I can't get over that photograph.

And this is the thing with China. China does that. There is so much beauty, kindness, love, greatness, history but always admixed with the most exquisite pain. That photograph could be on a Hallmark card, right? "Ah," it just makes you want to go, "Ah." It is adorable. And yet...

It's always there. The pain is always there; you meet a Chinese person, (s)he seems perfectly normal-happy or well-adjusted or content. Intelligent, personable. Get to know them a little: there is pain inside there. Every Chinese has got pain inside. Pain of a kind you have never experienced. Pain of an intensity that, mercifully, few of us ever know. Just remember: no matter how normal they seem, there is pain inside.