Umbrellas

Umbrella Seller
What a change from when we first arrived at the beginning of March! The weather is now a mixture of sunny hot and rather humid days, getting up to 97F today for example, and heavy rain and thunder storms. This umbrella sales lady was opposite the kindergarten on campus, taking advantage of the market for protection against both rain and sun. Umbrellas are used a great deal for both purposes here, as you can see from the picture of the crowds waiting in the sun to enter the mausoleum of Mao Zedong from two weekends ago. And in both sun and rain you can see many people cycling along holding an umbrella in one hand. Another common sight is a man on the saddle, and a woman on the luggage rack behind, holding an umbrella over both of them.

The rain is certainly a nice change from the bone-dry weather of winter. Unfortunately one thing that is the same is that the air is almost never clear. Back then it was the dust from the winds. Now a combination of the humidity and presumably city smog means that, again, we don't see blue sky for days on end. Even looking across campus the haze is evident.