world in a tube

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This post is about a 19km walk from Dingxing to Gucheng. My lens is still broken, and in the end my friend Zhu Hui comes back.

First the bad news: My wide angle lens is definitely broken – here’s one of the last pictures I was able to take:

I am in deep despair over that lens. The only hope I have is that there might be a gifted person in Baoding who can help me fix this problem. Otherwise there will be no more wide-angle shots, only telephoto – a world in a tube!

Wish me luck…

Here’s some good news, though:

1. My feet were much better today. Not exactly good, but better nonetheless.
2. My bowels were better, too.
3. I had lots of fun with the telephoto:

This trip is actually the first time I’ve owned a telephoto, and even though it’s ridiculously heavy I am really loving it!

I still think wide angles are more fun. But there are just some shots that you have no way of shooting without a tele range.

These two farmers are sitting on top of a pile of corn bags on a truck – there would have been no way to climb up there and portray their friendship like this with a wide angle lens. And it wouldn’t have looked as intimate anyway.

Besides, most people feel more comfortable having their picture taken from a distance.

But I would have loved to have the wide angle anyway. That way I could have shown you the pile of corn bags they were loading onto their truck.

“For export” they said. They added something about airplanes, but I didn’t get it.

What do airplanes have to do with these?

Anyway, I’m a bit nervous because of the problems with my lens, but today was still better than yesterday.

I ran into a flock of walking lamb sticks.

Their herder said they have about two months left until they will end up as part of someone’s diet. They obviously haven’t realized it yet. Poor fucks.

And then a good thing happened:
My friend Zhu Hui returned!

He sent me a message from Baoding asking if it would be okay if we walked together for a few days – of course it was!

We met up in a little strip town called Gucheng 固城 and rented a room with no heating. It was an easy choice: there was only one hotel and NONE of the rooms had heating.

Then we went to warm up with some good Beijing-style hot pot before we would go to sleep in the refrigerator they called a “standard room” here.

It is freezing outside and possibly inside as well, and my fingers are getting stiff as I am writing this.

Zhu Hui is already snoring away.

Wish me luck the day after tomorrow in Baoding!