Chengdu Trip

We took a sneaky little get-a-way this week to Chengdu,  towards southern China.  Its a 3 hour plane ride from Beijing.  We kept our feet going and walked about 8.5 miles a day!! Yippee!  It was wet and that always makes my hair big and frizzy!!!  Oh, the joys of curly hair!!!!  I would curl it and about 5 minutes due to the humidity it looked like I came from Africa!!!  To say the trip was wonderful would be accurate.  The food in this province is Schezuan, which is HOT!!! I mean HOT!  Red peppers in all foods.  Garlic until the cows came home!  I made sure Chris ate as much as I did
so he would still speak to me!  This is our plate of kung pao chicken after we had eaten everything else but the PEPPERS!  Happy clean your sinuses dinner!!!

We went to an ancient city, Hunglongxi,  that was an hour bus ride from Chengdu our first day.  It was so beautiful!  As you can see we are standing on stepping blocks and in the background you will see a dragon tail.  The water was very shallow and in the summer they say it is full of children playing in the water.  I wish I had my grandchildren with me every day!  We would have had such fun exploring!  So many things that are very different than America!

This was a big long bridge over a river by the ancient city.  It was a long walk but 

so fun and the views were breathtaking!  

On the way up !

This is the river that the bridge goes over.  Can you see all the gardening that is being done?
 In China every square inch

of ground is growing vegetables to feed the millions of people!

This is a close up of the river above. It really is remarkable how much
they garden every inch!  They could teach us

Americans a thing or two about eating veggies! 

This is part of a Buddhist Temple

 Monks are doing their daily chanting at the Buddhis Temple 

where the giant Buddha is.

These are our wonderful Chinese guides who are friends of some 

of the BYU China teachers who taught  in Chengdu last year.

From left to right:  Gloria our friend in Beijing with whom we teach, Autumn, 

Kathy(who), Utein, Cheun, & Roland, Gloria's husband also a teacher. We are all giving the

(don't bet more than 5 kui on your majong game), with Chairman Mao in

the background. This was a huge square with a very significant police presence.  

This is the roof top of a mall with the panda looking over at us.

This mall had upscale shopping like Prada &Channel, and a Ritz Carlton to lay
your weary head, after a long hard day of dropping thousands of Yuan.

Day 2 a high speed train to see the giant buddha and grottos

It was built in 713 a.d. on the  confluence of three rivers to bless and

protect the area from harsh flooding they had experienced over

many years.  It is 13 stories tall.

The long 9 turn staircase going from his head 

to his feet by the water.

Our last day at the Panda breeding center.  It was fascinating! We really enjoyed

watching them eat!  They were sitting in the tops of trees and sleeping....

You can see this guy is eating a bamboo breakfast.  They eat and sleep.  It is a hard life!

       We usually have Chinese ask to take pictures with us, I think we are so strange.  I think
                           we must look like a Circus act!  So we are happy to pose away!!!

I wanted to pet a red panda!  It was so fun!!! I couldn't believe they just let them roam around

for us to walk up to!!! It was unbelieveable!  Too good to be true!!!!  Baahaaaaaa!  Gotcha! Its a picture!  I hope you were impressed.  :)

These are the little guys.  They are about 1 year old.  we loved just watching them from

about 5 feet away.  They were playful and it was a great experience.

You can almost hear them crunching on the bamboo!

This guy was just tearing up the big long piece he was holding,

they are almost magical to watch.

Our last look at a red panda eating cantaloupe. They remind me of a

raccoon.  They are black on the bottom and red with white face markings.

They are small about the size a large cat.

It was a wonderful trip, with good friends, and memories we will reflect on.

 We really enjoyed the beautiful city.

Our silk road tour

We went with a large group of teachers from BYU on a week long Silk Road tour.  We flew far west from Beijing about 2300 miles.  The 5 hour flight had us end up near the border of Pakistan, Mongolia & Russia.  We followed the Marco Polo trade route.  We started at a site of an ancient walled city.  It was built around the time of Christ.

We came to a little town the people grow grapes and dry them and sell them.  The children were selling food, the many adults were cooking and selling their foods.  There were many shops with people saying "Heelloo, Aumercun".  We found nuts, dried fruits, scarfs, and Muslim foods.

                         You can see the grapes just hanging and drying there above my head.
   The put the vines over trellises and allow the grapes to grow down so they can dry on the vine.

This is what the houses looked like with multiple families living in them.

This is a mom and dad cooking in a hut with a cloth over the top and selling food on the street.

