While in China, we ate like Emperors.

Usually, food was served family style;

several bowls of food brought and put

on a rotating lazy susan. I cant remember a meal where there

were'nt at least 8 dishes.

This is not counting rice and beverages.

Shown here is the beginning of one of many meals.

Yum!

While at Xi'an, we

visited an chinese

folk art museum.

What we see here

is Lily learning

some of the art

of colligraphy,

and a terra cotta

scene of a farmers

household.

Burning incense at Big Wild Goose Pagoda

Here is Denise sending some prayers up to the Gods

by burning some incense.

Pagoda in Xi'an

Another site we visited in Xi'an was the

Big Wild Goose Pagoda. Here are the Girls

with Mom at an incense burner with the
Pagoda in the background.

Pictures from Xian

The second city we visited in China was Xi'an,

home of theTerra Cotta Warriors.

This is an interesting story.

About 2200 years ago, a mighty emperor

of China decided he wantedto 'take it with him'

when he died, so he had his artisans create

thousands of warrior figures to be buried

with him. Each of the figures has its own

individual face, and several army parts

are represented, horsemen (with horses!),

archers, foot soldiers,etc. When the emperor

died, the peasants revolted and burned the

burial sites to the ground. Over the years,

it was covered up and forgotten. In 1974

(I think I got the date right...) a farmer was

digging a well, and found a piece of one of the

warriors. The farmer had the presence of

mind to bring what he had found to the

authorities, and thus began one of the

biggest archeological digs in history.

There are three main burial sites (that

they know of) eachcovering hundreds of

acres on their own. Each of the 3 digs are

about the size of 3-4 football fields placed

side-by-side and is totally covered with

big dome roofs and open to the public.

These pictures dont really

do it justice, but here they are.

Enjoy!

More pics from Xi'an China

The city of Xi'an was the capitol of China for the early emperors.
The inner part of the modern city is surrounded by a big wall, about
20 meters high and 10 meters wide. 
 
About every 100 meters or so, there is a pagoda like structure
built as a guard house, or battlement. 
 
The two attached pictures show these structures.
 
 

---

Windows Live™: Keep your life in sync. Check it out.

More pics again

OCDF would give out little gifts to the girls
(and one boy) in the group every day.
One pic shows Lily with a flag of China.
 
The other pic is a Hotel built for the 2008
Olympics.  Its in the shape of the Olympic
Flame. 
 
Amazing!
 

---

Get back to school stuff for them and cashback for you. Try Bing now.

More great wall pics

The Great Wall of China is just so awesome!!!
 
I had to post these pics.  They turned
out pretty good, but they really dont capture
exactly how STEEP these steps are.
 
Awesome!
 

---

Windows Live™: Keep your life in sync. Check it out.

These pics were taken at the Great Wall of China
at Badaling (outside of Beijing).  'The Hat' pic
was taken in a suvenier shop at the wall.
 
More Great Wall pics to come!
 

---

Windows Live™: Keep your life in sync. Check it out.

More Beijing Shots

Here are a few more shots from Beijing.
 
One is of the 2008 Olympics venues,
the Birds Nest and the Swiming Arena.
Another is of our family at the Forbidden
City.  The man in the picture is a retired
college professor who lives in the old
part of Beijing called the Huatang
(probably not spelled right...)
 

---

Windows Live™: Keep your life in sync. Check it out.

More pics

Here are some pics from the Temple of Heaven in Beijing.
 
Rob
 

---

Windows Live™: Keep your life in sync. Check it out.

More pictures

I wanted to start posting some pictures on the blog,
so all our friends could see how amazing China is!
 
This picture is a little girl at the 'Amazing Hands' foster home
in Beijing.  Amazing Hands provides housing for orphans from
all across China who have medical issues and come to Beijing
to get these issues taken care of.  They stay at Amazing Hands
during their treatment, which sometimes can take several months
to years.
 
More to come!

Enjoy!
Rob

---

Get your vacation photos on your phone! Click here.

