Confucius says...

September 18th--We headed out today to the Beijing Zoo specifically to see the Panda Bears. We thought there was a subway stop right next to the zoo, but after changing several lines and walking around a subway stop looking for Line 4, we quickly realized that Line 4 was still under construction. So, we hoped in a taxi that took us the final few kilometers to the front gate of the zoo. By the time, we arrived at the zoo it was close to lunch time. We saw several eating spots outside the zoo and thought it might be cheaper to eat outside of the zoo rather than inside. So, we sat down for a quick pizza. We then entered the zoo and were immediately greeted by a patch of painted Panda Bears. Apparently, there was a contest for the 60th anniversary and these Panda Bears were all painted differently. In fact, we were highly entertained seeing Panda Bears done up like Spider-man and Spongebob. Very cute! From here, we went straight to the Giant Panda House. It was here that we got to see about 10 pandas. Unfortunately, it was lunch time and nap time for all of them. So, all we got to see was them eating (mostly with their backs to us) or laying around sleeping, but they were cute and neat to see in person. Pandas are treated like royalty here in China, so with that said, the rest of the animals aren't treated as nicely. We still walked around and saw some other animals though. After we got done at the zoo, we took a taxi to the Confucius Temple. The main reason for going here is in honor of my Great Uncle Bob. Every time we ate Chinese food and got our fortune cookies at the end, it was inevitable...his fortune always said the same thing per him. Confucius says..."he who flies upside down has crack up". This will forever be in our heads. The Confucius Temple was much smaller than the other temples we had experience, but we enjoyed the many statues of Confucius and the hall of 190 stelae that records the 13 Confucian classics in 630,000 Chinese characters. Also inscribed on stelae are the names of successful candidates of the highest level of the official Confucian examination system. We basically closed down the temple at 5:00 and and walked through an old, traditional Hutong street towards the subway stop. Austin stopped to watch some old men playing some Chinese game that looked similar to chess. He really wanted to play, but they looked to serious. We took the subway back to the apartment and had dinner in the restaurant downstairs. We have really enjoyed the noddle dishes they serve and it is very convenient. We're actually starting to get pretty good at eating with chopsticks!

