This line of poetry cos from Li Daoyuan's "Three Gorges," and it was indeed part of the middle school second year Chinese language textbook!
Tang Xiaoxin had never heard what "gibbon song" sounded like; back then, while morizing this line of poetry, she could only refer to the noisy and squawking calls of the macaques at the zoo, always quite puzzled.
Such a noisy and disturbing sound should be quite headache-inducing and annoying to listen to, so why would the ancients feel so sad upon hearing it that they teared up and dampened their clothes?
Thinking it over, she reckoned that perhaps hearing their calls reminded them of the monkeys back in their hotown mountains calling in the sa way, stirring up feelings of hosickness, which in turn led to the tears.
Now, listening to the gibbon's sonorous and lodious song, she finally had so understanding of how the ancients felt.
It's hard to describe their song in words!
Standing on the opposite shore of Gibbon Island, only separated by a river 10 ters wide, listening to them sing in the trees at such close proximity, it felt as if she were in the Wiener Musikverein's Great Hall, with a powerful and sonorous singer on stage, belting out songs that then cascaded down like a clear and crisp river, with delightful notes tumbling among the ripples.
Upon first hearing this charming and lodious strange song, she felt a tingling on her scalp and goosebumps all over her arms.
As she listened, she gradually beca intoxicated by the sound, her body slowly relaxing and feeling lighter.
Beautiful scenes appeared before her eyes as if the sunlight filtered through the leaves, the dew moistened the trunks, and droplets falling to the ground splashed onto the grass, bringing moisture to the earth and making life beautiful and vibrant.
Her soul felt cleansed by the song, seemingly becoming purer!
When the weather is clear and dawn is frosty, the woods are cold and the streams are solemn, there are often high gibbons howling, creating a poignant and unique resonance that echoes in the empty valley, sorrowful and long-lasting.
Tang Xiaoxin snapped back to reality, feeling that the gibbon's song was not so much mournful as it was resonating with the soul and making it tremble.
The listener's feelings must relate to the environnt and mood!
The autumn in "Three Gorges" is bleak and desolate, the journey is long and everything is silent, so naturally, one would feel lancholic upon hearing the distant gibbon's call.
Like on this kind of sunny day, waiting eagerly for the long sumr vacation and finally being able to play at the zoo, she was already very happy.
Hearing the gibbon's wonderful song just added to the excitent and joy.
Turning her head towards Qian Keke, "Wow, it's really nice to listen to! What do you think?"
Qian Keke replied with a smile, "Listening to their song, it seems like you can hear a carefree, very happy feeling!"
Tang Xiaoxin nodded in agreent, "It seems like it, doesn't it!"
The other visitors around them had different reactions to the gibbon's song!
So adults closed their eyes, hands clasped in front of their chests, shaking their heads and swaying, looking extrely indulged as if embraced by the spring breeze.
A child by their side pulled at the parent's sleeve, exclaiming in amazent, "Mama! Mama! They're singing!"
There were also children, excited by the sound of the gibbons, running back and forth, chasing the gibbons' movents on the island and flailing their hands in the air.
The ring-tailed lemurs on the neighboring island, with their thighs splayed and black paws facing the sky, sat basking in the warm sun, ditating while staring intently at the shore with ears pricked, listening to the two gibbons sing with great focus.
Seeing this amusing sight, so visitors couldn't help but chuckle.
So people like to play soothing natural songs during yoga practice to help relax their body and mind with the guidance of music, to dispel distractions for deeper ditation and achieve better exercise results.
For the ring-tailed lemurs, could the song of the gibbons be working its magic in a similar way?
Apart from the two gibbons, there were also other animals on the island!
There were also a few black monkeys sitting at the treetops, listening to their neighbor's singing.
They were Francois' leaf monkeys, completely black, with a white stripe on each cheek, running from the corner of their mouth to the base of their ear, forming a "V" pattern. From a distance, it looked like they had two whiskers on their cheeks.
One of the Francois' leaf monkeys was squatting on a branch, with one paw supporting its leg, looking very boss-like. It scratched its groin, listened to the song for a while, then flipped off the branch and with a leap, landed on a nearby vine trellis, where it began to playfully leap and bound through the air.
Another Francois' leaf monkey sat not far away, holding a leaf in its hand, chewing nonstop.
There were also two Arican tapirs on the island, who were curiously exploring the exhibit area, slling around the grass with their heads down.
Singing for such a long ti was also a very exhausting activity for the gibbon!
After singing for over ten minutes, they moved to rest on the central stone hill.
Sitting on the tree trunk, they grood each other's fur, looking very affectionate.
Gibbons need to be raised in a social group. Gibbons that are kept alone beco depressed, lose their appetite, beco lethargic and sleepy, and are unlikely to have the interest to sing.
However, not all gibbons can get along with each other.
Adult gibbons of the sa sex without blood relations are very likely to fight upon eting.
So it has to be either a male and female pair, siblings who grew up together from a young age, or parents or a single parent with their offspring.
As gibbons age, when they are close to adulthood, their parents will attack and drive them away, forcing them to leave and find a mate.
This pair of gibbon brothers, Sunshine and Qingtian, were already six years old, so they were not as harmonious as they were when they were younger, sotis fighting over food or territory.
They fought so fiercely one day in the back shed that they had to be separated into different cages. However, every day the two gibbons reached for each other through the wire sh, looking reluctant to part.
Now that they had much more space outside, they seed to get along quite harmoniously.
While grooming each other, they looked at the silly running children outside and casually picked a fresh leaf to chew on.
Perhaps to them, observing the bustling, shouting visitors outside was a kind of pleasure in their otherwise mundane lives.
The two gibbons grood their fur and after resting for a while, they started to play and chase each other again.
Qingtian jumped onto a tree below and, extending his long gibbon arms, grabbed the trunk and swung half a circle "swiftly".
Just when Tang Xiaoxin thought he was going to swing forward, to her surprise, Qingtian continued to swing upward like a pendulum, stepping onto the trunk below and walking as if on flat ground with his arm embracing the trunk above.
Gazing at Sunshine from across the stone pillar, the two gibbons locked eyes for a mont. Qingtian then leaped up from the trunk, grabbing a bamboo pole beside him. The elastic bamboo instantly bent down like a rubber band being stretched.
Using the montum, Qingtian bounced off, let go, and sprung back onto the trellis, while the bamboo pole bounced back up, swinging continuously, and the bamboo leaves "rustled" to and fro.
Sunshine swiftly descended a few levels, caught a trellis as if to chase, then swung from lower down to higher up, preparing to go around from behind.
The way they leaped and maneuvered in the trees was like that of a light and graceful bird!
Probably not even a gymnastics champion could perform such difficult moves; the tree trunks seed like extensions of their arms.
However, Qingtian saw through this move and stopped imdiately as Sunshine swung back.
Watching in amazent, Tang Xiaoxin exclaid, "Wow, amazing, amazing!"
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