We've returned from Hunan

Tonight I am too tired to begin the monumental task of sorting the dozens of photos we took in Yongzhou and Hunan and tell our story of returning to Helen's home province. I will soon. It was a very successful trip in that many of our hopes were realized in touring the city, visiting the orphanage, meeting the staff etc., but it was also a little emotional, maybe even more for me than for Helen.

China has been an emotional place this week. Yesterday was the one week anniversary of the earthquake in Sichuan, and at the precise time of the earthquake there was a national 3 minutes of silence (signaled by the ringing of sirens and horns throughout the country). We were in our hotel in Yongzhou when we heard the sirens go off, and out the back window I shot this photo of the troops at the military headquarters in formation after lowering the flag to half mast. We spent so much time riding through the countryside by bus on our way to and from Yongzhou that I was reminded that most of China (about 60%of the population) is still rural, living in small, somewhat isolated communities like the ones devastated by the earthquake.