Day 3 - Beijing

Today we decided to lay low after the big day yesterday. We started off with breakfast in the hotel...ahhhhh the western buffet is turning out to be our biggest meal each day! We met up with the rest of the families. I can't tell you how fun it is to finally put a face to the folks we have been chatting on line with for the past year or so! They are a great bunch and we are having so much fun with them all!

Ed and I got massages today... holy cow! We got to get them together so that was fun... and the total cost was less than what one of us would have paid back home!

Josh worked on homework, we both did some reading and just enjoyed the day. We finished out the day by attending an acrobatic show. It was really cool! Including pictures below.

Tomorrow we get off to an early start and head out with the goup for the Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square and a Hutong Tour. Gotta go to bed.... still trying to adjust to the time.... Josh was out like a light and Ed wasn't too far behind. I nodded off during dinner last night (not cool) and fell asleep on the way back from tonight's show! LOL.

We get Gracie in just under 2 days now.... can't believe it!!! Stay tuned. Thanks for checking in and a special thanks to those who are leaving comments and/or sending e-mail! It's great to hear from everyone... what a pick me up!!

Stacey - No more spending on things I can get in GZ...thanks for the heads up... I have spread the word....we all thought we were doing so well too! : )

Sign 'o the Day:

Day 1 -


Day 2 -


Day 3 -

Day 2 – Beijing

We decided to take a tour of some of the places we wouldn’t be visiting when the rest of the group arrived. On the agenda:

Summer Palace
Temple of Heaven
Tiananmen Square
Forbidden City

We were surprised with a few extra stops along the way as well. It was a loooooong day! We started at 8 am and didn’t return to our hotel until 5:30 pm. When we weren’t on the bus we were walking and walking and walking and walking. I think I shall rename this trip the “China Diet” since I am not eating much and walking a ton! LOL

Because we have a lot of photos to post, I am going to give each stop it’s own entry. Enjoy!

Day 2 - Beijing - Summer Palace

We started out our tour by visiting Summer Palace. This palace was built for the royal family to relax and enjoy time away during... you guessed it, the summer! There is a beautiful man made lake that sits in the middle of it all and to say the entire place was breath taking would be an absolute understatement. There is so much history here. Our tour guide shared many stories about the royal family that built these grounds. The large rock formations were brought in from all over China for the emporor since he liked rocks when he was a child. I think all little boys love to collect rocks but holy moly! : ) We ended our visit to this site by taking a boat across the lake... just beautiful.

After the Summer Palace we went to a pearl market and then to cute little resteraunt which I am sad to say we didn't eat much from. We have been pretty good at trying out new foods but let's just say the food was a little bit too authentic at this place. Although, they did have a tray of "American" hot dogs available to us... they were sliced and placed on sesame seed loaves with lettuce and tomato... okay. : )

Day 2 – Temple of Heaven

This is also known as Qigu Hall and it was the spot where the emperor of the Ming and Qing dynasties prayed for good harvest in Spring. While there are many temples scattered throughout Beijing, this is one of the best known. There were two other halls but both were being renovated for the ’08 Olympics so we didn’t have access to either. Temple of Heaven grounds include beautiful landscaping and parks where we watched locals enjoying the weather and each other. We climbed to the top and the view of Beijing was amazing! We could even see a ferris wheel in the distance… one of those really big ones like the one on the River Thames in London. The grounds surrounding this temple we could hear traditional instruments being played, people singing and playing. People of all ages were enjoying the day. I was taking pictures of a couple playing a paddle type ball game. They each had two paddles and bounced/balanced an odd shaped ball. They asked if I wanted to join in and let me tell you… I did but our tour guide was moving on and I had to decline.

Day 2 – Tiananmen Square

This was built in 1417 during the Ming Dynasty and is the gateway to the Forbidden City. Initially it was used to declare in ceremony to the common people who became the emperor and who became the empress. Today Tiananmen Square covers 440,000 square meters and is now a relaxing place for the common people to fly kites and socialize. On holidays, the entire square is covered with fresh flowers… They were getting it ready for the national 7-day holiday that begins on October 1st so there was a lot of activity.

