Beijing (Day 1)

Today was amazing, truly The Great Adventure. I am not sure what I thought Beijing would be like, but certainly not like this. After watching the Olympics, I had pictured an Americanized metropolis, but this Beijing was nothing like that; at least not the Beijing we saw today.

This first picture is of a monk (?) with Josh. He actually asked to have his picture taken with Josh. This was great with us since we wanted a picture too!!!


I have fallen in love! In love with the Chinese people and with Beijing. The Chinese people are so incredibly gracious and nice. They seem to always have a smile on their faces. And Beijing is such an interesting city, full of history like I have never seen before. The next picture is outside the Forbidden City. This city was built in 1406. That is before America was even officially discovered. It is amazing to walk through and touch the walls and the other architecture and know how old it is and how much it has seen. We spent a few hours here exploring and learning. I wish that you all could have been here.


The last picture is of us in Tiananmen Square. I couldn't get a good picture of the actual square because there were so many people, but in this picture you can see behind us the picture of Chairman Mao.

The only thing so far that has been a disappointment is the food. We were warned that we would be losing a lot of weight here and it seems, if today was any indication, that that is not going to be the case for me. I was hoping to go home a few pounds lighter! The food was delicious. They must have put at least 10 plates of food in the middle of the table and every plate was wonderful. How do the chinese people stay so small? Maybe it has to do with chopsticks and the size of the plates (a little smaller than our saucers at home). I totally ate with chopsticks!!! I am incredibly proud of myself. The girls and Mike have had this skill down for a while but today was my day to shine!

There is so much to tell that I don't know what to tell and what to leave out. There was our trip to the silk factory which was in itself an adventure. Did you know that the silkworms make a cacoon and that they boil the cacoon and stretch it out to the size of a quilt? This is true, I saw it with my own eyes and got to help stretch it with my own hands!!!!

I don't want to get too wordy or boring, but there is one other thing that I think is worth mentioning. The majority of people here live in apartments, really old apartments. As we were driving our guide pointed them out to us and told us that they were the expensive nice apartments. These apartments were huge old buildings with peeling paint. She said that people prefer the apartments to houses because the majority of houses in Beijing are "rectangle houses" where people have to use public toilets and showers. We rode in rickshaws (!) to go visit a homeowner in one of these houses. Talk about fascinating!! The guide rang the doorbell at a big door. I thought it was the door to a house but it turned out to be a door to a narrow, dark courtyard shared by numerous homeowners.

What an amazing day we had today! I can't possibly imagine tomorrow being any better. The only thing that would make this trip better is when we finally get Amy.... only 3 more days!!!