China Day 1

Wow...sorry it's taken me so long to finally update. We've been busy and have had some technical difficulties. We brought Matt's laptop and Pat's work laptop and we've had some troubles with each one plus the internet connection has been bad and blogger is having some difficulties. Matt's laptop cord has three prongs and our adapter only has one, so we didn't have power for it for a while. Pat's work computer was having troubles logging on with all the security the company has on it. Now we can't view our posts on blogger. Megan typed up a long post late last night and had a hard time getting it to post. Either the internet went out or blogger isn't working. I have had to share computer time with her and I fell asleep waiting for my turn last night. Here's Megans blog http://mechinagirl.blogspot.com



Anyway, we're all having a great time, but Megan is missing her brother terribly. We all miss him a lot, but it's been sad to see Megan so upset about missing him. We've talked to Matt each day and she instant messages him, and that usually makes her miss him more. It is really sad that he isn't able to be here.







Where do I start? Friday we (Miyah) woke up about 5 AM, and got ready at a leisurely pace and went down to breakfast. Our plans to sleep in were a joke, so we decided to join the tour that morning.

There are only 3 families adopting special needs children this time. We'll meet one of the families in Kunming and the other family is here in Beijing. When we went to meet for the tour in the morning, we realized we traveled with the same family last time (Nov 04) and they live like a mile from us! Gene and Louise have two girls, Victoria (8) and Diana (almost 4). Miyah is so excited to have two little friends along. They've become good buddies already. Anytime we're not with them she asks where her friends are.





We first visited the Temple of Heaven. The park was beautiful and it was just amazing to see the number of retired people socializing. China is so different than America that way. People are always out of their homes talking and doing things together. They're very active, too. We saw the people dancing (ballroom type dancing), dancing with ribbon sticks (we had to buy some of these because it looked so fun and beautiful), there were men doing some sort of game with string on sticks and an object that they swung across the sting (forget what called). They played poker, chess, mahjong, had singing clubs, all sorts of activities. Pat was invited to play a game I think our guide said was Tai Chi ball. Of course we found out they were trying to sell the ball and racket sets, so we decided to buy some.

It was kind of hard to enjoy the park because we were all terribly unprepared for the cold weather. I could have kicked myself for taking the gloves and turtlenecks out of the suitcases thinking it would be warmer.





We've had several people stop and ask us if we could have our pictures with them, but it's interesting people respond to Miyah even though she's Chinese. One lady came over to Miyah in her stroller and began chattering in Chinese. I was able to use my very limited Mandarin to tell her she doesn't speak Mandarin. I was so proud that my first whole sentence in Chinese was actually understood. What she wanted was her picture taken with Miyah and proceeded to try to take her out of her stroller! I told her "bu", no and our guide told her something so that she stood next to us and got her picture that way instead of holding Miyah. I've been very surprised that my shy girl hasn't been afraid of the Chinese people's attention. She even let our driver hold her and help her on and off the bus. Anyone who knows Miyah knows she isn't keen on strange men. I think she realizes that the Chinese people are just very friendly and seem to love children. They all call her a baby.







After the Temple, we went for lunch. The food was great and we even had a little entertainment. We were able to buys some gloves at the little shop in the restaurant.







Then we went to the drum tower where we climbed numerous steep steps to the top of a tower of....you guessed it, drums. These were drums used for telling the time.







Then we took a rickshaw tour of the hutongs (back alleys) of Beijing. By this time it had begun drizzling a little. Megan and I were a little worried because our driver (bicyclist) looked and sounded drunk. We stopped at a couple's home and sat in their little bedroom where they entertain people for lunch. Yes, their bedroom had a little table in it right next to the bed. The kitchen was unbelievably small. Our guide asked us if it was different from American kitchens and I said "Oh, yes!".







We then stopped at a kindergarten, but all the children were gone on a picnic. It would have been fun to see all the little ones Miyah's age. Kindergarten in China is for children ages 2-6. Most of the children live there 6 days a week and only go home on Mondays! Again, so different from America. We explained to our guide what the program is like for American preschoolers and that they don't stay overnight and she was surprised. The families actually have to pay for their children to attend kindergarten, but they say most children attend. Primary school is then paid by the government. I guess since nearly all Chinese couples both need to work, kindergarten is the same as day care for them only they don't need to pick them up at the end of the day.

After the hutong tour, we went to the Beijing Acrobat show. It was amazing! I can't even begin to describe the things those young people can do. Megan was most impressed with the girl who did an arabesque on pointe, on a man's shoulder while he moved around.

Miyah fell asleep while we drove to the acrobat show and slept through the entire thing. We got back to the hotel at 7:00 and I went right to sleep with her while Pat and Megan went to get soemthing to eat. Miyah slept from 5:00 until midnight. She woke up very hungry since she missed dinner. I made her some soup I had brought with and some dry cereal. Another night with only a few hours of sleep! I called Pat at 1:30 and he took over while I went to his room to sleep for a few more hours. Miyah went back to sleep at 3:30 and slept until about 7:30.