Friday – August 10: Happy Birthday Annika!!!
Fabulous morning! Sun was shining! Mark had the day off from work so that he could smoke the ribs in time for tonight's dinner. YAY!!!!!!!!!! 🙂
Mark and Ava made blueberry waffles for breakfast and Annika got to open the two gifts from the Mears family that were delivered via our Chinese friend, Lynn. Yay! Annika was so thrilled with her gifts!
Happy Birthday, Annika!!!!!!
After breakfast, I whipped up the meringue for the three lemon meringue pies. Mmmmmm!!!! I popped two of them in the oven. Mark went out and attempted to neaten up the backyard using our electric weed string trimmer.
The school was having an open house from 11-noon so we proceeded to school via the back gate a little before 11:00. We sat and listened to Mr Moody, the school director, tell us about the changes that had been made at the school- some good and some bad. Apparently the recent flooding in Tianjin was the worst in the last 40 years. Thankfully it didn't affect us but the schools gym was flooded as it sits lower than the rest of the school. The gym had wood flooring which apparently was destroyed by the flood waters and will now need to be replaced. Why oh why didn't we take a walk during the flooding and take photos? Oh, right! I like staying safe and sound and DRY!!!!!
The primary school building has had some mostly cosmetic updates done over the summer. I must say the changes are definitely for the better! It looks nice!
We got to meet next years teachers. Mark and I split up- I went with Ava and he went with Annika. Ava's teacher arrived in china just two weeks prior so everything is still very new to her. She's from Auckland, new Zealand! Just the place we're planning on heading to for CNY! Ava had already taken a strong liking to her so here's hoping first grade will be a good one!
We managed to scoop up not one..not two…but three of Annikas friends! Clair, Mimi and Andreina came home with us. Annika had a fabulous birthday play date with her friends!!!!
The pies are done and cooling. The salads are finished and chilling. The chocolate ice cream is ready for cranking. Just waiting on the ribs, and of course, our friends!
Aaron's kitchen delivers our huge order- including the two racks of ribs Mark is going to start smoking ASAP!!!! I still don't think I've told you about Aaron's kitchen or the other home delivery groceries, have I? Aarons is awesome! I order what I want for the following week (need to think ahead by one week) via email on Monday and the order is delivered on Friday! Aaron's has an online menu that you can select from. What do I get? Eggs, milk, Greek style yogurt, all kinds of meats (including cold cuts and cured meats), alcohol and some prepared foods. Saaaweeet!!!!!
The girls are all over the place- either playing with Polly pockets or jumping on the trampoline or racing around the house.
Annika and Andreina made chocolates using the make-your-own chocolate kit Annika got as a birthday gift:
We're still waiting for guests to arrive. We heard from Debbie- sadly Marko's ordeal in the Beijing hospital is taking quite a bit longer than anticipated (and they'd already anticipated a very long time for it). So that means they won't be joining us for dinner tonight. 🙁 We will miss them!!!!! Our new neighbors, Mary and her husband Andrew, from across the street will be joining us as well as Mimi's family.
We get started cranking the chocolate ice cream as its a monster sized batch. The girls all get several turns cranking it!
Finally! Guests start to arrive and so does Andreina's dad- he's come take her home. Thank goodness she gets to eat a bite of ribs and some chocolate ice cream "soup" before she has to leave.
We had a fantastic meal! Mary made some lovely potato salad and Chrissie brought an awesome couscous sweet potato salad. I forgot to take a photo of the lovely food!!! :-(
After dinner I lit the number nine candle on one if the pies and we all sang happy birthday to Annika. Mmmm….pie followed by chocolate ice cream.
Our guests left leaving us to savor the day before turning into pumpkins ourselves!
Good night!
August 11- BEIJING!!!!
Rise and shine!
Mr. Li will be here at 8:00 to pick us up for our overnighter in Beijing. First we will head to the hong qiao market- the pearl market. It's huge! It's vast! It has several buildings of stalls selling just anything you can think of.
We got to the market around 10:30. First stop- see if that Starbucks Jennifer, Debbie and I saw is finally open for business. Hooray!!! It is open!!!!!! Lattes for the grown ups!
Time to meander around and listen to the banter of the salespeople. Listening to all the haggling happening. We got to practice our minuscule, barely adequate Chinese with the salespeople. Hahaha! We bought a variety of things- two scarves for me, toys for the girls, a big old helicopter and a blue laser for Mark, and a few other random things.
Time for lunch! There are most of the big name fast food chains here but I think well stick to subway sandwiches. Mmmmmm!!!! Starbucks and Subway….not very Chinese but very much appreciated!
All right…. We still have another one and a half hours until Mr. Li comes to pick us up. Hmmm…what should we do? Let's go check out the Temple of Heaven across the street, okay?
Uh, guys???? I think it's going to start raining.
Oh no!!!! Of course it starts to rain on us – and we don't have an umbrella with us!
Well, let's go check out the Hall of prayers for good harvest and then leave. It IS a lovely looking park. But maybe well come back some other time.
After about a ten minute walk we're getting closer to the Hall of Prayers. And now it's really raining!!! Ugh!
We still have a few minutes before we're getting picked up so how about another drink from Starbucks and lets see if we can find an umbrella to buy. gaaaahhh!! How can they not have a single umbrella for sale????????
Oh good! I see Mr. Li drive up. Time to head to the Grand Hyatt hotel.
