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| Drakensberg
Mountain Range |
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You
ask me why I dwell in the green mountain;
I smile and make no reply for my heart is free of care.
As the peach-blossom flows down stream and is gone into
the unknown,
I have a world apart that is not among men.
Li
Bai
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The
magnificent Drakensberg mountain range towers
over the rest of KwaZulu-Natal at the highest altitude
south of Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania. This spectacular
area includes the uKhahlamba-Drakensberg Park which
has recently been declared a World Heritage Site by
Unesco. It features 200-million-year-old geological
formations as well as a wealth of San rock art: over
35 000 individual paintings at 600 sites.
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| Li
Bai (701-762) was
born in Suiye in Central Asia. His ancestors had been
banished there by the Sui rulers. At five he moved to
Sichuan with his father, who was probably a rich merchant.
When young, he studied not only Confucian classics, but
works of other schools. After 20 he first travelled for
and wide in Sichuan, and then he started a long journey
to Central, East and North China. He did not sit for the
civil service examination, for he looked down upon it.
But he wished to become an official. When he was 42, he
was recommended to Tang Xuan Zong , who ordered him to
go to Chang'an. He stayed there for three years and was
bitterly disappointed. During the years of An Lushan's
rebellion, he joined the staff of Prince Li Lin. Later,
because Li Lin tried to seize power and failed, Li Bai
was exiled to Yelang. On his way to Yelang he was freed
by an amnesty. He went to East China and died at 62 in
Dangtu, Anhui. |
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