Reciting Ancient Chinese Poetry as an Answer

Mr. Weng Baopin, Director of the Han Yang Ling Museum showed over five hundred slides of artifacts found since 1989 at the excavation site. Enthralling, to say the least. Figurines dated since 188 - 141 B.C.E during the reign of the Han Dynasty emperor, Liu Qi. I asked him if among everything they had happened upon any literature. The moment the interpreter finished asking my question, Mr. Baopin began to recite a poem. It was delighfully musical and it had a sense of aggression and determination. Something else differed about it, but I couldn't tell what I perceived in it. Mr. Weng kept reciting it with no pause while the interpreter and I watched him. The first few lines contained the sounds "tong," "wong," and "chong;" in between I heard a melodic "tsing" and "ming." I lost my focus on the musicality of the recital because I began to feel anxious for a translation. Then Mr. Weng ended the poem and laughed. He said something to the interpreter, who then turned to me, laughingly, and said he could not translate the poem because it was in ancient Chinese. I felt enthralled to imagine an archaeologist memorizing the poetry he found in his digs.