway is at its anchor by the shore and has become part of the city's aerial view, like a retired veteran. When the kids looking around this giant with curiosity, they may not be able to feel the sorrow of parting and fear of death of those people who once boarded it. Hopefully, they would never have to experience that kind of feeling, and this is exactly the aim of attempt for our generation.
Then we spent three days on the notorious California State Route 1, and arrived San Francisco Bay in the evening, dust covered and exhausted. After a refreshing shower, we went to China Town to fill our stomachs. The moment I open the door of the car, a nasty smell made me wrinkled up my nose, then I noticed the sewage and garbage on the street. The empty stomachs urged us to move on, so we walked in a restaurant, ordered and waited for dinner. Two young men and one young woman seated around another table, talking in English with very good accent. The older young man was trying to analyse some situation for the other two, and giving them some directions. They were talking with fluent English, but their way of thinking and dealing with people was typically Chinese, so I thought that they should be Chinese descendants. Which generation of immigrants were they? I didn't know. But the feeling was that the history of Chinese migration appeared in an appreciable way here and now. Again, I found myself get lost in time. From my own experience of life, I can fully understand how the first generation immigrants work hard to make a living as aliens-no matter what kind of job they do, they have to support the family while trying to accommodate themselves into a new environment. But I am baffled why after all these years, the Chinatown area is still filled with sewage and garbage, even the whole San Francisco has been reshaped once and again after the 1906 and 1989 earthquakes? What is the meaning of life if you have to live in the same environment generation after generation?
During the group trip, the greatest thing for me was having the chance to see some sites related to native Americans, such as Cheyenne, Dakota and the Sioux, Little Big Horn. The tribes involved here were mainly those who once inhabited the Great Plains. While talking with an native American in the Crazy Horse museum, I was moved by his saying"Our ancestors were arose from this continent, so do we. Native Americans will be guardians of this land as long as anyone of us still alive." Many people just see the westerners' spreading on the new continent as a triumph of civilisation over ignorance, to some extent, this seems to be the fact, since even native Americans are enjoying the convenience brought by the modern inventions. The question is simply that the price of this modernisation is too heavy to bear. For native Americans, the change of life is not worthy of cerebrating at all. If today's Americans cannot realize native Americans' situation and their feelings today, but to insist on the expelling of native Americans as part of the so-called Manifest Destiny, then there's no doubt that these people are flattering themselves by their own ignorance and proud.
Finally, let's back to California again. After sending everyone off from LA, I went on my lonely journey. This was to fulfil a promise for myself, a date with the Sierra Nevada. While driving for hundred after hundred miles in the desert, what accompanied me was a piece of CD. Maybe only under that circumstance, did I get overwhelmed by Morning from Peer Gynt, and found Clair de Lune so comforting. Also, I'll forever remember those sequoias in Yosemite Valley, the giants of stratosphere, they stood there, from the time when there was no me in the world, and will be there after my farewell. I guess they had also witnessed John Muir's life as a voluntary ranger. For Mt. Whitney, I stayed nearby for two days. I could see the peak when I lifted my eyes from Lone Pine, but after drove half way up to the camping site and began the Whitney Trail, it hided behind mountains and only would show up occasionally. After two hours' climbing, I ended up by Lone Pine Lake, not having a permit to challenge the peak. Actually, I was not well prepared for such an over-10-hour's climbing. Two hours was good for me, since I've seen the face of Mt. Whitney for myself, and I had nothing to regret.
On my way back to San Diego, I stopped in Death Valley to taste the salty soil and stayed in Palm Spring for 18 hours, just have time to visit the local art museum. I was glad to see both places have an introduction of native Americans' life in these area, this is what should be done.
There was too much that worthy to be recorded for all these days, but this time I just do it as a memorandum.
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