Posting a test picture

I am not sure if this will work, but here is a pic of Lily and Denise on the plane to Beijing.
 

---

Get back to school stuff for them and cashback for you. Try Bing now.

FW: Hello from Nanchang

 Note: put the wrong email address on this originally to post it.  Posting late.... sorry!

---

Well, this has all turned out quite differently than expected.  I thought we would be blogging regularly, but it turned iout that  we are unable to access our blog due to the unrest in western China.  So anyway, here is our report about the most important part of the trip. 
 
We got to Jiangxi Province two days ago (I think?).  When our guide picked us up at the airport, he presented Christine with a large red silk banner that read "Welcome Cao Xia Hai Back Home" in english and Chinese.  She was very pleased by this.  We stayed in Jiujiang.  The second day, we met with Mrs. Yue, who was the woman who came to the Lake View Hotel with the babies 9 yrs ago.  She remembered Christine, and took us to the SWI.  We were originally told we would not be able to see any children due to concerns about the swine flu, but we were able to see the children and walk the grounds. 
 
Eventually we went up to the room where we met with the notary 9 years ago.  Mrs. Yue presented Christine with a lovcely porcelin tea set, and a porcelin rabbit (her zodiac sign).   Then she gave us a China set!  We were amazed at their generosity.  She made it clear that they were very glad that Chridstine came back to her home town, and back to the SWI. After  they took us for lunch, we went to see Christine's finding site; it was a small village on the outskirts of Jiujiang, very poor.  We took some pictures and talked to a few women who were around.  Then we took Mrs. Yue shopping for a copier for the orphanage and were done for the day.  It was emotionally exhausting.
 
All in all, it was clear that they were happy to see one of their former charges return, and weer pleased with the book we created of all our girls.  They do consider the girls to be part of them, and want them to consider China their home.
 
This is what Christine has to say about her experience:The orphanagge kids were very nice they greeted me  when i came in. I was plaesed that i got to see my neighborhood. Some people said hi to me. When i was going past my neighborhood I was thinking my real mom could've lived there.
 
So that's all for now, maybe more when we get to Shanghai later today. 

---

Windows Live™ Hotmail®: Celebrate the moment with your favorite sports pics. Check it out.

---

Get free photo software from Windows Live Click here.

OK, we are finally home - and how good it is to sleep in our own beds (not the concrete Chinese mattresses), and be able to brush our teeth using water from the faucet! Aaahh, the little things in life! I will continue to post for about another week or so, try to upload some pictures, and fill in the many gaps in our travels. We were quite surprised to find out that we could not access our blog from China, after setting it up at home. I guess after the Chinese authorities saw what happened after the Iranian "elections", they did not want something similar happening with the riots in western China, and so cut off all access to blogs and twitter.

Just general impressions for now tho - the flights are as grueling and unending as I remember. This time, I was sure I would sleep on the plane for the first time ever, with the help of my new best friend Ambien! However, even modern chemistry could not lift the sleepless curse! As I said last time we left China. and this time I really mean it - next time we go to China, we stop in Hawaii to break up the trip.

The crowds, especially in Beijing, were horrendous. I think that we didn't consider that it is vacation time for Europeans as well as the Chinese, so everywhere was crowded. It was really
so different from the other times we traveled in Beijing. If I had to go again in summer, I would go in early to mid June, before Chinese school kids get out in July.

China is so much more prosperous than before. New building is going on everywhere, there are tons of shops and boutiques. The sheer volume of private automobiles is staggering. It is apparent that it is no longer a government controlled economy, but rather a controlled free market economy. China will clearly be a major economic power before very long.

Later, I hope to post some pictures and tell you about our time in Beijing - stay tuned!

Goodbye China

Well, the day has arrived for the Beal/Dojka family to return to Illinois.
We leave this afternoon on a long (15hr?) flight back to Chicago.

