This past Tuesday, the sky was a blindingly bright blue, stretched over the arid landscape like a protective tarp. Nary a cloud interrupted that boundless mantle above. And the sprinklers on the campus lawns splashed the grass with their afternoon drink, because the weather still wouldn’t bring rain to this semi-desert terrain.
But there I was, strolling down the dusty hill in the shadow of a salmon-colored umbrella.
Crazy. That’s what I thought of the sea of umbrellas that ebbed and flowed on the urban streets of China in the scorching summer heat. In my mind, umbrella always meant rain, not sun. And if I hated the heat, I just donned a hat and slathered on the sunscreen.
But the longer I stayed in China, that sea of umbrellas soon flowed right into the background of my mind. Continue reading “The Parasol Paradox”