Fourth lecture and a farewell feast.I gave a presentation on travel in America this afternoon. The PowerPoint version of the lecture is available here [it is a huge file, about 153 megabytes, so it will take some time to download). I spoke about the history of transport and travel, touched on the economics of travel and leisure, and recommended some interesting travel literature. Most of the presentation concerned questions the students might have if they were to visit the United States. What are the options for getting around, and where should people stay for the night, and what food might they eat, and what can they see in American cities, in National Parks, and in state parks? I suppose many of the students might, in a decade or so, when they are English teachers or translators or tour guides, and China has become wealthier, come to America as tourists, or perhaps bring some of their students with them on an educational trip to America. In the evening I went out for a farewell feast at the famous seafood restaurant. Here are four photographs of the memorable and delicious food we enjoyed at this celebration. I made it to my train and took my seat about two minutes before the train left the station. Some running through the station was involved. |
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| This is some fish served in the seafood restaurant. | As usual, there were many dishes, and I did not have time to adequately eat all of them. | Delicious vegetarian food in the seafood restaurant where we had our feast. |
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| The tofu was perhaps my favorite dish at this banquet. | The image above has a link to “Tales of a Traveller” as a PDF (10.0 MB). This is a book by Washington published in 1849 (this is an 1894 edition). | The image above has a link to “A History of Travel in America” as a PDF (15.5 MB). This is a book by Seymour Dunbar published in 1915. |
I was not entirely satisfied with my presentation on travel in America. I think I did not have quite as much passion or energy as I had displayed in the previous three presentations. It isn’t that I think it was a poor presentation: probably it was a good one. I just felt that I could have done a much better job, whereas with the previous three presentations I was satisfied that I had achieved something near the top of my potential. The train to Beijing was an overnight train, so I spent the night of May 31st on a train. I do not think I slept very well. I was excited to see my family, who were arriving on June 1st in Beijing, and also I had taken too many drinks at the feast, and had to get up three or four times to use the bathroom in the dark hours of the early morning.
Here below, in one place, are links to materials I’ve shared online related to my presentations. PowerPoint of Travel in America [ppt, 145 MB] |
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