Ellie arrived on the 25th, and immediately had to deal with the frustrations of China. The driver thought she was at Terminal 3 when she was at Terminal 2--and she didn't have a phone! Finally a nice man gave her the wi-fi password so she could text me on her iPod and all was straightened out. Her flight arrived at 11 pm and the driver picked her up at 1:30 a.m. Long night!
Then my sister came to visit. Terry has been teaching English in Guangzhou this winter at a university there.
We've been able to connect on a couple of trips, to the Silk Road last fall and the cruise. But it's always fun to be able to show family your home turf. The best part was that she brought spectacular weather with her!
Her one wish? To see the Great Wall and ride the luge at Mutianyu. So, off we went to Beijing.
Others had cautioned us, since it was a national holiday, that traffic might be terrible.
It did take us an extra hour to get there (4 hours instead of 3), but not too bad.
The ornamental trees were in full blossom.
The skies were cloudless AND smog-less! About 73 degrees, breezy
(so hiking up the wall didn't make me all sweaty), and absolutely gorgeous!
We could see the Wall snake over the mountain tops for miles and miles.
The ride up to the Wall... (Ellie and Terry)
The ride down... a luge! They call it a toboggan. Either way, it was a lot of fun!
You sit on a sled on wheels, with a control stick for braking, and down you go!
Twists and turns--it took about 5 minutes because some people in front of us were going pretty slow.
We would stop and wait so we could go fast for awhile.
Who says Beijing has a pollution problem? Not today!
Kevin often has meetings at the Gateway building (center), and usually you can't see the top.
Terry was able to enjoy the patio (I did too).
We also did a lot of sightseeing around Tianjin. The French Catholic Cathedral.
Real Chinese shopping at Shu Guan Li. These are typical Chinese dresses. I see women
all in fluffs and ruffles, all the time! We found great bargains at the Ancient Culture Street,
because of the May Day holiday. And saw only one other Westerner there in the crowds.
We walked along the river (and again, no pollution!)
Elizabeth and Alice occasionally got asked to be included in a picture.
This time, a crowd of about 50 people quickly gathered and several took turns getting their pictures taken with the two blonde girls. Even Kevin had his picture taken with a couple of guys.
Terry, in front of one of the trees at our apartment building.
Sometimes, we comment, "Well, after all This is China". That has been shortened to T. I. C.
We had one of those T.I.C. experiences on Terry's last day here, Thursday.
We went into Tianjin for some shopping (found a great fabric store). About midway, I called the driver as we were finished there. He was quite frantic--"No car!" I couldn't understand the problem so he called Kevin who called me. The driver had parked in an underground parking garage. Someone had a grievance (with the attached hotel? with the garage owners? who knows!) and parked two cars in front of the entrance/exits. No one could leave!
The driver was worried about Terry's flight, so he called another driver
to come pick us up and finish our errands, as well as drop off Terry at the airport.
(It all worked out fine for us.)
We had arrived at 11 a.m., and our driver was finally able to leave the parking area at 4 pm.
Someone finally called the police (were they reluctant to get them involved?).
I couldn't understand why the hotel didn't just call a tow truck and have those cars removed.
Oh, well! T.I.C!
Yup, spring is here!
