Friday, June 1, 2007

Walking around Beijing Red Moon Restraunt with Tim! 7:20am-Well, we finally got to sleep last night. We woke up at 5:15 this morning. It is weird that you all are just ending your previous day. My back hurts...our beds are like concrete slabs with pads on them!!! The bed is about 1 1/2 feet off the ground. Ah China! It is rush hour right now and hear lots of whistles and horns. Looking out the window we see lots of people riding bikes to work. I found out last night that you better look both ways and KEEP looking or they will just run you over. They don't stop for pedestrians. We are leaving for breakfast now. 9:00am- We just got back from an awesome breakfast with Tim. Food was great...Buffet....it was quite the spread! The restaurant is in the Poly Plaza where we are staying.... We are leaving to work out at the American Club and a days adventure touring Beijing with Tim as our tour guide. We are so happy that he is here with us at the beginning of our trip. We are clueless about alot of things. He speaks some Chinese and is teaching us things to say and do!!! 5:30pm- We have been gone all day walking around Beijing. Very interesting and different. We must have walked 8 miles today and my legs really feel it. Several people came up to us and started speaking broken English and it seemed a little shady...probably wanting something or other!!! Lots of people looking at us and getting stares. Lots of construction going on and getting ready for the Olympics. Hard labor around here by hand....it's unreal. A college couple came up to talk to the three of us. They talked us into going into a college art gallery to see some of their work. We ended up buying a panda painting that the guy did. There were 4 paintings, one for each season. He wanted us to buy all four, of course, but I picked "Spring" because that is when we are adoping Emma Rae and also he said it meant "beginning". We are planning on buying 16 small gifts for Emma Rae and are planning to give her 1 for each of 16 birthdays!! I'm sure they took us for a ride. Dawson and I are suckers and need to read up on the art of bargaining! We took a taxi ride back to the hotel and the cab driver took the "long way". Tim was not too happy and let the guy know. The driving here is CRAZY and I screamed outloud once and held in the next fifty. We are taking the subway tonight to the Red Moon restraunt in the Hyatt across town. Tim has eaten there and said it is great. Talk tomorrow.