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| A family of 3 on our way to becoming a family of 4. |
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| The first of many flights to get to Emalie. |
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| Nikolas so happy to become a big brother! |
Day 1; July 20, 2012; Beijing, China
I look out our hotel window and I see smog and lots of people. There is no indication of a blue sky above what would look like fog in Seattle or San Francisco. The street is busy with buses, vans, cars, bicycles, mopeds, and pedestrians. You would expect it to be chilly but from what we felt yesterday it will be very hot and extremely humid. The day is as bright at 0830 as it was at 1630 yesterday afternoon. Who knows where north, south, east or west is because you can’t see the sun.
We had a fantastic first day in Beijing. The hotel offered a great breakfast with a lot of variety. I’d never had wonton soup for breakfast! We met our guide Alice at 0900. We took the subway to Tiananmen Square and walked through the Forbidden City. It was so funny to see how the people flocked to Nikolas. I have many photos of people taking photos with Nikolas. Alice took us to a local noodle house for lunch. We enjoyed Kung Pao chicken, noodles and a tofu pork dish. Coke has never tasted so good as after walking three hours in very high heat and humidity. We felt very tired from the heat, but the locals looked that way, too. After lunch we took a rickshaw ride through Huton- old alleys- and visited the house of a local family. The bus ride home was very long and hot. An elderly lady told us to “take a seat” and we were shocked that she spoke English. We had a nice talk with her. She reminded me of a Chinese Grandma G.! I think her sense of humor and disposition were similar. We will write on postcards for family and I wish I could send one to Grandma G. Oh how I miss her and wish I could tell her about this adventure!
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| The view out of our hotel room in Beijing. |
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| Nikolas keeping his own journal of our adventures in China. |
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| Our guide Alice with me and Nikolas in Tiananmen Square. |
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| Tiananmen Square |
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| Tiananmen Square |
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| The children of China are so beautiful. |
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| Soldiers marching through Tiananmen Square. |
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| The three of us with the entrance to the Forbidden City in the background. |
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| The gates to the Forbidden City. |
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| People, people and more people. |
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| Nikolas waiting for Alice to return with tickets for us to enter the Forbidden City. |
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| Nikolas with his first group of admirers. A blonde-haired, blue-eyed, handsome boy in China gets a LOT of attention! |
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| Inside the Forbidden City. |
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| Inside the Forbidden City. I don't know if I've ever been that hot in my entire life. |
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| The Forbidden City-- what stunning architecture. |
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| A lion guarding the gate-- this one is a mother lion. Our guide explained that if a lion baby is under the lion's paw then it is a female and if a ball is under the lion's paw then it's a male. What a neat piece of trivia! |
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| Prior to leaving Colorado, we got the name of Nikolas' karate Shihan's school in Beijing (where he studied karate). We weren't able to go inside because they were on break for the summer, however we were equally thrilled just being able to find it! |
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| Ready for a rickshaw ride through the old alleys of Beijing. |
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| German beer in China....Sven's happy! |
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Nikolas aspired to learn how to use his fan the way the locals did.
This rickshaw driver gave him a few lessons. |
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| The old alleys of Beijing. |
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| The old alleys of Beijing. |
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| The front door of the local home we visited. |
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The lady of the house kindly repairing Nikolas' fan.....
learning those fancy tricks creates a lot of wear and tear on a little fan! |
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