Chinese Extremes Part 1

Phil had been looking forward to the competition for weeks and now that it was over, he felt slightly disappointed. Not that he really had anything to be disappointed about. He had advanced to the third round in the Karate tournament where he had met an admittedly better opponent. So it wasn't that he was disappointed about his result (or at least he knew he shouldn't be), but considering the time it had taken him to prepare for the event, it was over all too soon. Now all that was left in the tournament for Phil to do was to watch the final rounds from the sidelines. The rest of the team was also out of the competition, so there was a large group of Americans watching the tournament wishing they had advanced a little further.

Phil Green was a part-time Karate instructor. He owned a small business and as it is with such things, it took up a lot of his time. So when there was a planned lull in business and the chance arose to go China to compete in Karate, Phil had grabbed that chance. It had been a long time since his last vacation and going head to head with the kind of competition he was likely to meet in China was a challenge he simply couldn't pass up.

Watching the final fights proved very interesting, but soon that too was over and it was time for the group to go home. But not for Phil. Phil had decided that now that he was here it would be a shame not to do a bit of sightseeing. The tournament had been held in one of the shiny new arenas made for the upcoming Olympics in Beijing and had in itself been a sight to see, but Beijing had so much more to offer. There were trips to the Great Wall, the Forbidden City and all the temples.

It was on the grounds of the Temple of Heaven that Phil met The General. The Temple of Heaven was a huge complex consisting of exclusively circular buildings, the circle being the symbol of Heaven. Phil was standing on the causeway leading south from the main temple when a man came up to him and spoke: "Mr. Green isn't it?" the man asked in a deep and cultured voice with a slight trace of British accent.