Day 2 – Forbidden City

Forbidden City was forbidden territory for common people during the rule of the royal family. The grounds are made of thousands of rooms…. 9,999 rooms to be exact. The number 9 in China is a very lucky number that is why they never went for the 10,000th room. They also felt that the 10,000th room was occupied by a god. Once again, tons of the buildings were being renovated so we weren’t afforded a great view at times. Our guide took us straight up the center of the city so we weren’t able to explore the side halls. I don’t think a single day dedicated to touring this site would allow one to truly enjoy themselves. There is just too much to see.




At the end of the grounds was the Imperial Garden. BEAUTIFUL!!!! I am including pictures from there as well. We go back to this site on Friday with the Bethany group so we will have the opportunity to visit the other gardens and buildings we missed.

We then went to visit Jingshan Park which was across the street. BEAUTIFUL!! I wish I could post more pictures but it takes several minutes to load just one so I'll have to end this post with this one from the park.



We ended the afternoon having tea in the park at a Tea House.



For those of you who know us, you know we are quite the tea aficionadoes! This was MY temple of heaven!! We participated in a traditional tea ceremony and we're bringing some home! We drank jasmine tea with real flowers in it! It was like drinking a flower... none of the tea was what we are used to... the tea is actually hand rolled balls, pellets, leaves, flowers.... amazing stuff!



Josh really was having a good time... I thought this photo was pretty funny though!

A common scene in local parks...

It's 4:30 in the morning... do you know where your family is?

Josh is reading a book.
Ed is eating Jelly-Belly's.
I am Blogging.

Me: I can't believe you are eating Jelly Bellys at 4:30 in the morning.
Ed: I can't believe you are Blogging at 4:30 in the morning.

Enough said... end of that conversation! LOL

I.CAN’T.SLEEP.

Day 1 (con’t)

We found the Silk Market! What an experience that was. But not before the taxi ride from hell! I cannot even begin to describe what that was like! We came within a hairs breath of hitting pedestrian after pedestrian.... people on bicycles rode around with big targets on them as they were especially in danger! It is nothing for a car to cross over 3 lanes and swing in to a turn only lane without batting an eyelash! Paris cabbies have nothing on these guys! LOL! But anyway, we found out we were pretty close to the Silk Market and decided to head over there “just to look around”. FAMOUS.LAST.WORDS.

The atmosphere was incredible. Five floors packed with vendors who were selling everything from silk pajamas to pearls to iPods. The only bad thing was that if you even glanced at an item, the salesclerk started wheeling and dealing with you. This may be a good thing as it probably kept me from buying too much on this, our first full day in Beijing! At one point I had three different sales clerks holding my arms trying to get me into their store... they were from different stores. This happened to Ed to but all he could think about was that he should have asked me to take his picture so that he could share with everyone how he had three women fighting over him! LOL We happened to stop by a store selling ski clothes. I explained we had no use for them so the clerk asked us where we lived. We said Florida and she knew exactly where that was and proceeded to tell us that what we should do is outfit ourselves with her ski clothes and move north so that we can use them! She was serious.

Price Haggling 101
The prices that you are presented with are typically a bit high… but that’s all part of the game. I had been told that when you are presented with a price, no matter the amount, show a bit of concern or disinterest and they will start giving you a lower price. Now, one of the things we wanted to buy for Gracie was some silk pajamas. Note that they are not really pajamas but traditional wear. I have seen children’s silks at EPCOT for about $40… not surprising as Disney tends to mark everything up 500% anyway. I knew that I could get them for less than ½ of that price. I thought I would put my “haggling” lessons to work and see what would happened next. I present you with what happened next... (for the purposes of today's deomonstration, SM=Silk Market):

Me: How much for these pink silk pajamas?
SM: I can give to you at 400RMB (about $50)
Me: 400 RMB? That’s pretty high” at this point I gave her a look of concern and told her “no, that’s a lot”. That's what a good little haggler does...right?

CRITITCAL ERROR

I turned to Ed and do you know what this un-schooled on haggling man did? He said “That’s fine, I like them… and proceeded to count out the money”. First of all, hello, I wasn't looking for permission here! What happened to my husband? The man who hates when I spend too much? The man who can’t even stand shopping or crowds let alone the two combined? HELLOOOOOOOOO? So I gave him the look (ever see Everyone Loves Raymond? They did a whole episode on the look)... okay time to start re-tooling my strategy. I put them back on the rack and said I didn't think I liked them as much as I thought. Immediately the price dropped by 100RMB (now we are down to about $40…still some work to do because I really did like them!).

