Arrival in Beijing

We arrived in Beijing around 2:15 p.m. The sun never went down on our entire flight, so I don't think any of us slept more than an hour during the whole airport/ flight time. We awoke at 5:30 a.m. befofe departing on our Chicago flight. All in all, we were awake 28 hours in a row. After arrival in Beijing, our guide Nelson took us to the Redwall hotel to rest. I told him we have a friend in Beijing, Li, and that we might call him to go out for dinner before we called it a day. I know he found it hard to believe we didn't just want to go to sleep but, we are only in Beijing occassionally.



Mr. Li came and got us around 6:00 and we went to Chinese Hotpot. It is an unbelievable meal. In front of you lies a spread of razor thin sliced lamb and beef (raw,), fresh mushrooms of differening varieties, several types of roots, and other stuff of which I cannot currently describe (it is 3:00 a.m. currently). Next to each person there is a pot of water above a flame (this was not an OSHA approved establishment). You grab a few pieces of meat, mushrooms, seaweed, roots, etc, and drop them into your hot pot. when you think it is safe to eat, usually one to two minutes, you pull it out with chop sticks or a fork, eat it, and repeat it. I will post pictures of this tomorrow. I must say, Kati did amazing during this adventure. A seven year old up for 28 hours, walking around the streets of Beijing, and avoiding a major meltdown. She is a real trooper. My mom, Al, and Jane also had a great time. Jane needed a memory card for her camera, and we haggled with a street vendor (which was quite fun) before finally negotiating a price of 150 yuan. I think this is roughly about 20 dollars U.S. Pretty good price for a 1 G memory card, I think.



I am going to sign off and try to go back to bed. We need to get up in three hours to get ready for breakfast and then sight seeing of Tienammen Square and the Forbidden City. We will post again soon. Thanks for all of your support. Two more days until our families become