China

On April 17th Andy took some days off of work to stay home with Sophie and let me go to Beijing with a wonderful group of ladies from Osan. We had 25 women go and climb the Great Wall, try many different kinds of chinese food, and work our bargaining skills at a few of the markets. We also had a couple of ladies who were extremely brave that tried some of the exotic foods on Wangfujing Street. Exotic being scorpions, snakes, starfish, and silk worms on a stick, fried. Not my kinda thing but the girls who did it were rock stars just soaking in the culture completely.

We were there for four very full days. We saw the Temple of Heaven, The Forbidden City, Tiananmen Square, The Great Wall, The Summer Palace, a jade factory, a pearl factory, and a couple of markets. The Great Wall was...well...great! It was amazing to actually be able to climb and see the view from the top.

Many times climbing the wall we were stopped by other tourist, Chinese, to have their picture taken with us. It seemed like we were there to see the Great Wall and they were there to see us. When a few of us made it to the top we did a group picture and then a whole bunch of people jumped in our picture to have theirs taken with the Americans. It added a few more laughs to our trip.

The Temple of Heaven, I was told, is very similar to Central Park. I've never been so I'll have to take folks word on that. There were people everywhere doing Tai Chi, dancing (couples and something similar to line), playing a form of hacky sack with what looked like a badmitton birdie, singing kareokee, and playing cards.
A few of us jumped right in. It was a lot fun, and the folks that were doing it welcomed us and tried to help us learn the correct steps or the best way to kick the "birdie".


Shopping at the markets in Beijing was a whole new experience. They have booths with everything you could possibly want: North Face jackets, UGGs, purses, sunglasses, watches, etc. They will try and charge a ridiculous amount for these items so you have to bargain. It was fun but exhausting. I was told that they will charge you $100 for a bottle of water, they expect you to haggle with them. As long as you kept a smile on your face and were kind they were the same and so much more willing to come down to your prices. I don't know how long I could do that for, great prices but there's something to be said for just walking into a store and paying the price on the tag. China was a great adventure that I am so glad I went on and I had a wonderful time but it was so nice to come home to my family
I have been amazed in the ways the Lord has blessed us and allowed us to see and enjoy so much of His wonderful creation. Our next big adventure will be back to the states in a few weeks.