Tiananmen Square, Forbidden City, and the Pearl Market

While still in Beijing, Hannah and I took a tour of the sites in downtown Beijing while David and Yejun had a full day of business meetings. First stop Tiananmen Square. The square is a HUGE paved open area. At one end is a large memorial to Mao Tse Dong where his body is entombed in a glass case (rumor is, that the body has been replaced by a wax replica). Our tour guide didn’t want to go there, so we didn’t go in the memorial (there are mixed feelings about Mao Tse Dong in China).

Hannah and I in Tiananmen Square

At the other end of the square is the Forbidden City. It is a massive estate of palaces and supporting buildings. Every bit as massive and beautiful as you would expect. This is a picture of the Imperial Palace.

Apparently, we were somewhat of a novelty with some of the people. These were the first people to ask to have their picture taken with us.

After walking through the Imperial Gardens at the far end of the Forbidden City, we exited the Forbidden City and crossed the street to Jingshan Park. We climbed the mount in the park, which was constructed from dirt dug from the moat around the Forbidden City, where you could overlook the Forbidden City and most of Beijing (depending on visibility due to air quality).



Following our tour we had a lunch of traditional Beijing style noodles, then headed off shopping.




First stop, the Pearl Market. Paula knew the owner of one of the stores, so we didn’t have to bargain. The prices were really cheap. About as cheap as buying costume jewelry in the US, so Hannah and I got a little carried away picking out jewelry for us and ones to bring back for gifts. But it was a great deal. While the pearl shop made our jewelry, we went to other floors to do some bargaining for good deals.

The sales people are relentless. I can’t tell you how many times we heard, “Hi lady, you want _____”. They will even grab your arm to stop you. One time a lady had Hannah by the arm and I tried to pull her off with no luck, the lady had an iron grip. Luckily we were warned ahead of time or it would have been a little scary. If we saw something we wanted we would walk a little past the booth, pull Paula aside and have her coach us on what we should pay and where to start the bidding, then we would go back prepared for battle.

The bargaining game went a little like this. They type a completely outrageous price on a calculator and show it to us, we act offended and shocked at the high price. We say, “No that’s too much!” Then they say, “How much you pay?” and hand us the calculator. We type in something about 70% less than what they asked. This time they act shocked and give us a price that’s half of their first offer. Then we say it’s still too much and type in our offer again and tell them that’s our final price. They still try to talk us into something higher, so we say we’ll get it from someone else and mention we saw it on another aisle. Then they say, ”no, no, final price” and give us our original asking price or something very close. Hannah seemed to weaken our bargaining position when she would start giggling and have to step away from the booth so she didn’t distract us. There were times, when you threatened to walk away and they would grab onto your wrists and you would be dragging them down the aisle until they finally gave in and gave you the price you wanted. Really it was kind of hilarious. It helped having Paula there.


We were so exhausted from the day, we went back to the hotel and crashed without having dinner.

I climbed the Great Wall!

That's what it says on the souvenir T-shirts we bought because that's exactly what we did. And when I say climb, I mean climb. We couldn't do the normal tourist thing and go out to the designated Great Wall tourist area, take a picture, and be done. Nope. Instead we opted for a full day excursion that included a trek along 7 miles of the Great Wall. It felt like 7 miles of stairs - straight up. It is every bit as beautiful as any pictures you've seen. Yejun He, a scientist from XOS, accompanied us on the trip where we found out he was affraid of heights. I don't think he'll be doing that trip again anytime soon. Seriously though, I understand the tactical advantage of building fortifications on the mountain tops, but what kind of of crazy people actually do it.

Hannah made a BFF in her Chinese Sherpa that led her safely along treacherous parts of the wall. (Actually it was a local farmer who was trying to be helpful so we would buy cold bottles of water and souveniers)

Good Morning from Beijing

We arrived in Beijing after a 12-hour flight yesterday. We checked into the hotel, then headed straight for a tailor. We ordered 2 custom made suits for David with 2 pants each and a business suit each for Hannah and I (Hannah's first "interview suit") which included pants and a skirt. All of this custom made for less than $500! What a deal. David got his usual enjoyment from haggling the price. Their original asking price was $400 for one of David's suits. Even the Chinese people we were with thought it was a great deal. We were all measured and will return in 2 days for the fitting and pickup.

