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Believing in Kindness

The Jell-o Cup That saved My Life

CHINA | Tuesday, 26 May 2015 | Views [157] | Scholarship Entry

The section of the Great Wall known as Badaling curls around the edge of Beijing like a tea cup, holding in all the hustle, bustle, and madness of the city. To stand at its top is to watch the sloping hillside roll slowly into the basin of the sprawl- and also to see the mountains rise out of it, a gentle reminder that humans are still smaller than nature.
Badaling is built in the elements: no protection from the scorching sun or howling winds, stone steps as jagged as the cliffs surrounding them, and low handrails that offer more of a warning than support. Few mortal attempts have been made to match nature’s harshness, but here stands a valiant effort. It is as the saying on their touristy t-shirts goes, in broken Chinglish, “Badaling makes the real man put hair on his chest”.
No matter how tough you are, it’s tougher.
But the funny thing about being a first-time tourist in China is that you expect things to be easy. Surely they’ll sell bottled water on the Great Wall, I thought. There might even be some of those popular street vendors with watermelon slices to munch, I reasoned, presuming my trip would be an Alice In Wonderland-esque picnic and not a hike through Oz.
Many hours later, up steep steps and down even steeper ramps, the sun was baking my exposed skin. There were no vendors in sight, only well-prepared Chinese families eating jell-o and grapes. My eye sight was spotty, and I knew I’d never make the rest of the hike.
“My chest will remain hairless!” I gasped to my brother, a last-ditch attempt at humor from the kitschy t-shirts we bought. He began swimming in my vision. What would happen now? Would Badaling claim victory over me?
Suddenly, those oh-so-prepared Chinese families stepped in. I was offered water, oranges, and someone even bestowed their last jell-o cup to me. Ready to drown in my own sweat, I was rescued by the kindness of those next to us on the wall.
We are always taught that the world is a big, bad scary place. Don’t talk to strangers. Keep to yourself. And what starts as a very practical safety sometimes builds walls inside us as formidable as Badaling itself.
My brother insists to this day that I was saved from heat stroke because of that jell-o cup.
I know it was a bit more than that- it was the kindness of strangers that kept me going. It’s a lesson I’ll never forget.

Tags: 2015 Writing Scholarship

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