day 118: 西安 (Xi’an) = 0km

When I woke up this morning and felt my foot, I decided it was necessary to stay in for another day.

Once I went out and tried to get some more effective medicine:

(The sound got lost on this one as a result of the speed increase.)

Well, what else can I tell you about a day like this?

I am tired, and I worry. Not about the foot, that’s really just a minor hassle. I’ll be on my way by tomorrow if it doesn’t get any worse.

The thing I worry about is time. Time bound to Chinese visa and German passports. Time needed to walk through places that lay somewhere ahead of me. Time wasted in hotel rooms with hours and hours of TV. Stretches of time my loved ones can spend without me, and stretches of time I can spend without them.

So I sit here, and I worry.

The last few days have been fun though - with all the positive feedback I’ve been getting. I mean, who am I kidding, I’m doing this entirely for myself, right? But then of course it’s really nice to hear grown up people tell me they enjoy looking at what I’m doing. And I love reading the little notes my friends and family leave me, they’d be like: “Chris, your beard is so yellow!” - and that just puts a smile on that beard.

As long as this happiness outweighs the worrying part, then everything is okay.

Weariness adds to the worry though: you’d think that staying in a nice hotel in a town like this would be a good way to rest up. But in reality, I just get more and more involved in things, more and more busy, and more and more tired as a result:

Right now, nobody here knows that I haven’t left yet.

I have potato chips, some cookies and a tasty vitamin drink.

The room service is just a dial away.

And nothing will go wrong.

Soundtrack: Integrity - “Eighteen”

—total: 1565,8km