Great Peking

September 17th--Today was our big day to head to the Great Wall. Instead of doing it by ourselves or with a big tour group, we got our own private guide through our apartment. We were met at the apartment by our guide at 9:30am. She escorted us to our passenger van where we were greeted by the driver. We loaded up and off we went for our hour drive to the wall. It was the typical Beijing traffic of a lot of honking, swerving and slamming on the breaks, but we safely made it to our first stop. Our first stop was a Cloisonne factory. Now, as we pulled into the parking lot, I thought "this is why I hate tours". I thought we were going to be put into some high pressure sales shop to buy some junk. Well, we were pleasantly surprised otherwise. We entered the store and were greeted by a nice lady who became our personal tour guide. She explained to us the process of making Cloisonne and walked us through the various stages of the traditional Chinese art being made. (Honestly, I didn't even know what it was when we entered). Cloisonne is the ornamental vases and jewelery that you have seen that looks like some kind of mosaic ceramic. It is actually copper that is molded and then filled with enamel to give it its unique color and look. Anyway, you can see the pictures in our album, but suffice it to say it was a neat process to see up close and personal. Of course we ended up in a "showroom" with things to buy, but interestingly no one was pressuring us to buy anything. However, we actually surprisingly found a Cloisonne Santa Claus so Amy was able to complete her China Santa purchase. After our purchase, we loaded back up in the van and headed off to the Great Wall. We had made the decision to visit the Mutianyu section of the wall. It is said to be a slightly steeper section, but with much less tourists and more beautiful scenery. This sounded great to us! We arrived and parked at the bottom of the hill. We walked up the hill (through a gauntlet of people selling / pushing stuff) and made it to a cable car. The cable car would take us up the remainder of the way to the wall. Once we arrived on the top of the wall, we stopped for a moment as our guide gave us a brief introduction. From here, we were off to walk the wall. First, we were amazed at how big/grand the wall structure is. When you realize that it is along a mountain ridge, it is amazing to think how they got the materials up to build the wall (I mean, we took a cable car up!). Second, we were amazed at how steep it was between sections. It was hazy/overcast again today (although our tour guide kept calling it fog and we wanted to inform her that it was "smog"; but as far as we know that's what she knows it as), but the humidity was pretty high so walking between the sections was a little tiring (for everyone except Austin who ran everywhere). Finally, you are taken by the length of the wall. When we first arrived on top of the wall, I remember looking at a section off in the distance thinking we would make it there and then turn around. After walking for close to 30 minutes, we were no where close to that section and I realized it was much further than it looked! We decided to turn around because we knew however far we got away, we had to walk that far back. We didn't want to have a kid (or adult) meltdown on the wall. So, we walked/hiked the wall for about an hour, all in all. It was really great because there weren't very many other people out today. In fact, at times, we had entire sections to ourselves. It was really nice to be able to experience the wall without being rushed by others wanting to take pictures of our children. We made it back to the cable car and then back down to the parking lot. We stopped off at KFC (our first in China) for a quick lunch on our way back to the apartment. Once we arrived back we took the kids to the playground to continue to burn off any energy they had. Amy and I took turns going to a nearby spa for foot messages. We were able to get 1 hour foot messages for $10! They were great. The only thing that was a little odd, but turned out great was a cupping technique. Cupping is where they take glass jars, stick fire in them and then place the open end on your foot, which forms a suction on the bottom of your feet. Although I was a little alarmed when I saw a flame close to my feet, the process felt wonderful. Once we finished up, we went back to the apartment to clean up before heading out to dinner. Our guide had recommended a great restaurant nearby our apartment for Peking Duck. No trip to Beijing would be complete without Peking Duck, so we decided this was a must to try. We walked to the restaurant and were seated at a large table. They brought us the "picture menu" and I pointed to the duck. We also ordered some appetizers before the duck. We entertained ourselves with eating our appetizers with chopsticks while waiting on our main course. Finally, they brought out our duck on a cart. The waiter carved it up (which was a show in itself) and then another waiter showed us the proper way to eat it. He took very thin pancakes (think tortillas) and put sweet noodle sauce on it. He then placed the strips of carved duck inside and served it like a fajita. Of course, he did the entire process with chopsticks but we had to do some of it with our hands. It was wonderful! We thoroughly enjoyed our Peking duck dinner! Today was a great day climbing the Great Wall, getting awesome, cheap foot messages and then finishing off with a wonderful Peking Duck dinner.

Forbidden City

September 16th--Today we woke up to the worst smog yet since we've been here. If I didn't know any better, I would just say that it was very foggy and potentially going to rain. Nope, it's just a whole lot of smog. It certainly didn't change our plans for going to the Forbidden City though. We headed out (smog and all) to Forbidden City. We arrived about 11:00 a.m. and were immediately greeted with one of the biggest scam known around that area. There was an Asian woman who spoke great English posing as an art college student (actually from New York). She wanted us to follow her to look at her pictures. Luckily, we had read about this scam beforehand and knew that she wanted us to come buy her overly priced artwork. We nicely said no thank you and continued through to the Gate of Heavenly Peace (and Mao's huge picture). They are setting up for the 60th anniversary celebration and it looks like it will be quite an event. At this point in our day (the beginning), Austin was already asking to be held. I couldn't understand why he was doing this until he explained to me that as long as I was holding him, then no one would be touching him or holding him. I thought that was very insightful of a 3 year old and he was already being proactive to avoid the "paparazzi". Anyway, we walked through the Gate of Heavenly Peace and one more gate before getting to the actual entrance to the Palace area where we had to have a ticket to continue on any further. The Forbidden City, named because it was off limits to commoners for 500 years, housed two dynasties of emperors, the Ming and Qing. The Forbidden City is huge!! (understatement!) It is over 10 million square feet, 800 buildings and 9000 rooms. Luckily, only about half is open to visitors. Upon entering the Meridian Gate (the gate formerly restricted to emperors), we ventured off the beaten path to escape the throng of other tourists. We found a large green area that included the Golden Stream and some smaller temples (again, without all the crowds). After spending some time in this area, we headed back down the main north-south axis into the Three Great Halls. The large halls, the heart of the Forbidden City, were mainly used for ceremonial purposes. We made our way through this area and found a restaurant to grab a quick lunch. We then headed into the former residential area which now serves as a treasury, displaying artifacts from the dynasties. We finally made our way to the north side of the Forbidden City and exited the North Gate. From the North Gate, we caught a taxi to take us to the North side of Tian'men Square. We knew we didn't want to come back to this area on the weekend so we decided to take full advantage of walking through this square in the middle of the week. We casually walked the length of the square which totals 9 football fields. Upon getting to the end, we were tired from a long day of walking and wanted to find a spot to relax for a little bit. We decided to go back and try the Lao She Teahouse. It was open this time and we were nicely greeted. We got a table up in the balcony area where we got a great view of the live music and the area all to ourselves. We read over the long list of tea choices and even though they were in English, we still didn't know what they were. I finally decided on Big Buddha Longjing not because I knew what it was, but because it was on the top of the menu of Green Teas. We also order a few snacks to sample. The tea making process was very unique...definitely different than the 'pour hot water into a cup with a tea bag' process. The waiter first rinsed our glasses out with hot water, then put the tea leaves in the glass and then poured the hot water in. It took me a while to be able to drink my tea because it was so hot, but once I did it wasn't bad at all. I could have used a little bit of sugar, but thought that was probably really inappropriate. Anyway, the atmosphere and experience was well worth the trip. After the teahouse, we headed back to the apartment. Mike and Austin played on the playground while Abby did her school work. She actually drew a great picture of a temple from the Forbidden City as her history part. By the time, Abby finished up, it was dinner time. We decided to have pizza delivered and we all ate it like we hadn't eaten in days. It was a nice change from Chinese food. We are all heading to bed early because we have an early tour to the Great Wall tomorrow morning.

Olympic Park and the Silk Market

Sept 15th -- Today, we decided to start off by taking the subway to the Olympic Park. With the 2008 Summer Olympics still somewhat fresh in our minds, we wanted to see the memorable buildings, specifically the Bird's Nest and the Water Cube. We exited the subway at the Olympic Green area and immediately saw the 2 buildings in front of us. The area was still full of tourists, and very clean and maintained, even 1 year after the games. We first spent some time looking at the 1 year anniversary pictures display. It was fun to see some of our USA winners. From here we thought we could see people walking around on the inside of the gate to the Bird's Nest. We weren't sure when we ventured out to the Olympic Park if we would actually be able to go inside, but were really excited to find out that we could. So, we bought our tickets and entered the Bird's Nest. While inside we sat in the seats of the Bird's Nest admiring the architecture and surroundings. We walked through the Bird's Nest store and took pictures with the mascots before exiting. Since we were so lucky to go inside the Bird's Nest, we figured that we would be able to go inside the Water Cube. So, we walked across the large concrete area (called Olympic Park) over to the Water Cube. We got our tickets and entered the building. We sat down in the seats and imagined Michael Phelps winning all of his gold medals. Amazing! A year ago when we were watching the Olympics, we never would have imagined ourselves here. After finishing up, we grabbed a quick snack and headed back to the subway station. We got on the subway and headed to the Silk Market. It was incredible how the station just fed us right into the Silk Market. Almost immediately upon entering, we were attacked by sellers. Let me rephrase that...our kids were attacked. The sellers were really good at getting to the children in order to make a sale. Before we knew it, Abby had on a dress and Austin had on a shirt. Of course, the kids wanted to immediately buy them, but we wanted to look around. So, we walked away with some unhappy kids. But, by the time we got done at the Silk Market, we left with happy kids. Abby bought a silk Chinese dress and Austin got blue silk pajamas with a dragon on it. We didn't spend a whole lot of time at the market because it kind of wears on you with the bargaining and constantly being asked to buy something. Nonetheless, it was a fun experience and we got some neat silk items. From here, we headed back to the apartment and the kids got some playground time before dinner. We decided to go to a restaurant right by our apartment. The name of the restaurant is Peng Xiang. We had stopped by there earlier to check out the menu and Mike said it looked good because it had pictures. Well, the story was a little different when we sat down to order. Let me back up, when we got ready to go to dinner, both kids wanted to wear their new silk purchases. They were too cute! Back to ordering, Mike was the only one with a menu and the waiter just stood there until Mike told him our order. Also, no one in the restaurant spoke English. When Mike got finished, I asked him what he ordered and he basically said "I don't know, some chicken and beef. One of the English descriptions was chicken claws. Well, chicken's don't have claws so that can't be literal". When the food came, I was very impressed. It all looked really good. There was a plate of corn, the chicken and beef with vegetables. Mike took a bite of the chicken and said "the kids can't eat this". Of course, we were all like Why not? And he just kept saying it's spicy. Well, when I bit into it, I immediately spit it out. It tasted like a big piece of fat. Apparently they were claws. We are not sure what part of the chicken it was, but it was not good. Thank goodness for the corn and beef dish because they were very good. It was a true cultural experience that's for sure.

Temple of Heaven

Sept 14th -- Well, it was another slow morning after a late, exciting night last night. We had to get up this morning and talk to the grandma's and tell them all about it. Once we finally got going and out of the apartment, it was lunch time. We decided to stop by Subway for lunch. We happened to find a Subway in the basement of a nearby office building. After lunch, we walked to the subway station for a trip to the Temple of Heaven Park. After a short ride, we exited the subway right at the east entrance to the park. The park contains some of the most perfect examples of Ming architecture with some unique architectural features. We walked through the park for a few minutes before coming upon the Hall of Prayer for Good Harvests. This temple is the crowning structure in the park. It is mounted on a three-tiered marble terrace with triple-eaved umbrella roof. While it is beautiful to look at, it is most impressive to learn that the roof is supported on the pillars without the use of cement or nails. While in the courtyard of the temple, we began to notice police pulling out police tape and roping off the area. Having bad flashbacks from our day being trapped around Tien'an Men Square, we wondered what was going on. All of a sudden, 4 guys come running out with a machine on their backs spraying what looked like water on the base of the building. After just a minute they stopped and then began to remove the police tape. It was the weirdest thing, watching them spray water on a marble slab. We aren't sure what it was all about, but think we witnessed a real Chinese fire drill! We then began to proceed south through the park to the Imperial Vault of Heaven. Here we found a lady that was making Chinese paintings of names. They were too cool so we had to get one for Abby and Austin. From here, we proceeded to the Round Alter before making our way out of the park. We walked to the street and caught a taxi to return to our apartment. It was rush hour traffic and we had more than a few moments of panic on our 45 minute journey back to the apartment. Luckily we made it back safe and sound. The kids spent some more time on the playground before heading in to have dinner in the restaurant downstairs. After dinner it was bath and bed time.

"I have a raisin in my nose!"

