Human Train

It was a beautiful thing this Human Train.

We were ice skating at Peking University Pond / Tiny Lake on a blustery January day when we had a revelation: let’s make a human train. So we began our train with 4 people in a line with two Clydesdales (people who had girthy hamstrings and have skated for more than 18 minutes in their lives) at the front doing to pulling. As we awkwardly snaked around the pond I couldn’t help but see people start beaming and latching on the end.

I was a Clydesdale.

Pretty soon our train of 6 grew to 30ish humans, laughing and chanting, “Let’s go baby!” There was no nationalistic fervor, no language gap, no political opinions, no grudges, no frowns – just humans savoring life for a few short minutes as they latched on to each other in the mutual pursuit of fun (and to avoid falling and shattering a coccyx).

After a few laps the human train encountered some turbulence and splintered into oblivion, but it was a sweet reminder that there are some things on this lonely orb that don’t need to be translated, dissected, or defended but simply savored.

- m -