Hello from Guangzhou (Dave speaks)!

A day and a half have passed since the last time we posted, so I will try and summarize what we’ve been up to then go into more detail later. First, however, is a note about our internet connection… at this time we don’t have one in our room like we did in Beijing. I’m not yet sure how we’re going to get it worked out, but it’s going to be much harder to get timely updates to you.

Now for the day and a half:

Monday we woke up pretty early to eat and check out. We needed to have our bags ready and packed outside the door by 7:30 am. The early time wasn’t a big issue because the jet lag makes it hard to sleep past 3 to 4 am! If you add in the rock slabs they call a bed, sleeping comes mostly in fits and starts. The breakfast was really interesting. Foods that appear normal – bread, cereal, milk, and juice – all taste slightly different. Really, the only foods we’ve eaten that looked normal, tasted normal, and were prepared locally were some awesome french fries at the pearl shop. Sorry for the tangent.

We next left the hotel and rode the bus to a government jade factory. The items were very pretty and interesting but nothing that seemed worth buying. From there we went to the Great Wall of China. It was colder there than anywhere we’ve been – and the windiest. Most of the group got off the bus, put their feet on the first step so they could claim they’d been on the Great Wall and retreated to the safe, warm bus. Melissa and I, however, decided to climb as high as our legs would take us. I figured I probably wouldn’t be in China again and I didn’t want to regret not going all out up this crazy wall. Melissa was awesome and when she started to get tired and wanted to quit, she’d say out loud, “come on, no regrets!” I’ve got a picture from the top that I’ll try posting soon. In case you’re wondering, the other people in the picture are from our group also (all of us studs if I do say so myself). It’s unfortunate that the pictures can’t capture the amazing views, sounds, smells, etc of what we’re experiencing.

After getting back to the bus, we left the great wall and headed for a cloisonné “factory”. I put quotes around factory because as far as I can tell, it’s basically a government store with a small amount of workers showing the process. I’m sure there are more sales people than craftsman. The sales clerks follow you everywhere. They are not pushy, but are ready at a moments notice to help you buy anything you want. We also had lunch there - small plates, a fish dish that had the head and tail included on the plate, and other Chinese style foods. One thing I found interesting was as our guides were helping us get seated and ready for lunch, I asked one of them to sit down with us. She said no thanks and that the guides and bus drivers have a separate room to eat in. Then she smiled and said this food (the stuff we were going to eat) did not taste too good to them!

From there we made our way to the airport, where I had the joy of downing two cups of Starbucks coffee (my first in several days). It was a little watery and they didn’t have venti (only grande), but I have not seen coffee anyplace we’ve been so I could care less. We then left on a 3 hour flight to Guangzhou. We’ve been here a short amount of time, and I just got the internet and phone card situation figured out. We have 50 minutes until we meet with the rest of our group to head over to the Chinese civil affairs office to pick up the babies! One of us will post more later.

Everyone’s emails have been so wonderful to get and read (Kathy, I can’t keep straight what day it is here or back in Kentucky… I’m sad to admit that I didn’t really think of the staff meeting yesterday!).

Thanks for joining with us in this adventure!

Dave