Back from Beijing

ChinaYesterday I got back from China, where I shopped at the stalls of Beijing's enormous Panjiayuan Flea Market. I bought glass beads (20 yuan), an old wooden-case  mantel clock with a ticking Mao (80 yuan),  a long cloth decorated with a traditional Miao design (140 yuan) and a Coca-Cola (10 yuan). If I had more time and if airplanes had bigger overhead compartments for carry-on luggage, I also would have  brought home a painted wooden footstool (40 yuan), a hand mirror decorated with a painted of three pink-cheeked Red Guard girls (150 yuan),  Cultural Revolution posters, a huge Buddha for the garden and an old Underwriter typewriter (price unknown).