Driven by the Coolness

Seldom for me to see the bamboo chairs here in this country, a normal look one stood out in the middle of day in the middle of my way to friend's house one day when I was completely absent-minded. A glance at it gently touched my mind. It was lying quietly inside of the store behind the glass wall. Its color re-damned with worn maroon. I felt something connected which made me slowly approaching to it.

Quickly flipped through memories I tried to seek for the relationship that came across to this special chair. That went back to my childhood. I lived on the fifth floor with my grandparents in a city called in Changzhou in the southern part of China. Summer season was my favorite because our leisure "Chengliang" activity. Literally, it can be translated into "Driven by the coolness". Those bamboo chairs are those which we drove on. They were usually made of bamboo stripes. That was the only furniture I could carry because its light material when I was that young. Sitting on them, we cheered and drank the soy milk my Grandpa made for us. We three usually got three bamboo chairs. I got the smallest one. Or sometimes we got only two of them. I would climb onto Grandma and snuggle with her. She would pet me softly. Grandpa usually has his own chair and he usually sang all the songs he knew without certain order . Lullabies and the songs he used to sing in the army in Korean or Russian, he would stare at the sky and tell the lengend of the moon or other stories he was told when he was young. Grandma and I would just sit there and enjoy whatever Grandpa was telling. We felt we were so comfortable because our special "rides" by the coolness,we felt our skin could breathe through those little holes through the crossed stripes. At the same time we were so connected between each other feeling thankful for life and pleasant times.

After staring it for a while, I had a very nice walk to my friend's house filled with all my sweet memories. I am so glad going back this winter to celebrate the New Year festival with them and talk about that around the dinner table.