Saturday

Saturday started at 4am.  Caylee woke up and could not go back to sleep. We were all up by 4:30.  We went for breakfast sometime after 6:00. 

 

It was such a busy day!  Bethany does a 3 day tour in Beijing before you fly to your province.  It helps you get adjusted to jet lag and also helps you understand a little more about the culture.  I can't wait to tell Alina about it someday.  We went first to Tiananmen Square.  Believe it or not, it isn't a square.  Who knew?!  ;)  It was much bigger than I thought though.  There is a big picture of Mao on the building.  This was the first stop of the day & of course this is where our camera decided to die.  Boo.  We put in new batteries but it still wouldn't work.  We tried to use Caylee's camera but that died shortly after too.  So we switched out batteries and then hers stopped working too. Turns out we had a bad pack of batteries.  Thank goodness one of our new friends stepped in & let us take pictures with her cell phone. 

 

We walked from Tiananmen Square to the Forbidden City. The Forbidden City was the Chinese imperial palace from the Ming Dynasty to the end of the Qing Dynasty.  For almost 500 years, it served as the home of emperors and their households, as well as the ceremonial and political center of Chinese government.    It went on forever.  Building after building and courtyard after courtyard.  The architecture was beautiful and every attention was paid to detail.  We found a little gift shop there and were able to get some new batteries.  Ba bam...our camera worked again right away.  Whew!  I could not imagine not having a camera & taking pictures of all of these amazing things! 

 

There are several families here with children so it was really cool to see them all playing tag together while we waited outside the Forbidden City.  Lots of people came up and wanted their pictures taken with the kids.  And they love Caylee's blonde hair!

 

We went next to a traditional Chinese home.  We had to take a rickshaw to get there.  You can only fit 2 people on there so Randy and Caylee rode together and I got to ride with my new friend Teresa.  It was fun!  I was just trying to take in all the sites and sounds of Beijing.  I still can't believe that we are here!  I also got to practice some of my Mandarin.  The rickshaw driver was impressed that I could say his rickshaw #:  363 - san leo san.  He would yell it back to me. "SAN LEO SAN!"

 

We passed an ice skating pond and it was packed!  They have these chairs they sit in with blades on the bottom for the ice w/some kind of poles in their hands and they were able to get around.  I've never seen anything like it.

 

The traditional Chinese house was really cool too.  There was a big courtyard surrounded by different buildings.  1 room/building for a kitchen.  1 room/building for a bedroom, etc.  And sometimes there are 2 or 3 families living there together.  It was great to explore!

 

We next went to a Chinese restaurant for lunch. It was hibachi style where someone cooks right in front of you.  We got to practice with our chopsticks because that's all they gave us.  P. S.  How do you eat fried rice with chopsticks?  Randy thinks we should use chopsticks with every meal because it would help us eat less. It's weird , I noticed that they were skipping the children on every round.  Someone told me later that they believe in serving the oldest (eldest) first and the children last. 

 

After lunch we went to a tea house and got to try several different types of teas.  The first sample we tried, you had to take in 3 sips.  The first for happiness, the second for prosperity and the third for long life.  I made sure to write that down because I knew my dad would appreciate what it meant.  The two other teas were a blend of Jasmine and they weren't my favorite.  I was proud of Caylee for trying it.  The last tea really wasn't tea at all but they called it fruit tea.  It is boiling water over dried fruit.  It was yummy!  And there is nothing to waste because you can eat the dried fruit afterward.  The tables and settings and all of the décor was beautiful. 

 

We went back to our hotel to rest for a little over an hour because we were meeting up later to go to an acrobatic show.  We decided to sleep but it was so hard to get back up!  The acrobatic show was amazing.  Those kids are really talented.

 

We got back to the hotel and went with friends to dinner.  This time we found a KFC but we had to go through kind of a shopping mall to get there. This is not like our shopping mall.  Imagine stores a little bigger than a kiosk all side by side.  Some had the exact same things.  And everyone approaches you.  Everyone!  Some lady told Caylee that she needed a different color boots to go better with her outfit.  Of course on the way out, we found the back way in.  KFC was good but different from our KFC.  And we had to communicate by pointing at pictures.  I feel like it gives me more empathy for people who are in America whose first language is not English.

 

Sunday is a day of travel and we had to be up and at the lobby by 4:50 so we went to bed almost as soon as we got back in.  Here are some pictures from our trip so far: