Travel Journal - Day 2

A Day to Kick Back……

Hello from Beijing, China! We all slept remarkably well last night and started our day at around 9:00. There is a HUGE breakfast buffet that comes with our room and it was awesome. It had all the normal American breakfast food along with fried rice and noodles as well as sandwich meats of all kinds. We decided after breakfast to go to the Carrefour (our Walmart) to get some water and pop. That was quite the experience! It was on several levels, with clothing, electronics, and sporting goods on the upper level, and grocery items on the lower level. Everything is in Chinese, of course, but we didn’t really have any problem finding the snacky foods and water. In order to get to the water we had to head through the meat market, and that was quite interesting. The seafood area had squid, eel, carp (yes our junk fish!), and several other very interesting animals I wouldn’t even begin to try to figure out!! They also butcher the meat right in front of you. The smells in the area have quite an aroma!! It’s a smell you really can’t explain. Dana ended up buying a watch which he had to pay for first, and then go back to get it from the showcase. Dad Connie got a pair of pants, and they altered them free right at the store. It took all of 10 minutes. We cruised around the area just looking and staring. We didn’t feel out of place staring because it seemed like everyone else was staring at us!! Especially the older folks. One lady that was older was geeping at me so much that I nicely looked back at her and said "Nie Hou" (Chinese hello, but not spelled right) and she about jumped out of her shoes!! I bet I scared her!! She just gave a big smile, and stammered a bit and also said "Nie Hou" (Hello)! I don’t think she expected to hear Chinese come out of my mouth!! She was very nice though!! We took an afternoon nap (I guess I should say I did, not Dana. The boys are smiling right now, right Dustin and Jonah??) and then just wandered around the hotel for a while. While we were sitting in the lobby we saw a number of other AWAA (our agency) families coming in. They looked very tired!! We are going to venture out somewhere to eat tonight. Mom Judy wants McDonalds, I think Pizza Hut sounds good, and Dana wants KFC. Hmmmmm…….( : Tomorrow we have a full day. We are meeting in the lobby at 8:30 and the plan is to visit Tiananmen Square, Forbidden City, and the Summer Palace. I don’t think that we will be home til evening. We are glad that we arrived a day earlier than the rest and were able to rest up. I think AWAA’s plan is to keep us so busy we can’t think about our babies!! We have seen several French families in our hotel with little Chinese babies and they are adorable!! We just can’t wait!! Talk to you all tomorrow!! *We got all of the well-wishes from Jonah’s class at Worthington Christian, and we really enjoyed them all! Thanks so much for all of the prayers! *Thank you also to friends and family who have emailed us. Please know how much we appreciate reading them! Keep them coming. I apologize to you if we can’t reply to all of the messages.

DUSTIN AND JONAH**Can you believe that you are already on day 3?? Time flies when you’re having fun!! Remember, don’t have too much fun!! ( : Sorry if we didn’t answer the phone when you called , but we just received it a couple hours ago. Next time you try it should work. We miss you and love you lots!!

Mom and Dad