Sept 13th -- Today we decided to head out to Beihai Park. It is a large park, primarily composed of a lake, that was the former playground of the Yuan emperors. Yesterday, we realized that taxis are really cheap in Beijing, so instead of taking the subway, we took at 20 minute taxi ride that cost about $3. We arrived at the south gate and stopped into an information center for a map of the park. We then bought our tickets into the park, which also included entrance into the temples inside. We entered and the kids ran and played around a big, open square for a little before we decided to get some lunch. Across a foot bridge from where we entered were some restaurants on Jade Islet. Jade Islet is in the center of the lake and is composed of the heaped earth that was scooped out to make the lake. We found some seats at the restaurant that overlooked the lake. When we started to go through the menu, it was very funny. The English translation was literal. So you would see things like "the pineapple fries the chicken". We finally ordered and again, had some great Chinese dishes. After lunch, we decided to go for a boat ride around the lake. We rented a "battery powered" boat that I believe was slower than the paddle boats. If a strong wind blew in our face, the boat wouldn't move forward. However, it was perfect to allow the kids turns driving. So we "putted" around the lake for about an hour. After our boat ride we began our ascent to the White Dagoba Temple atop Jade Islet. We made our way up and then grabbed an ice cream snack at the top. We then headed back down and began to walk along the shore line of the lake to the north park exit. Along the way, the kids came across some Chinese kids flying paper airplanes. They would all throw them at the same time and see who's would fly the longest. Theirs surprisingly stayed in flight longer than I would have thought. That, of course, made Abby and Austin want paper airplanes. So Abby pulls some paper out of her bag and asked me to build them one. Now, I haven't built a paper airplane in many years, but I gave it the good ol' college try. So they joined in and threw their airplanes.....which immediately did a nose dive into the ground. Austin starts crying and wanting me to make his better. Of course there is a crowd around watching and I feel like the stupid American who can't make his kids a good paper airplane. After a while, the Chinese kids started to leave, but before they did, they gave Abby and Austin their paper airplanes. I looked at them and realized I was going to need an engineering degree to figure out how they were put together...they were impressive. Along the pathway to the exit, we ran across a young girl with a slit in her pants from front to back. We first experienced this yesterday on the subway and have since seen it several times. It is the strangest thing we've seen, but think it has something to do with potty training. The young children (some not even walking) don't have diapers on, so they are fully exposed. They apparently just go to the bathroom where ever they are (but we haven't experienced this yet). Very odd, but I guess it saves a lot of money on diapers. So we finally left out of the park and took a taxi back to the apartment. The kids played on the playground for a little while while I got a haircut at a nearby "Modeling Agency" (English translation). We then went inside for dinner and baths. Afterwards, the kids were watching a movie while Amy and I were updating the blog. This should normally be the end, but not tonight. All of a sudden we here Austin say, "I have a raisin in my nose!". So I turn around and tell him to blow. Immediately a raisin fires out of his nostril. I was thinking the "crisis" was over when he then says, "I have a raisin in my other nose!". So I clog the open one and tell him to blow and nothing happens. I take a look and don't see one and so tell him to blow again...and still nothing. So we question him again and he says there is one in there. Luckily our apartment has a flashlight so we lay him down and look in there. Now it was hard to see but we thought we saw something way up in there. This was not good. Amy went to get the tweezers to see if we could get it out. Of course Austin wanted nothing to do with tweezers in his nose. Honestly, Amy and I weren't even sure if there was a raisin in there or not, but when we asked Austin how many raisins he put up his nose, his answer was 2. We tried using the tweezers, but Austin would not stay still for us to really get in there. Finally, we decided we needed to take him to an ER. We did not want to risk there being a raisin up there and an infection of some sort setting in. So, I got Austin dressed and went down to the receptionist to ask if there was an English speaking clinic or hospital nearby. She wrote the name of one down on a piece of paper in Chinese and told me it was about a 20 minute taxi ride. I decided to go back and tell Amy where we were heading. While I was gone, Amy had gotten online and found some "home remedies" via google for "raisin in the nose" (at least this means we aren't the first). It involved clogging the open nose with your finger and blowing a quick puff of breath into his mouth. So, I told Austin that Mommy was going to give him a kiss and in Amy went...and nothing. So I decided to take a turn...and still nothing (except snot). I then checked google again and found a direction that said to cover his mouth and blow into his open nostril....still nothing. I looked at google one more time and found an entry with "GROSS" in the title. It indicated to try sucking the object out of his nose. Now, I wouldn't usually do something like this, but I was not wanting to have to make an ER visit. So I grabbed his little nose and began sucking his nostril...and again nothing (except strange looks from Austin and Amy). At this point, we had no choice but to head to the hospital. So out Austin and I went (Amy and Abby reluctantly stayed behind) and about 20 minutes later we arrived at United Family Medical Center. I was excited to see the name in English. We entered and were immediately checked for fever. We then did all the normal check-in and financial paper work before seeing a nurse. Luckily, everyone spoke English and the hospital was very modern. Finally, the Doctor came in (who was an older American gentleman) and asked Austin what the problem was. After Austin told him, he said "let's hope we can get lucky". He then proceeded to look up his nose. He then turns to me and says, "I don't know if it's a raisin, but maybe a really nasty booger". Now, I about fell off the bed. I thought, if I just came to the ER and payed $365 (the cost of our visit) to have a nasty booger removed, I am going to die. The doctor then leaves the room and comes back with a long, skinny probe and said "I don't think Austin and I are going to be friends for long". He said he was hoping to get lucky but no such luck. I said, "you were hoping to use the blow technique, weren't you". He looked at me shocked and said "you must have other children" and I said "nope...Google". He was again surprised and said "there go's our secret". He said it wouldn't work on Austin because it was so deep and not completely blocking his passageway. So he laid Austin down and began to stick the probe in his nose. Then with a quick dive and a flick....out came a raisin onto the bed. I must say, I was really excited to see it was a raisin and not just a nasty booger. So with that, we headed out and got back in a taxi for our ride home. When we got back to the apartment, Amy and Abby were waiting on us and were more than excited to hear everything went ok. Of course it took a while for everyone to wind down and finally get to bed. Well, we made it 223 days before having to make our first ER trip. Luckily, it wasn't for anything major.

