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{mosiamge} By James Leigh
By the time this is read, I will likely be on a plane, headed for Japan and, ultimately, to China.
I will be spending a total of two weeks across the sea in China before returning to Malvern, heavily laden with gifts for family, friends and coworkers. As I have stated in previous columns, I will travel first from Little Rock to Minneapolis before we take the 12-hour journey to Japan and China. While in China, we will be visiting many popular tourist sites, but we will ultimately be there to experience a culture that we will likely never get to experience again. I say “we” because my wife and I are traveling with a group of 18 more individuals from Henderson State University in a study abroad program. I use that term rather loosely because there will not be any classes that we will be taking, but the study will be of the culture and history of such a beautiful and culturally wealthy nation. Now, before we left, Mary and I had to determine what to do about our two cats, Marlowe and Sugar. My parents agreed to care for the pair while we were overseas, and, at the time, I wasn’t sure whether they knew what they were getting into. Marlowe is one of those cats that you see in the pet store window that is beautiful and playful, but when you get him home, you realize that playful turns out to be extremely messy and, at times, bothersome. Sugar, on the other hand, is far from playful, and she prefers her personal time. When we made the hour trip down to Texarkana to deliver the pair, along with all of their necessities since they (mainly Sugar) are rather particular, Sugar cried the entire trip. This greatly upset my wife, who was already reconsidering leaving them at my parents since she didn’t want them to feel like we were getting rid of them. After arriving, Marlowe (the kitten) took charge of the situation and began exploring while Sugar took the time to find herself multiple hiding places. We spent several hours in Texarkana waiting to see how they would get accustomed, and Marlowe had settled in and was playing with my 17 year old sister like she was his new best friend. Sugar had gotten herself stuck under the bed and found many other hiding places, but by the time we left, she hadn’t really come out from her hiding places. Since we left (Mary in tears for the majority of the trip home), we found out that Sugar has started to come out and spend time with my family, and Marlowe has gotten into plenty of trouble. Nevertheless, we, as well as our traveling companions, have taken to the air for my first flight and trip overseas. Each day of the trip, I will have a travel log of the happenings, culture, sights and history of the areas we visit along with pictures to accompany these. More pictures will also be available on my personal blog at http://blog.myspace.com/jamesleighjr. (James Leigh is the sports editor of the Malvern Daily Record) |
