{"id":142,"date":"2011-08-21T08:27:12","date_gmt":"2011-08-21T08:27:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/chinagriffith.com\/journal\/?p=142"},"modified":"2011-08-21T08:27:12","modified_gmt":"2011-08-21T08:27:12","slug":"going-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/chinagriffith.com\/journal\/?p=142","title":{"rendered":"Going Home"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a title=\"Logan Utah by Mark Griffith, on Flickr\" href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/niffgurd\/5954788921\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter\" src=\"http:\/\/farm7.static.flickr.com\/6148\/5954788921_563e6d5cdc_z.jpg\" alt=\"Logan Utah\" width=\"640\" height=\"424\" \/><\/a><br \/>\nWe just returned home to Beijing from 5 weeks home in the States. To describe the experience as a bit surreal would be appropriate I suppose. Upon our return to the States it felt as if we&#8217;d never been gone and yet that we hadnt quite returned either. Living out of a suitcase for weeks on end takes a toll on you after a while. Each place we went we savored and the time was sweet tinged with a little bitter.<\/p>\n<p>Things I enjoyed :<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>the clean air :\u00c2\u00a0<\/strong>\u00c2\u00a0that dry mountain air in Utah with a slight hint of sage and the oxygen rich air of the PNW with a hint of rain<\/li>\n<li><strong>American movie theaters<\/strong> with previews and salty popcorn<\/li>\n<li>\u00c2\u00a0<strong>mexican food<\/strong> : ahh Chipotle how I had missed you<\/li>\n<li><strong>steak<\/strong> : nothing tastes like a thick cut of American beef (Thanks Mike)<\/li>\n<li>the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/niffgurd\/6012208638\/\" target=\"_blank\">rhythm of a conversation<\/a> in English over a good lunch<\/li>\n<li><strong>the mountains<\/strong> : Miles and I&#8217;s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/niffgurd\/sets\/72157627165887625\/\" target=\"_blank\">backpacking trip to High Creek Lake<\/a>, my hike to <a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/niffgurd\/archives\/date-taken\/2011\/08\/06\/\" target=\"_blank\">Alta mountain<\/a> up Snoqualmie Pass and my climbing of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/niffgurd\/sets\/72157627406401514\/\" target=\"_blank\">The Grand Teton<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>As we fly over China into Beijing I realize we are again in a foreign land with a rich and diverse culture and history. I feel that same zing of\u00c2\u00a0excitement\u00c2\u00a0when you travel, even though we are coming home. We are lucky to be here I realize that and I look forward to savoring our time here together as a family.<\/p>\n<p>Driving back through the streets from the\u00c2\u00a0airport\u00c2\u00a0to our apartment it feels like we&#8217;ve never left Beijing. \u00c2\u00a0Things don&#8217;t look foreign or strange, they are familiar. \u00c2\u00a0Home truly is where you live and we find it on both sides of the world.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We just returned home to Beijing from 5 weeks home in the States. To describe the experience as a bit surreal would be appropriate I suppose. Upon our return to the States it felt as if we&#8217;d never been gone and yet that we hadnt quite returned either. Living out of a suitcase for weeks &hellip; <a class=\"read-excerpt\" href=\"https:\/\/chinagriffith.com\/journal\/?p=142\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&raquo;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-142","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-by-mark","category-living-in-beijing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/chinagriffith.com\/journal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/chinagriffith.com\/journal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/chinagriffith.com\/journal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chinagriffith.com\/journal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chinagriffith.com\/journal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=142"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/chinagriffith.com\/journal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/142\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/chinagriffith.com\/journal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chinagriffith.com\/journal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/chinagriffith.com\/journal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}