"I don't want everyone touching me!"

Sept 12th - After a restless night for the kids, everyone slept until about 9am. When we finally got up, Amy and I spent most of the morning trying to get caught up on the blog. We had originally planned to hit the Forbidden City this morning, but since we were getting such a late start to the day, we decided to just go exploring the city, with no real plans. We first stopped off at "Hollywood" again for some good, quick Chinese food. We then walked to the Subway station. We had the hotel write out for us in Chinese that we wanted a weekly pass, but that still didn't work as the lady just shook her head and gave us 2 single tickets. Oh well. We headed into the Subway. The train was very new and was very easy to figure out as they had all the stops labeled in English. So after about 20 minutes, we arrived in Tian'an Men Square. We exited the Subway and after just a few steps, were able to see the Gate of Heavenly Peace with the famous portrait of Mao. We began walking away from the gate towards the center of Tian'an Men Square. After a few minutes, we realized something was going on as the streets were blocked off and the entire square was blocked off. It was odd to see the huge square completely empty. We walked the length of the square to try and get to the other side. We had read about a great teahouse and decided we would go there for an afternoon snack. After walking for about 30 minutes and navigating the closed streets, we finally found the teahouse, only to find it closed. We continued to think it was odd that everything seemed to be closed off. About this time, we noticed that the police were beginning to form a line and move everyone off the street we were on to another street. We followed the crowd and eventually sat down on a street curb along with a lot of other people. We had determined that there was going to be some kind of parade. This is when it is hard not to speak the language. We attempted to ask many around what was going on, but never found anyone to speak English. After about 20 minutes of sitting the police came and moved us further back down the street. At this point, we gave up that we were going to see anything. The real unfortunate part was the subway entrance we needed was about 100 meters on the other side of the police line. So we started walking away from Tian'an Men Square. There is a main street that runs due south from Tian'an Men that was also blocked off. We kept walking along a parallel street because we needed to get on the other side to get to a subway stop. As a side note, if you have any self image issues, China is the place to come. We were stared at from the minute we got off the subway line. Now, it is for the most part a very friendly stare. And for Abby and Austin, it is like being movie stars. People are constantly coming up to them and touching them, taking their picture and even picking them up and kissing them. Again, it is a very positive, friendly approach...but it is non-stop. After about 3 hours in the sun, walking and trying to get out off the blocked streets, Austin had enough. He finally looked up and said, "I don't want everyone touching me!". It was too funny! Unfortunately for him, it just goes with the territory. So, he would hide behind Amy and me and we would just smile and laugh. We finally got to a main street that was not blocked off, but then had another 20 minutes walk until we got to a metro stop. In hindsight, we should have found a taxi somewhere and got out, but we never thought we would be that blocked off from a subway stop. Also, somewhere along the way, we found two British guys, who explained they were practicing for the upcoming National Day on Oct. 1. I had heard that you did not want to be anywhere around on that day and I now understand why. Once we got back to the subway stop near our apartment, we decided to take the kids to Hard Rock for a reward for being such troopers today. It is only a few blocks from our apartment and is very nice. It was completely redone for the Olympics last year (as seems almost everything else). We found out there, that every Saturday and Sunday will be like today until Oct 1 because this year celebrates the 60th anniversary and they have big plans. So, note for the rest of our trip....stay away from the center of town on the weekends!