Traversing a distance like this by foot across one country that includes 22 provinces, 5 special administrative regions and 4 municipalities will introduce one to different minority groups, languages, scenery, food and adventures.

Christop Rehag did just that from November 9, 2007 to November 13, 2008. This clip has soul, colour, vibrancy and some awesome visuals of a country steeped in history and incredible scenery.

Imagine spending a year on foot, one step at a time.

This journey is inspirational. I’d ask you to think if you went through your own life one step at a time, rather than in a blur, and put each day into a slideshow, would it be soulful? Colourful? Vibrant? Full of movement? Memorable?

The Longest Way 1.0 – one year walk/beard grow time lapse from Christoph Rehage on Vimeo.

Peter Weinberger travelled with me on a nine day trip through China.  On a nine day trip, you would think the checklist would be pretty tight: Great Wall, Terracotta Warriors, dumplings, crowds, Forbidden City, Tianamen Square. When I asked Peter to recount a vivid memory from our time together, none of the checklist even got a mention.

Instead, Peter reminded me about the joy to be found in the unexpected… and looking up.

One thing I remember from our time in China was being in Xi’an late at night. We’d started with karaoke and managed to humiliate the only poor teenager in the group by making his mother sing Motown songs in front of him. We moved on to the disco and ran into another Intrepid Group. I remember these 20 something girls in that group who just thought they were so damn special — these well fed Australian girls who were only getting attention because they were the only game in town and rather then being engaging and sociable, they were revelling in their finally feeling that they were hot. Yech. So we moved away from them and drank and drank with the locals to Chinese pop music.

Finally, we were walking home together, you, me Brian and another Intrepid guide and perhaps another person or two. The night had taken on a bit of a melancholy feel. I’m not sure why. It was hot and humid and even though it was midnight, people were sleeping outside on some big central square because it was so damn hot. It was a friendly crowd, and unlike in the U.S. there were no drunken jerks, no roving gangsters looking to cause trouble. They were just normal people and families, eating, drinking, singing and playing games, enjoying the warm weather under a moonlit sky.

And then we happened upon the oddest site. A middle aged man in thin baggy shorts that made him look like he was walking around in his boxers He had an equally worn out tank top undershirt. He was dragging behind him an open sided trailer. Filling up the entire bed of the trailer was a 20 foot long telescope. It was the most unwieldy thing one could imagine. I have no idea how he got it in the trailer or how he managed to drag it to the park. (Or where he got a 20 foot telescope.)

The man was selling views of the rings of Saturn for one RMB – about twelve cents. It was a surreal scene. We had just left the loud partying in the disco, girls and boys drinking and trying their best to look cool and pretty, we were wandering between families playing mah jong and getting ready for bed outside. And here, in the midst of this, was this odd man, in the middle of the silent city, encouraging people to look at the stars, gently urging people to expand their world to include the stars and the rings of Saturn. All of this on a not summer night in the middle of China.

It was an oddly calming and wonderful experience. I don’t know exactly why, but it was just a nice denouement for a hectic evening in a crazy, overcrowded country where just spending the day breathing can wear you out. Tina, this strange guy even seemed to pick you up out of downcast mood. Without saying a word, you were giving off the emotional message that sometimes being an Intrepid guide can be a very lonely job, something that seems impossible in a country that is so over crowded that people must absolutely crave loneliness.

In the midst of these crowds, the emotional torpor of our wonderful guide, and self reflection that Brian and I were going through ourselves — wondering how two 40 something guys got here in our lives — finally allowing ourselves some introspection now that we were away from the never ending demands of girlfriends, children and work. In the midst of all this, we had to remove our gaze from our own navel, slow down, empty our brains of all extraneous thoughts and simply stick our eye to the end of a telescope and look at the stars.