Trip to China
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Saturday, November 1, 2008 Today was a long, BUSY day! As soon as breakfast was over we met our group in the lobby and boarded a bus for Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City. Holt became quite the tourist attraction there, with groups of people wanting to touch his blonde hair and take his picture. MeMe and I agreed to have a contest with him to see who would have the most people request to take our picture; unfortunately we scored absolutely no points in that little contest. And of course he had to point out that blondes have more fun. I must say he was quite full of himself after all the attention. After two and a half hours of solid walking and lots of picture taking we returned to the bus to go to our next stop, which was lunch. Lunch was served a 5 star Chinese restaurant and was enjoyed by all. Then it was on to the pearl factory, where the kids learned all about how pearls are formed and they were each given a small pink pearl to keep. Of course, Holt had his heart set on one of the rare black pearls and somehow managed to sweet talk one of the sales girls into slipping him one of those as well. Maybe blondes do have more fun! We bought Maili a pearl necklace, bracelet, and earrings to give to her on her wedding day. After the pearl factory we visited the Summer Palace, which was huge and very ornate. We took lots of beautiful pictures along the river. Then we were on to the silk factory, where we learned how silk is made from the cocoons of silk worms. Holt managed to snag a couple of cocoons for himself but I’m not sure how that will play out when we try to go through customs. All of the kids got to try their hand at pulling silk to make a quilt but they pretty much destroyed it in the process and the silk worker declared them all fired. After deciding there was no future for our group in silk making, we headed upstairs to check out the wares. We had decided to buy Maili a traditional Chinese silk dress to have her picture made in, and of course Holt decided that he needed an outfit to match. So he modeled a few for us before settling on a beautiful red and gold silk set. The sales girls got quite a kick out of our American boys trying on all the outfits. When we finally left the silk factory it was time for dinner, this time at a so-called Western Restaurant. However, as our guide warned us before going it, it had Western food that was not Western food. I didn’t quite understand what she meant until Holt bit into what he thought was a hot dog and found corn inside. Who knew! There was a rather interesting assortment of American food that didn’t quite taste like American food, but it was all delicious in spite of a few surprises. Holt passed out at the table about 10 minutes into the meal and we had to wake him up and practically carry him out. I think the jet lag is starting to catch up with all of us, but tomorrow shouldn’t be quite as busy as today.

Our travel group Inside the Forbidden City Holt's Paparazzi Holt mastered the art of chopsticks At the Summer Palace

Decisions, decisions


Trying on clothes at the silk factory

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