Following our quick shopping stop, we had dinner with Wonder who is XOS's distributor for Sulfer Analyzers in China. There were several people from Wonder's company and Wonder's wife, Paula, as well. We enjoyed fine Chinese dishes like Kung Pao chicken, broiled lamb, barbecued ribs, frog, pig's feet, and bamboo (did you know you can eat steamed young bamboo? Me neither. Kind of reminded me of an artichoke). We ate outside on a nice roof top restaurant.

Unfortunately it was dark and what looked like a green bean, was actually one of those really hot dried red pepper's. Fortunately it was dark, so no one could see the tears streaming down my face and the pained expression.

Hannah's home!

Hannah seems to have survived her first year away to college. Actually, survived may not be the right word, maybe thrived in her first year of college is more fitting. She made lots of new friends, did well in her honors studies, joined a dance company, participated in the ward (church), became a die hard hockey fan, and learned to live in harmony (most of the time) with roommates. What more could you ask for? We went out and picked her up on Thursday.

Would you believe this was the second load!?!

I hope she doesn't plan on packing anything like this when we take her to China next month. She's carrying her own bags!

Paintball and Dancing

It was a fun weekend. David went from one extreme to the other on Saturday. In the morning he took McKay and his friends to play paintball which is an extreme boy thing to do (guns and all), to attending Hannah's dance recital at Northeastern University which is very girly. Here are some pictures.

Chris Ranc, McKay, and Adam Bailey

Hannah (yellow shirt in the back)

Hannah center front

That's what happens when you have girly girls and rough 'n tumble boys.

Easter Sunday

The Easter Bunny found our house once again.

We went to Walt and Alice's branch for church this week. We were thinking about going because Walt and Alice were speaking, but then Walt ended up in the hospital, so David made a deal with his Dad. If Walt wrote the talk, David would give it. That was OK with Walt on one condition-David had to SLOW down when he talked. I think Walt didn't want to write a longer talk (that and he wanted to spare the branch because Alice talks really fast and having two speakers like that would be an overload for Easter Sunday...or any Sunday). So David delivered Walt's talk and added a message of his own. He did a great job.

Then we went up to Walt and Alice's for Easter dinner. Dorothy, John, and little John were there along with Ben, Drew, and Drew's fiancee Laura.

After a conference call with Walt, we decorated Easter Eggs.

Happy Easter!

Au revoir Montreal

Saturday was our last day in Montreal. Just before packing to checkout of the hotel, the bathroom sink struck me as funny. Maybe we could coordinate a little better so each person doesn't bring their own toothpaste...

Anyway, we started off the day by heading off in search of butterflies. Where would you find butterflies in April? The Jardin Botanical Garden butterfly exhibit, of course. This is one of the best butterfly exhibits I've been to. One landed on Bryson.


After the butterfly exhibit we enjoyed their collection of bonsai trees. Some were almost 100 years old. Then we went over to the Insectarium and learned more than we wanted to know about bugs, beetles, and everything creepy.

We spent the rest of the afternoon in Old Montreal. The architecture is really quite beautiful if you ever look up to check it out. Similar to the old part of New Orleans, Old Montreal is for the tourists. All kinds of unique gift shops, art galleries, and restaurants. There were even a few street performers out this early in the tourist season. We liked the guy juggling fire the best. We stopped by Notre-Dame again and were able to go inside. I've been in dozens of cathedrals and this one rivals the best of them for beauty. It was truly stunning.

We got some gelato and headed off in search of a bakery before we left. We had to get our baguette and croissant fix before leaving.

At one point we came down a hill to find McKay meditating on this stone in a park. Since he had just been scared by a squirrel that jumped in front of him on the path, I figured he must be summoning the squirrel gods.

