It is Saturday morning in China (5:53am to be exact) and Friday night in the US. We are getting ready for our second full day in Beijing. Our flight went well. It was a long day. We left our house at 11am on Wednesday and arrived in China 25 hours later. We sailed through the temperature screens with no problems. A major praise! None of us slept much on the plane, and we are still trying to adjust to the time change, as evidenced by the fact that I have been twiddling my thumbs since 2:30 this morning.
Our first day was awesome and packed full of 10 hours of sight-seeing in Beijing. The first thing we did was have breakfast with my sister Holly and her husband Marc. It was great to see them after a year! We met up with the other families traveling with us and loaded a bus about 9am for the Great Wall, with a quick stop at the jade market on the way. The Great Wall was amazing. The steepest steps I have ever climbed. The hottest weather I have experienced in a long, long time. I know I feared the swine flu, but it may be heat stroke that does us all in. We climbed/walked the loop, which took about an hour. The girls were troopers. And yes, we did take an O-H-I-O picture at the top of the wall!
After the Great Wall, our guide, Uncle Zhou (Joe) had arranged lunch for us at the Friendship Store. We sat at big round tables and shared different Chinese dishes. Holly and Marc provided chopstick lessons for everyone. We had a tour of the Cloisonne factory, which is where they make enamelware—a very artistic and detailed process. There was shopping after lunch and we were able to buy some beautiful Cloisonne Christmas ornaments for the girls.
Next we stopped by Olympic Park and saw the Bird's Nest Stadium and the swimming venue. Very cool to get to see that. Then it was off to an acrobat show where we all finally hit the wall of exhaustion.
Today we are headed out for more sight-seeing. Holly and Marc will join us again, so we are excited to spend more time with them. Not to mention, they were a HUGE help with the language and culture yesterday. Holly gave all the women in our group lessons on how to use the squat potties, she negotiated good prices for me while shopping, got my girls ICY cold water when they were stroking out at the end of the Great Wall hike, and gave language and culture lessons to anyone who had questions.
Very surreal to be here. Loving the chance to take in the sights and get a taste of the culture here. But, no amount of fun and sight-seeing can distract us from the real reason we're here….2 sleeps until Isabelle! Woohoo!!!
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