Your Ears Bring You Home

I think a lot about a time many years ago when we were driving along the road separating our house in Xiangshan towards downtown and Hsinchu proper. The kids likely had dance class, or maybe drama or piano - they were enrolled in just about everything. All around us was the scene of the place we lived in. Chinese characters on signs attached to gray concrete buildings, flashing their lights ever more brightly to grab your attention so you might stop and spend money. Crazy blue truck drivers speeding in and out, and the occasional betel nut stand with scantily clad young women sitting behind the glass facade folding up the poison in green leaf. I had just gotten some fancy Nokia phone and I think we had 3G. There was a radio app which allowed me to tune into a Truro radio station as we drove. The juxtaposition of the sound of the maritimes, and the visuals presented outside our car window still sticks with me today. You are driving down a vivid road in a strange land, seeing all these…