COUNTRY PURSUITS

Amid the wide grasslands and splendid mountains of Sichuan, in southwestern China, prim jackets and long, romantic skirts outfit a passage into pastoral paradise

- BELINDA HUIJUAN TANG

GETTING OUTSIDE

In the spring of 2018, after two years living in Beijing as a graduate student, I began to experience a crisis of self. I’d suffered an ignoble breakup delivered via Instagram DM and planned soon to leave China, the place I’d been happiest, to pursue a writing career in America. I could find no solace in a city of 21 million, bumping up at every turn against another hurried body. On the subway or biking through the sprawling city traffic, I felt jostled like a pinball. Even when I retreated to a park, I was soon interrupted by pop music blaring from speakers for a congregation of dancing retirees, or a shopkeeper arguing with a customer.

I sought shelter in the countryside, in Anhui, the province where my family is from, and where my grandma still lived. It’s far from the beauty of the images on these pages, but both places have a similar sense of untouched wilderness. While China’s cities are testaments to the possibilities of human will, Anhui is dominated by lush fields and pastures—a reflection of a diverse and temperate climate. My family comes from the rice-growing region, where for centuries the landscape has been blanketed with verdant paddies. I wanted to walk alongside these swaying fields and turn my face to the wind.