Life on the Road: Beef Jerky, Swimming, and a Search for Spiritual Relief
by Deborah Fallows
Today, we are on an unplanned layover in Rapid, which until a few days ago we called Rapid City, probably like you still do. Just now, in our independently-owned eco hotel, a Chinese student from Shandong province, in the rough and raw northeast of mainland China, came to our room delivering a small bag of colorful candies as a welcome to Mount Rushmore country. She was as surprised at my Chinese babble as I was at seeing her face here in southwest South Dakota.  (Read it here.)