Friday,
May 27
Only 4 days to Isabelle (counting the 27th)!
We woke up this morning a bit more refreshed but still must
admit suffering some of the effects of jet lag and the time
differences between home and China. The 12-13 hour
difference means we want to go to sleep when we should be waking
up and wide awake as everyone here is winding down. Tori
seems to have overcome the effects the most but then again maybe
it was the 13.5 hour nap she took.
We have been trying to follow the advice of everyone on the
boards and it seems to have helped. One of the best
suggestions was to eat a ton at the breakfast buffet and then
skip lunch and just have an early dinner. We may have
overstepped the "eat a ton" bit because we never really made it
to the 'dinner' part of the plan. So, needless to say the
breakfast buffet here is very good. It seems to have
everything from every country. Could choose from American
or European breakfast or even lunch/dinner items such as: rice,
pot stickers (dumplings), and fish.
After the big breakfast, we met Mr. Wang, our driver who was
provided on the recommendation of a new friend from Beijing that
we have gotten to know via email, who drove us the two hours to
the Great Wall. The traffic here is fun to say the least.
I tried to teach Mr. Wang the phrase "sweet move" because there
were several times he made the just the right turn or quick slip
to get us past the traffic of bicycles, mopeds, buses,
pedestrians, and other cars that had no regard for traffic laws,
that we could understand. After all of his sweet moves, we
arrived at the Great Wall at Mutianyu.
We decided to take the cable car up to the wall rather than
ascend the 1,000 steps up to the wall. We would later
descend those steps on the way back to the car. Much
better going down than it would have been going up. We
didn't escape climbing the Great Wall itself however. It
was an amazing site seeing the length of the wall and the
various heights as it rose and fell along the topmost side of
the mountain range. We decided to climb as far as we
could before the crumbling part of the wall stopped us from
continuing, actually we were stopped by both the warning to not
go farther and our own aching/crying muscle pains from the
ascent. You can see Tori and Stefanie still fresh, prior
to the big climb, in the picture that has the sign above their
heads that states, "Dangerous section pay your attention."
We got a kick out of the sign and other little English language
idiosyncrasies you witness everywhere here. Following the
Great Wall, Mr. Wang suggested we head for the Summer Palace so
we took him up on it and discovered another treasure of China.
At the Summer Palace, we were accosted by vendors but did find a
gem in the guide who took us around. Her name was Tracy
and she described for us the many details of the Palace.
Seems that longevity was an important issue to consider for the
Dynasties as they designed and lived throughout the centuries.
Tracy told us how the design of the grounds and buildings
contributed to the overall feeling of the Palace, which covers
2.9 sq. kilometers. She stated that were many things used
for longevity, including: the color green, peaches, and turtles.
The numbers of paintings in the world's longest covered walkway
(verified by those fellows who track world records) were
astonishing. Really too many things to take in and provide
a quality report. It was awesome!
We made it back to the hotel and spent a couple hours unwinding
and then it was time for Mr. Wang to take us to the Red Theater
were we would see, Chun Yi, The Legend of Kungfu. Other
than all of us being tired the show was fantastic and we would
recommend it to anyone who comes to Beijing. Some of the
stuff they did would be impossible to explain. It was a
world class demonstration of karate, ballet, gymnastics, and
dance. The kids doing flips using their heads made us
cringe and "oh and ah" as well. Several ovations for those
kids. The play was the story of Chun Yi and how he
left his mom and went to become a monk and the trials and
tribulations he had to face before eventually becoming the top
monk in the monastery (simplified explanation).
The real fun began when we left the theater and found a driver
who would take 20 RmB for a ride to the hotel. He said he
knew where it was but after several turnarounds we all began to
realize that we were in a foreign country without any idea how
to get to the hotel with a driver that knew about as much as we
did. We finally figured out a way to communicate our
concerns and showed him the back of our room key cards and then
he did a 180 and we were at our hotel in a flash. The
detour did give us the opportunity to see Tiananmen Square and
the Forbidden City all lit up. There were lights
everywhere, kind of like Times Square at Christmas.
Tomorrow is shopping day and a Hutong Tour. Mr Wang will be
driving so if you're worried don't be because he is great.
While we enjoyed all the things we did, the best part of our day
was that we were able to talk by phone with all the boys!
Zach at night here (10 p.m.) and Dalton and Asher this morning
(7:45 a.m.). It was fantastic to hear from them and know
that they are doing so well. Our families are such a
blessing as they shoulder the responsibility of watching/taking
over the care of the boys. Thank you for everything!!!!!
We love you all and miss you but continue to focus on getting
Isabelle on the 30th. |
Chris and Tori on
the Great Wall
Danger sign warns that continuing to
climb will cause sweat and tears to
flow from anyone attempting to climb.
Stefanie and Tori taking a 'short' break
before arriving at the top of the climb.
We made it to the top and all looking so refreshed.
Dragon boat that we took to the Summer Palace,
Tracy explained this unique Chinese statue is believed to have had the
power to tell right from wrong and royalty from unroyalty. |
