the highlight of my easter sunday...

happened when i was walking in chinatown with becky and peter after having dim sum with andre and his aunt, cousin, corinna and lana. the three of us ran some errans, bought groceries, snacks, what have you. we were walking down the street when becky pointed at a poster in the window of an accupuncture/accupressure shop. the poster depicted the bottom of a foot and how different sections of the foot represented different organs and part of the rest of the body. (peter was sharing his hour long foot massage story when he was in china so the poster was somewhat relevant). when becky stopped to point at the poster, this small skinny chinese man, probably in his 40s to 50s, wearing a beanie and holding a cup of coffee, stopped to see what becky was pointing at and seemed interested in what he had to say. becky just ignored him and moved on. the man and his friend walked past us, ahead of us, all the while talking to himself or possibly to his friend. i couldn't tell.

peter and i were trying to figure out if he was a bum, if he was crazy, or if he was one of those people that 'talk to god'. so we were a good quarter of a block behind them when they reached the curb. there was a small puddle between the street and the curb. the man bent down, did a few bounces like he was stretching or getting ready to... jump! and he did... he jumped! up into the air, over the puddle, and landed, i would say, about.... 10 inches away from where he left the ground. right, 10 whole inches! he could have just walked over the puddle and be done with it, but he went through this whole drama of bending, bouncing, jumping and landing like he was jumping over a 10 foot ravine or something.

it was the funniest thing i had seen in a long time. becky and i just stopped in our tracks and rolled with laughter. it was such a great moment, we wanted more, so i suggested that we follow them to see what else this weirdo might do. they turned the corner and we followed. i see them walking past a white couple, the crazy chinese man walks past them, notices the tall white guy, and then does this weird impish walk right in front of them. for apparently no reason at all. i laughed again.

the two men then turn and walk into this building that we soon realize is a buddhist temple. we look past the door and see the crazy chinese man kneeling before a buddhist altar, worshipping in silence. this, to me, is an idication that the guy is not crazy at all, but totally sane and was fuckin around with all of us!

peter, becky and i had a good discussion whether we thought this guy was retarded or crazy or bothered or just normal. somewhere in the discussion, i made the comment that you can't give retarded people coffee to drink.... that apparently made no sense to becky. made perfect sense to me. think about it.....