That was a short drive! I didn't realize they were so close to each other. Time to check in.uh oh. Somebody forgot their passport. I'm not naming names but his name starts with M. 😉 the hotel did NOT want to let us check in but somehow we managed. And now I'm just pissed off (not at anybody in particular). NOT a good way to start what was supposed to be a fun weekend getaway. Grrrrrr!!! Reminder: you need your passport or a copy of it to check into any hotel in china. Actually, i think you're supposed to have your passport on your person at all times but we usually keep it in a safe place. However, the police in Beijing are more likely to check your passports to make sure you are legally in the country.
Finally! All checked in ….so let's go to the pool! I hear its phenomenal. And guess what??? It really is!!! It truly is spectacular! It looks like a tropical resort pool- with cricket and frog sounds. It's hard to believe this structure is underground. This pool was THE reason we chose this hotel. We wanted to take Annika to a nice swimming pool as part of her birthday gift/celebration.
The natives are getting hungry…so let's do something totally crazy and order food for pool side delivery. OUCH! Those are some steep prices! I hope the food is good….bummer though. They won't allow beer in the pool area. 🙁 we will see what actually comes with our order. Mark wasn't sure if they actually understood him even though he read it line by line from the menu.
Where is our food?
Oh! Here it comes! It's all here- smoked salmon, a noodle-y dish and a fruit platter with three raspberry iced teas. MMMmmmm.
Let's swim some more!!!!
Now it really is time to get out. Its a little after 7:00 but we've been swimming for hours! Time to get dried off and changed. Let's head to our room- room number 1054. Finding our room took us longer than expected….and can someone tell me why room 1015 is next to room 1054? Is there a logical pattern to this? I think not.
Mark and Ava went to look for AA batteries for her little remote car she bought at the toy market. They came back telling us the hotel connects up a large, partially subterranean mall!
We had no idea that was there!!! We all decided to go for a walk around the mall. Oooooo!!!! Ice cream! I got a tiny scoop of something called peanut ice cream. All I could taste was vanilla. Where is the peanut flavor???? Everybody else got cookies and cream. I think that was a better choice than peanut. Hmmm….our homemade ice cream at home is better!!!!!
Oh! I see a Paris baguette …and I see a Starbucks. What the hey? The whole reason I agreed to buy the breakfast buffet at check in time at the hotel was because I couldn't find a Starbucks or anything close to the hotel on google map! HA! Let pick up some treats from this other tiny bakery that looks like it has some yummy stuff.
Time to head back to the room:
Munch munch munch. Mmmmpf!!!! Mmmmmmph!!!!
Nighty night! Sleep tight!
**********************************************************************
August 12- still in Beijing…
Wakey Wakey! How did you sleep????
I slept awful!!! Grrr!!!! What a hard hard bed and the pillows were horrible. What the heck????? We paid how much for this room to get a nasty hard bed to sleep on????????? I tossed and turned all night and now my back is screaming at me. Maybe they should include a back massage with the room …it seems we certainly paid enough to stay here!
Sigh. Sometimes I miss home. And the beds in the USA!!!!
Let's get some breakfast. Maybe that will cheer me up! Well they do have a nice breakfast bar. Not the nicest or the most sumptuous but pretty nice. We got the bill and they wanted to charge us 798 RMB!!!! Yikes! That was the cost of two nights stay in datong! Holy cow! Plus, that isn't what the front desk said it'd be. We most definitely don't eat enough to warrant those kind of buffet prices.
Mark and the girls are going swimming while I will hang out by the pool. We have a lot of planning to do on our Japan trip. Oh no. Annika got a scrape on her shoulder from something in the pool. Shes now out of the pool for good. Darn it!
Let's get dried off and changed. I want to see Tiananmen Square- just because we're in Beijing. We are supposedly super close to it right now and we haven't seen it yet.
Impressive pieces in the hotel lobby:
About a twenty minute walk later- there's the Forbidden City on our left and yep, the Square is on our left (on the opposite side of the road. Just have to figure out how to cross that insanely busy street to get to it. Can you see a way? OH! I figured it out! There's an underground path to it. We just met a guy from London who is here for business. Funny him being here when so many have traveled to London for the summer Olympics. Nice fellow. It was very cheerful talking to another English speaking person for a change. He works for Ford and was in Chonqing last week.
Hahahaha!!! Several people have come up to ask to take photos of the girls and Annika is now telling them they can take a photo with her for five kwai! Everyone walks away shaking their heads!!!! It has at least service it's purpose….they have left us alone. Hey! If you take photos of us as if we are part of the sights then were going to start charging. 🙂 heheheheheh! The picture taking thing is getting really old. I am really old.
Tiananmen Square (rare family photo):
The square is just that. A big open square. Hard to imagine what happened here with tanks and all. Which by the way, is a taboo topic in China. We heard that even people living in Beijing didn't even know about what happened in their own neighborhood! It was all hushed up and the Chinese media never reported about it. Or so we've been told. Therefore it didn't happen. Or did it????
Let's walk back to the hotel:
A view from our hotel room:
And now a view inside the hotel room:
And look what our room came with:
Time to check out of the hotel. Thank goodness they've adjust the price of the breakfast buffet! It's certainly not as ridiculously expensive as we'd been lead to believe this morning. Whew. I wish they would have gotten it straight at breakfast time! Mr. Li will be here to pick us up at 2:00pm.
Two more stops before we head home: Annie's and Jenny Lou's.
Thanks for hanging out with Beijing! I hope your back isn't killing you like mine is! Thank goodness for the decent bed that awaits at home.
See you back in Tianjin.
:-)