David thought differently. He says this is simply a nut summoning a squirrel.

Good Friday in Montreal

Seriously, we don't make Bryson sleep in the closets when we travel. It's all his idea. I mean, one time we made McKay sleep in the trunk, but that's a long story. The closet in this hotel even has it's own light that Bryson rigged up with an extension to the cord so he could turn out the light when he was done reading.

We started out the day with a bus tour of the city. One stop was at la Basilique Notre-Dame. It bears resemblance to Notre Dame in Paris, but it's smaller and no gargoyles.

They were holding Good Friday services, so we didn't get to go in. Maybe tomorrow. We did see the procession leaving the church with a guy holding a cross at the lead.

The tour bus dropped us off at one of the look outs on Mount Royal (Montreal, get it?). We happened to have 3 pairs of binoculars in the back pack. I try to be prepared for any occasion. Bryson, Parker, and McKay below.

After the tour was over we explored the underground mall that stretches for miles and then caught the Metro to go to the Biodome.

The Biodome is an old Olympic venue that has been converted into an indoor zoo of sorts. It has 4 habitats that you walk through and see animals and plants that live there. It was very cool. McKay and Bryson's favorite was the otters, David's was the tamarind monkeys.

After the Biodome, we took the Metro to near our hotel where we hiked up to another Mount Royal look out.

Montreal is a beautiful city. McKay says he likes it better than Paris. Not me. But it has it's own charm.

Bon Jour from Montreal!

The boys are out of school Friday for Good Friday (one of the perks of living in New York, we get all the Christian and Jewish holidays off) so we planned a quick getaway to Montreal. We had planned to stay until Easter morning, but yesterday David's dad, Walt, went to his Dr. and found that the leukemia is returning quickly and they wanted him to start Chemo today. They admitted him to the hospital today, although they normally do this regimen as outpatient, but they didn't want to wait until Monday to start, so they had to do it inpatient. 5 days of Chemo, 4 weeks off, then repeat. For anyone that's counting, yes, this is round 4 with leukemia. Since each time he's faced it he's had less than a 50% chance of survival, we can't take the statistics very seriously anymore when it comes to him. I think he has something against statisticians and he's out to prove that he's above their rules. That's fine with us. He can go right on proving them all wrong. Anyway, Walt was supposed to be talking in church for Easter, so David is going to deliver his talk, so we'll only stay until Saturday.

Montreal is interesting so far. It seems a little strange that a city only 4 hours from my house could seem so foreign. It's probably the whole french speaking thing. We were hoping it would be like Paris. I haven't seen much that's like Paris, but maybe tomorrow.

Parker, David, and I set out in search of dessert after we got settled in the hotel room here in Montreal. After stopping by an ATM I noticed a guy following us and watching us while occassionally texting. I had a bad feeling about him. I prompted David to cross the street and we started walking back from where we came. The guy turned and started walking back the way we were going while talking on his phone and crossing over to our side and occasionally glancing at us. We decided to cross the street and duck into a retaurant (more to get away from the guy than to find a dessert) and right in front of the restaurant was another guy with the same cell phone, talking on it and watching us. We quickly walked into the restaurant and decided we were getting a table and staying for a while. A group of the guys were talking outside the restaurant for a couple of minutes then we couldn't see where they went. The restaurant hailed us a cab after we had some dessert and we took it the 2 blocks to the hotel. The guys probably had the ATM staked out. I was mentioning to the boys only an hour before that I read how safe the city was any time of day or night. We're not mentioning it to McKay or Bryson until we leave. We don't want them to be scared. Parker's a little shaken, though.

Is it safe?

Bryson participated in the Voorheesville Elementary Science Fair tonight. His subject was "Is it safe? Lead in toys". With a little help from XOS, he had the right tools to test some of the toys around the house. Good news, the toys he tested from our house were safe. Here is a picture of Bryson showing it to his teacher, Miss Hillard.

I got to act as "Visiting Scientist" for the night and talk to kids about their projects. The kids love to explain their project to a real scientist.