Through the Mist—I Recall a Visit to West Lake

IT has been many years since the last time I visited West Lake in Hangzhou but it is still fresh in my menlory. It was in late spring, a cloudy and drizzly day. I did not feel like going at first, but later went along as two veteran editors insisted upon going. It didn't take long to get to the lake. This was my first time to appreciate the landscape of the region south of the Yangtze River at leisure. The air was damp and chilly as we strolled along the bank. Mist and fog hovered over the lake, and it was hard to distinguish the water from the sky. At a kiosk on the