Perfect Rice, Perfect World

Last night I made some perfect rice in my perfect rice cooker, cooked up some ground pork, scrambled a couple of eggs, added some soy sauce and presto, my American version of a Chinese dish. I ate it with my chopsticks.......and pretended I was living in Beijing.
There’s been other times in my life when I’ve had a strong desire to live in another country for a while. After visiting Haiti three times, I really wanted to live there. It’s an incredible country, full of life and happy, generous people. Yes, it’s one of the poorest countries in the world. I wish I knew how to explain it but there’s an air of struggle, of challenge, that is intoxicating for me. Life, and the things necessary to sustain life, are not taken for granted. At the end of each day I spent in Haiti I felt something I do not feel at the end of every day spent at home; that of accomplishment. I haven’t been to Haiti in 10+ years. The desire and hope of spending an extended amount of time living in Haiti is like a distant fire. I can see it but I can no longer feel the heat. I don’t want that to happen to my desire (really, it’s more a craving) to spend an extended amount of time in China. In a perfect world, with everything falling into place and all kinds of logistics being worked out, I would leave for China late August, early September, 2007. I would teach and live in Beijing. I would travel throughout China on the holidays, and I would enjoy the wonderful chaos of being in an international city during the summer Olympics (August 8-24, 2008) before returning to the U.S. Anyone in China interested in hiring me to teach English?
So in the meantime.....before the perfect world comes along.......I will continue to harness the discipline necessary to learn Chinese, continue to make my American version of Chinese dishes, and above all, try to stay close to the fire.