Me: I don’t think I’ll take these, maybe they aren’t exactly what I was looking for.
SM: I give you good price, you be my friend, 200RMB.
I decide to give Ed a second chance so I turned back to Ed again and what did this man who is not my husband say? THAT’S FINE. What is wrong with this guy…. Didn’t I just give him the look???? LOL

Long story short, I ended up paying 150RMB (about $18) and Gracie has now scored her first set of pink pjs! I had a long talk with my otherwise awesome husband and I think he gets the drift now and has decided to not be an active participant in the haggling game... that will now be one of my jobs on this trip. We left the Silk Market with a few other items and another set of silk pjs for Gracie…. Which I might add are way too cute!!

We ended the day having dinner with Anne and Scott, our Bethany travel mates. What a cool couple! We have been talking with them for over a year on the Bethany Boards and other online forums. The Internet is such an awesome thing… later today we will meet up with more of the Bethany families including Conway, Juleen, Rossette and Tarita who we have also been talking to for a while. We can’t wait!

Today we are off on a tour to see the Temple of Heaven, Summer Palace and the Forbidden City!

Day 1 - Beijing
We started our day off with a great breakfast buffet! They had traditional Chinese foods along with western style foods such as cheerios and frootloops! I decided to try a couple of new food items and had an egg custard... it kind of looked like flan but it tasted like soft boiled eggs. I liked it. Also tried fried noodles and they were really good! Ed and Josh had those as well as eggs, bacon, sausage, etc... The hot tea was delish!

Our Hotel




We went exploring near the hotel and ended up in a mall!


We were really looking for a place to buy water and a few odds and ends and there we were. Very nice and super clean. The sales people follow you everywhere and there is tons of security. They had a car show in the middle of the mall (did I mention it was 5 stories) and they had beautiful women in evening gowns next to each of the cars...


Well afer returning to the room and doing a bit of research, we have discovered that we are mere blocks away from Forbidden City, the Pearl Market, the Silk Market and the Friendship Store. So it looks like we are going to head out and so some real exploring and maybe get a jumpstart on some shopping.

We are here!! We got to Beijing at around 9:30 this evening... that would be 9:30am Monday morning to those back home!




What a loooooooooooooong trip! I have never been on a plane that long...EVER! We were given 3 movies to watch so that was cool.... but otherwise...yeeeesh! lol But how awesome it is to be in the same country as Gracie.... soooo close!!

Interesting stuff in no particular order... hellloooo... random girl here!

1. By the time we got to the hotel, it was 11pm and we were very hungry.... we learned that the McDonalds across the street is open 24 hours... but we didn't want to have to cross the 6 lane highway via underground tunnel at midnight... so being the "spoiled" Americans we are (LOL), we ordered room service. We ordered a very fancy spread indeed.... hot dogs! So I asked for 2 hot dogs each with a side of fries. That's it. Behold... this is what was brought to our room... table and all!


Yep... we were served 6 meals, with six orders of fries, six hot dogs, six silverware settings, and all on a big table for... you guessed it... six! So I'm thinking we need to work on our communication skills! lol

2. We got to watch an episode of Friends in English with Chinese sub-titles.
3. Japan has the funniest commercials, while we waited to board our connecting flight, they had a huge tv in the waiting area and it seemed like the commercials
WERE the shows... very entertaining!
4. The airport in Tokyo was very busy and very quiet. Weird.... just a very hushed atmosphere... they had plenty of stores and kiosks but it was still very quiet.
5. The Detroit Airport was pretty cool... they had an awesome water fountain that danced (mini version of what we see at Epcot)...you can see Ed and I in front of it and our huge plane behind us! We took a picture of Josh in front of it too.. just before he got sprayed by it... it will be posted to his blog in the morning.
6. The first thing we noticed when we deplaned were the smells of Beijing... lots of factories... not sure if it was smog or what but wow... this City is pretty cool and there is so much going on to prepare for the Olympics... we saw consruction workers working on projects as we drove to our hotel at 11pm!!
7. We have Internet.... Ed was able to determine that he and Josh were doing well in this week's fantasy football league.

This is us in front of the fountain and our plane....


For Dan... by the way you were only off 1/4 lb on Lisa's suitcase weight! Your good!

We're gone one day and look what happens... what's up with this??
Earthquake???