Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Kites For Kids - Welcome

From texture - misc.

Let's go fly a kite. A perfect pre-marathon activity, if you are covered with sun screen.
Kites For Kids - Welcome Kites for Kids is Saturday, May 2, 2009
* 10 am – 5 pm
* at the Carnegie Science Center
I understand that they'll be flying -- or trying to fly -- kites on the river off of boats. I always wanted to do that from my canoe.

In Beijing, kite flying a long-standing recreational activity. The older men do it and use a bike wheel like take-up spinner for the string, often framed in hand-made wooden cases. While there in August 2008 for the Olympics, the city had put out an order that there would be no kites in the sky -- due to security concerns. The kites could have jammed the surface to air missles, I guess.

On a number of instances, we were able to see the 'kite police' come to tell people that they'd not be able to fly the their kites. Those suckers get airborne too -- very, very high.

From Beijing - sports play
We are hoping for good weather on Sunday, without any wind, so we can play with these birdies -- hardly a kite -- at Schenley Park.

1 comment:

Tim Parish said...

"The older men do it and use a bike wheel like take-up spinner for the string, often framed in hand-made wooden cases."

Interesting little snippet re those Chinese kites - to me, a single-liner kite fanatic.

"Those suckers get very very high"

Mmm perhaps less strict aviation authorities than over here in Oz - we have to stay under 400 feet above ground, everywhere. But then, 4 or 5 hundred feet could seem a lot if you tend to fly (or see people fly) at 30 or 40 feet down at the beach! :-)