Day 2

Thursday May 8, 2008
We have landed. Kang Kang kept saying "I can't believe are in China." Our hotel is a hutong and is absolutely marvelous. There are about 8 rooms around 2 central courtyards. Beautiful, quiet, Chinese. The kids can play in the courtyard while we sit and drink coffee. That is tomorrow's plan.

Tonight we ventured out to eat at a local restaurant. We were tired so we forgot to ask someone from our hotel, who speaks English, to write down a few items for us. So, we are in this restaurant. We speak no Mandarin. No one there speaks English. Can't quite make out the pictures on the menu. By some extreme stroke of luck I end up with absolutely my favorite Chinese dish, a spicy eggplant. I did get the people in the restaurant to write that down for me. The whole dinner including a large bottle of beer which Nancy and I split, 2 500 ml apple juices, one order dumplings, 1 order noodles, 3 rice and the eggplant- less than $14.

We did not sleep much in the plane but I guess it was enough because I am okay. Kang Kang just fell asleep and it is after 9 pm here so, we should be okay in our adaptation I think. I hope.

Photos will have to come another day. Good night.

The gang in Beijing.

May 9th or 10th or some such thing
Who really knows? And does it really matter? So,  Good news for Ellen. Kang Kang slept through the night and so did I with one little glitch at 3 am which a sleeping pill quickly remedied. Bad news for Nancy. Both kids were awake at 1 am for the duration. Since they slept on the plane, the short nap from 9-1 seemed to suffice.  I am so glad we were not sharing a room.  She did get her revenge though. By 3 the kids were falling asleep in the van but sensibly, she was having no part of it. No need for a late nap and then kids awake all night. So she poked, shook, tickled, prodded, cajoled, anything to keep them awake.  Caleb protested mightly, whimpering for about an hour until he suddenly decided to cheerfully perk up and switched in a second to laughing and running.(By that time we were out of the van) Did I mention he can act?  By 8 or so Chloe fell asleep on the floor and Caleb cheerily said goodnight to Kang Kang and I and got himself ready for bed.  But I digress, that is night.

Today we got up and had breakfast outdoors in our lovely courtyard.  The kids can play outside, run between courtyards all safely as they cannot get out.

We then went for a bicycle rickshaw tour of a Hutong which was fun but a little anticlimactic as we are staying in one. Our area is a neighbourhood where people actually live so that is fun.  We had lunch at a local home. Sadly, breakfast was late, lunch was early and I think we insulted him as he made enough food for 6 people easily and we only ate a little.   Next, off to the Summer Palace which was beautiful.  We are quite the objects of curiosity, us White folk with the Chinese kids. At one point at the Summer Palace we were surrounded by a Chinese tour group all laughing and pointing at us.  Today was cool and rainy at times but mostly okay. Our guide is nice and helpful but a bit rushed at times.  We were supposed to go to the Acrobats tonight but when we learned it was another 30+ minutes in the car and the same to go home and given that the two younger kids were not awake, we decided to postpone that until tomorrow.  Kang Kang was a little disappointed but came home to the hotel and showed the other two his DVD of the acrobats so was appeased.

Tomorrow we were supposed to go to the Forbidden City and Temple of Heaven but the weather says nice tomorrow and rain the next day so we have decided to flip the schedule and do the Great Wall tomorrow. I hope our guide is reasonably flexible as we do not have his hone number to call him and let him know. The Great Wall is important to Kang Kang and so we really want to be able to enjoy it.

I will try to keep up but do not expect a missive every day.