Trip to China
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Friday, November 16, 2007 WOW! What a day! I can honestly say, we enjoyed every minute of it. Here’s the run-down… It started with a breakfast buffet enjoyed in our hotel restaurant. It was elegant and they offered everything from bagels to pork fried rice to fish cakes. YUM! From there we loaded up on the bus and headed to first, Tiananmen Square, and the Forbidden City . It was here that Tony got to test his powers at bargaining with street vendors. Tony negotiated an Olympics 2008 knit beanie down to 15 yuan (about $2.00 and some change)! I was so impressed! Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City were really impressive. The square itself can hold a half a million people. As for the city, it was surrounded with high walls, and hundreds of years of history. The intricate architecture was beautiful, the colors vibrant in places, and the tourists plenty! Our WONDERFUL guide Catherine filled us in on all the “reasons why” behind the buildings and grounds. The Emperor’s Garden was amazing. I’m sure it’s more beautiful in the lush summer months. From there we came back to the hotel. I say that, like it was a jaunt to Walmart. I’ve read many blogs about the traffic situation here. There’s nothing like experiencing it. Tony thinks I honk the horn a lot and get frustrated, NO WAY! It’s every man for himself and the lines painted on the road are merely a suggestion. Catherine said when we needed to cross a busy intersection, “You walk when the Chinese walk, and stop when they do!” We took her advice, but it was scary! Luckily, the bus we’re on is one of the biggest on the road, and it works pretty much like rock, paper, scissors. Tiny bike with a box on the back beats plain bike. Tiny compact car beats bike with box. Mini-van (by mini I mean, way little) beats compact car. Taxi beats mini-van. Jeep-like car beats taxi. Bus beats Jeep-like car. Bigger bus (that’s us) beats all! Our driver is excellent!!! When we got back to the hotel, we headed out with Brian and Lynn (daddy and mommy-to-be of Kiera) to the mall and grocery. The mall was very high end. However, we ate at the restaurant there and Tony enjoyed fried meat (it was labeled chicken, but who knows) and I had mac and cheese! I know, I know not totally adventurous, but I wanted to enjoy the rest of the day. We also drank Coke Lite! Big Tony can tell you all about that! After the lunch, we went to the grocery store that is located in the basement of the mall. It was interesting…an employee posted at every aisle (both beginning and end) and sometimes one in the middle. They were very friendly and it didn’t matter that we couldn’t understand them…they just kept talking and smiling! (So we did too!) We left the grocery with more Coke Lite, Pringles, Snickers, and Tide (to wash clothes in our sink). FUN! This evening we went to an Acrobat show. It was simply amazing! Imagine people tumbling, and jumping through hoops, bending and contorting in all sorts of unusual ways, and piling one on top of another on one bicycle! It was an impressive show! Afterwards we went with just a few members of our travel group and our guide to a Peking duck restaurant. It was VERY nice and our guide said she’s never been able to get in there, they’re usually so booked! She said we were lucky people! We ate family style on a middle lazy susan and it was so good! We had beef, chicken, rice, shrimp, and of course, DUCK! We tried it all (well, Tony didn’t try the shrimp) and it was pretty good! We drank delicious tea and enjoyed fun conversation. For dessert, we ate this almond dessert. Imagine a cross between a yogurt and tapioca pudding…and hot. It was actually pretty good! Even Tony liked it! We were brave and tried Karl’s (another dad in our group) black sesame dessert. Lynn described it perfectly as charcoal pudding. YUCK! But at least we tried it! They also served us fresh fruit and there was a fruit that looked like TINY oranges. Our guide explained that our girls’ birth city (Yifeng) is known for this fruit. Unfortunately, we didn’t care for them. The whole thing was truly a great experience.

Hanging out at Forbidden City The View Leaving the Forbidden City Beijing...It's HUGE! Hanging out at Tiananmen Square Another View from our Hotel View from our Hotel

Tomorrow we’re going to the Great Wall and Summer Palace . It’s supposed to be a full day! That’s ok by us, it keeps us from freaking out about the fact that in less than 48 hours we’re going to become Mommy and Daddy. Wow… Speaking of which, we got some information back from the orphanage about Laney and Abby. Our agency sends a list of questions to them ahead of time and we got the replies. Here’s a few little tidbits. Evidently we have been wrong about what they’ve been calling the girls. It isn’t La La and Mei Mei. It’s La Zi Bao Bao and Mei Zi Bao Bao. I’m not sure why, and we hope to ask the guide tomorrow. And here’s something precious, they suck on their fingers before they go to sleep. I’m not sure how they do it, but for many adoptive children from China it seems as though it’s their two middle fingers, and it’s adorable! It also asked if they were active or relatively quiet. The answer…they are both active. Great! We’re toast! One final detail, we found out tonight that our guide in Jiangxi is actually FROM the girls’ birth city of Yifeng !!! What a personal experience she’ll have to share! Sorry this post is so long, we just have so much to share and want the girls to have this record. Thanks SO much for the guestbook entries! We LOVE LOVE LOVE reading them. It’s good to hear from home. And there’s no rule about only posting once. We want to hear from YOU daily as much as you want to hear from us! So keep them coming! We love you all!   POP QUIZ FOR MRS. HOKEY’S AND MRS. FOSTER’S CLASSES: What’s the population in Beijing ? How many cars are there in Beijing? What’s the capital city of Abby and Laney’s province, Jiangxi ? The answers will come tomorrow!

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