More About That Later

What I Did On my Summer Vacation
by Lynn and Barbie
We went on a boat.
The boat went fast.
The boat was fun.
It was good.
We ate Chinese food everyday.
The only bad part was having to pee in the shower.
There was a show every night.
The waiters and housekeeping people put on the show.
We will show you what they did when we get home.
The End.

The First Action Figure Collection

Yesterday when we got off the ship, an American working on the boat told us that the earthquake dams had broken and that was why the river was a torrent of rapids our last 2 days. Now they tell us.
There was an 8 girl band made up of the waitresses and maids on the boat playing as we disembarked. They were playing doe a deer, a female deer and Home On the Range. They sounded like their band director was Harold Hill. It was so cute.
More about boat later....
We were in Chungquoing (Chungking) where the Flying Tigers were based. We went to the museum and a John Belushi Samuri-ish professeor yelled at us for 10 minutes and then the translator would explain, He say "The American come and save us. We grateful."

Then we went to see the pandas. OMG How cute. It was feeding time and they were so close. We liked the one that came out and grabbed his food and then deliberately turned his back on us. He would slowly reach around and grab a new branch of bamboo and then turn back away. He did not want to be the exhibit. Speaking of that, we were (the exhibit, that is) Cute litte kids would bravely come up and yell Hello and then run back and hide behind their parents. 2 boys played hide and seek in the group of tall Americans as we listened to our guide.
We are learning to follow a pink sign everywhere we go like lemmings. What will we do when the sign goes away?
Then we flew to Xi'an. They served us boiled peanuts on the plane.
Today we saw the Terra Cotta soldiers. It gave us chills. Tanner you would like it here. We also found John's twin among the statues---Really. Will show you picture later.
We also visited a poor village school which made Lynn deathly ill with a rash.
The olympic torch will be here tomorrow. There are millions lining the streets already. We won't be one of them. We've seen a torch.
Tomorrow more Xi'an and then fly to Guilin where we will get to ride another boat.

We are missing our puppies oh yeah and the people that are taking care of them too. We get NO news. Are fires still burning?

Shock and Awe

We are all okay - we've been on a cruise ship on the Yangtze River for five days, with no internet access - more about that later.

We have seen more people in the last week than we've seen in our lifetime. Last day in Shanghai, we went to an old people's activity center, where they had a fashion show, dancing, and singing. We then went to Mr. Woo's house for lunch - it was delicious. We walked through a farmer's market, and saw lots of food (some living, some not) --some of it crawled off before we could sample it..... Barb stepped in some of it, so we're still nibbling off her soles.....

We got to experience our first typhoon at the Shanghai airport, where we were Shanghaied for four hours. When we finally got to go, the water was so deep, the staff used cases of Coca-Cola for us to step on to board the boat, er, bus to the plane. The pilot was so anxious to get the hell out of there, he taxied to the runway before everyone was seated - and he taxied at Mach 2....

We landed with a thud... he apparently turned loose of the yoke about 12 feet off the ground. We then drove through the mountains, next to sheer dropoffs, and through miles of tunnels, at midnight. Lynn keep seeing the headlines--"Tourist Bus Falls Off Cliff in China", but fortunately, it wasn't a premonition.

We boarded the ship, and crashed for the night. More about the five days that followed later...

We're now in northern China, in Xian, off to see the Terra Cotta Soldiers, and then to visit a school. Hope it has reinforced concrete.....

Thank you, Rob, for the reports, and thank you, Jenny, for the cattle roundup -

By the way, Jenny, Lynn lost her sunglasses.... yes, those sunglasses....

Found Out

Lita looks great in flames.
Today we rode the Shanghei version of the bullet train to Souzou. The peasants at the train station would come and stand right next to us and stare up and down. No politically correct 12 inches personal space. Children were running around with no bottom to their pants so they could just squat and go anytime they want. Yesterday we saw a parent hold their child out from theirbody so they could poo on the sidewalk.
Souzou is considered the garden city of China. Notice we say "considered". We rode a canal boat. It is a lot like Venice. just as dirty. Children were swimming in it as people were pouring things into it.
then we went to a traditional Chinese garden that has been reproduced in the NY Met Mus. and in Portland, their sister city.



Tonight we were excited because we were not going to have the usual lazy susan chinese dinnner. It was billed as a western dinner...................
We figure that means they left out the rice. But the bananas with red onion and cilantro was goooood. So was the skimmed bean curd skin and celery.
Tomorrow we fly to board our cruise on the Yangtse.
So far the weather has been fantastic. Good luck follows us.

Brue Sky

We have been doing so many things we can't believe that we were just at the wall. We are too tired to be funny or clever. Deal with it Pegi. Oh thanks Peg for the world news update. We also heard that Britney Spears sister just had her baby. Now we are caught up to current news. It's a good thing too. CNN here has been showing the same news for 3 days. No weather here either. The approaching typhoon is not on the news at all.
First, Rob, thank you very much for ALL you are doing and you don't really need to kiss our ass.
Although others have notice our ass and want to have their picture taken with it. Also Richard's nose.....
Later we will fill you in on our travel group. It's a whole nother entry. Yesterday we saw a kung fu school presentation, a jade factory, the olympic venues, and then flew to Shanghei and saw a Chinese acobatic show before we went to our new hotel.
Today we went to the Bund, Shanghei museum, the Jade Buddha and drove through parts of Shanghei. Barbie accidently killed an insect inside the Buddhist temple.

Shanghai is an ooooool city with new, futuristic buildings built right on top of them. Think Blade Runner.

Traveling with John

BEFORE AFTER

We should know by now. In Australia he missed the bus and was tardy a couple of times., causing us undue worry. He also took us on a short walk to a Thai restaurant that turned into several miles. "It's just a couple more blocks." he said as he did his famous walk-run.
In Tokyo he said, "I know all about the subway, and we'll take it to the Tower."
Several miles of walking after we got off at the wrong station and then walked the wrong way, the Tower came into sight. "It's just a couple of blocks." he said repeatedly.
He has a thing about "short cuts." Both in Tokyo and here in Beijing he took us through holes in fences and over railroad tracks to get to our target destination.
He has finally found someone who can keep up with him. Kaleb, who is 14 went to the top of the GW in record time.

Rob, chin wo pee gu!

Hello from the big wall place! We climbed around and walked miles today. Jenny, you'd be proud of Gigi. We took a picture of Great Wallaffitti. We love our guides. Today Lilli said, "That very chill." when she meant "Cool." Went to dead Ming guy tombs and walked the everlasting refreshing walk of many animal statues in the pouring rain. No different from the non rainy weather. Just a little wetter and slightly cooler.
We have noticed that there seem to be no traffic rules except for Drive and Honk.
We have enjoyed seven lazy susan chopstick meals featuring unidentifiable items, that Mom calls mouse paws. We are very brave. Went to cloisonne factory and did arts and crafts. We bought several useless, but important objects.
freshette score; Lynn 2--Barbie 0.