A mom with her groceries and child on the back.  In china there are no car seats or helmets.

This is a bed they sleep outside in the summer no air-conditioning

                                                          It can get up to 130 degrees.

         We travelled to the Gobi Desert and rode camels, there were over a 1,000 camels.
                                                      About as many riders as camels.

             It was interesting, many people were riding in sleds down the sand mountains.
                                                         Just like we do with snow!

  We went to Dunhuang and visited the  Mogao Buddhist Caves where there are over 735 caves with               Buddha's statues and paintings in them from as early as 366 a.d.   We were allowed to see about 9 caves.  They change what caves they allow to be opened each year.  Our guide unlocked the chosen caves for us to see, then locked them after  we left.

This is in one of the caves.  It was a great thing to see the caves so pristine and so old.

We flew two hours to come the the city of Xi'an.  (pronounced shyann)  We went to a Muslim Street where the very old housing is still in existence in Xi'an, and bought great bread that looks roundand flat like a pizza crust.  They were making hard candy, you could buy sheep hoof, crabs on a stick and many other delightful foods. ;)

We went to see the 8th wonder of the world, the Terra Cotta Warriors.  It really was impressive and Chris and I were able to be terra cotta warriors just for a moment!!! We really enjoyed the silk road trip!

Beijing apartment life

Thought I might send a little information about our little apartment here in Beijing.  We are so spoiled with so many things which  the past BYU teachers have left us!  We have realized we don't need nearly as many rooms, clothes, decorations or pictures.  We are on the second floor of an eleven story building. Foreign teachers and foreign graduate students live in this building. The apartment we are in has been used by BYU China teachers for a few years. Our pics of the family on photo paper are our most prized possession on our walls!  We have been enjoying the bikes the Powells left us.  The water cooler  keeps us hydrated!  We can't drink any tap water, it isn't sanitary.  We boil water to wash dishes.  We wash our fruit and vegetables in vinegar.  We really love our three balconies, and there is a little window in the kitchen that looks out onto a courtyard, grass area in between two other high rise apartments where students live.  I  watch the children play with their grandparents and parents.  They make it fun to be Gladys Cravitts (from Bewitched)- wink, wink!!!  Maybe even a nose twinkle!!  I took some pictures to share.  I think the most important thing I have learned is that I need to simplify and not be so busy getting THINGS! 

This is the front door with our water cooler and the  cutest pictures of

our adorable family on the wall along with our family calendar JoAnn makes every

Christmas for me!!!  I spend a lot of time at the table doing power points

and preparing for class and emailing everyone

from our previous life!!!  

This is the living room with our favorite bikes!!! 

There is a balcony outside the window.

This is the humble washer!  A set of sheets is almost too much for it to

handle!!!  The inside is about 15 ''x 8",  don't be jealous!!! I don't have a dryer.

I won't ever complain in my mind again about folding all the laundry the comes out

soft and smells fresh again!!!  I have a drying rack!

This is the spacious really nice bathroom!  We like it and it is newly

remolded with a western toilet!  I am sooo thankful for it.  China uses squatty pottys. 

 You can just google that and look at the images-self explanatory!!

The kitchen with a two burner stove and 4 foot high fridge.

The oven is next to it!! Its the size of  a microwave.

The microwave is usually on top of the oven, but

the oven gets really hot so I put on top of the fridge

while I roasted veggies!!!

This is our bedroom with my favorite pillow case Karissa had

made for me just before we left with the cutest 7 grandkids I have

ever seen, and miss like crazy!!! Thank goodness for facetime!

Love this place and we are certainly blessed every day!!

Last but certainly not least the study.  Chris has his ball

and chain on in this room quite a bit.  He gets ready for 

his classes in here.  The former teachers have collected quite a library as you can see. 

It is a great storage area and quiet.It is always quiet!!! We are the only ones here!Ha ha!!

Tiananmen Square

Our great friends the Powells' (who were in our very apartment last year, with the BYU China teachers program) left us their bikes in their apartment.  So we were so excited to get out and bike around Beijing!
The President/ Chairman of the Party in China, Xi Jinping put on a huge parade today here.  The preparations were all around Tiananmen Square so we decided to make our maiden voyage there.  It was WONDERFUL!  We rode with all the crazy other bikers, scooters, little delivery scooter trucks, buses, cars & pedestrains!  We had the time of our life!! It was beautiful.  So many police and guards all preparing for the big day today.  Can't wait to get out again! I love to discover this big beautiful city.