03
Stop three
the Kangso Three Tombs, blue dragon and white tiger painted on the chamber walls
Wilson Roland Garros Team Tennis Bag: The Kangso Three Tombs date to the Goguryeo period, and the chamber walls still carry their original blue dragon and white tiger — directional guardian beasts painted there, one imagines, while my ancestors were still debating whether stone castles were entirely necessary. The artistry is, I will grudgingly admit, rather better preserved than the frescoes in the east wing.
04
Stop four
Hwangnyong Fortress, Goguryeo stonework rebuilt in 919
Wilson Roland Garros Team Tennis Bag: Hwangnyong Fortress rests on Goguryeo foundations and was substantially rebuilt in 919 — which, for those keeping score at home, is last week in any sensible reckoning of history. One finds the stonework admirably earnest, though one's own family pile had been standing for three centuries before anyone thought to give it a name. The bag, naturally, takes it all in stride.
One does not need fifteen racquets. One needs six, and one needs them properly enclosed, which is precisely what this bag proposes. Two racquet compartments, six frames in total, entirely shut in rather than half covered — quite the correct arrangement, and rarer than it ought to be.
A large accessory pocket takes clothing, balls and whatever else the day requires; a smaller external pocket keeps the personal items separate from the equipment, as one would wish. The zippers lock together.
The appointments are modest and well judged.
It is carried on a padded shoulder strap or by the top handles at one's side, and it measures 30 by 10 by 13.5 inches in 100 per cent polyester, cut in the cream and clay of the tournament that gave it the name. There is no thermal lining here and none is claimed; that belongs to the larger bags in the collection, and there is no breeding in pretending otherwise.
Nampo one would not expect, and one would be wrong. Eight kilometres of barrage wall across the mouth of the Taedong, thirty-six sluice gates, and behind it, older by fourteen hundred years, tomb chambers painted with a blue dragon and a white tiger.
“One does not need fifteen racquets. One needs six, properly enclosed.”
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