For the next eighteen thousand years, P'an Ku wored constantly to keep the heavens from crushing the surface of the earth. He ate only the mists that blew into his mouth, and he never slept. At frist he could only rest on his kness with his elbows bent. He pushed his feet against the earth, and he pushed his hands upward against the sky. Each day he pushed the heavens ten feet higher, and he forced the earth to sink ten feet lower. And each day he become ten feet taller.