It has been a fantastic time, but grueling. I developed a nasty head cold
in Nanchang that kind of diminished our time in Shanghai. We tried to go
on a boat trip last nite, but it was cancelled due to Typhoon! We got to
see a little bit of the Shanghai skyline at nite from the cab ride.
Awesome! Even covered in clouds!

All in all it has been a wonderful trip. I think the highlight was the
orphanage trip, followed closely by the Pandas and our Chengdu experience.
Xi'an and Beijing were awesome too.

I think we accomplished what we set out to do. Christine and Lily now have
a new appreciation of their original home, and hopefully a better feeling
about themselves and their culture as a result. And we had a truly
memorable family experience.

Now we go home with wonderful memories (and about 20GB of media to wade
thru!). We are looking forward to familiar sites, sounds, faces and food.
And perhaps bring some new things and ideas to add to that repitioure. We
will add some pics to the blog as soon as we can get things sorted out.

Bye for now!
-----------------
Sent by Rob Beal from my Blackberry handheld

Goodbye Chengdu

Hi

On the plane getting ready to go to Nanchang for the orphange visit.
Chengdu was nice. Of course seeing the pandas was a highlite. Last nite
we were also treated to a spectacular fountain/light show at a park not far
from our hotel.

Today we fly to Nanchang, then drive to Jiujiang, where Christine was born.
Our travel group/friends have all split up to go our seperate ways. We
will meet up with our main guide and one other family in Shanghai, then fly
home.

The orphanage part should be emotional. Got to go now. More later.

Rob
-----------------
Sent by Rob Beal from my Blackberry handheld

Terra Cotta Warriors

Ni Hao;

Today we visited the TC Warriors. The site was unexpectedly large. Twenty
six square miles. The first emperor who unified China over 2000 years ago
wanted lots of help in the afterlife, so he had over 8000 lifesize warrior
figures, plus armor and weapons made, then put them underground for his
tomb. The existence of this was kept a secret and only discovered in 1974
when a farmer was digging a well and got a suprise!

The chinese have done a great job creating mamoth buildings to house and
display the excavations.

Today when we visited it was raining very hard, so we all got wet. This
was a huge improvement over being wet from sweating our b__tts off! Temp
was mid 80's. Ate at a hotel restruant near the site and watched an
artisan give a noodle making demonstration. Basically took dough, rolled
it up and stretched it out, doubled it up, stretched, repeat until he ended
up with spaghetti sized noodles. Very kool. Unfortunately, our cameras
were on the bus, so no pics or video.

Toinite we see a presentation of Tang dynasty dance and afterward the girls
get to pose with a dancer. They will be dressed to the nines in
traditional chinese dresses for the occassion. Should be fun.

Tommorrow we fly to Chengdu to see the pandas. More adventures!

More later.
Rob
-----------------
Sent by Rob Beal from my Blackberry handheld

Beijing

Hi everyone;

We left Beijing last night (friday nite here) and boarded a sleeper train
for Xi'an.

Beijing was fun. We saw all the usual sites, Temple of Heaven, Forbidden
City, Great Wall, Tienanmen square. Denise and I had seen these when we
came before on our adoption journeys, but it was fun to see them with the
kids. Both of them agreed that the Great Wall was the best.

Christine and Lily have both made friends with the other girls in the
group. There is one 11 yo boy who seems to be enjoying being the only male
in that age grp. Christine has suprised us by trying some new foods
without being forced.

All in all a great trip so far. The only downside has been the heat and
the crowds. Also, air quality has been poor. Lots of smog.

The sleeper train was fun, even tho we didn't really sleep too well and the
bathrooms were smelled horrible!

It is great seeing something new (to us) in Xi'an. Its a medium sized
city, only 8mil people. Today we saw a 700 year old Budist pagoda, an art
museum and a Chinese muslim mosque. Tommorrow we go to see the Terra Cotta
warriors.

Only able to post via email right now due to chinese govt blocking inet
access to blogs. Makes no sense to me, but there you go. Will post more
from my bberry later.

Rob

-----------------
Sent by Rob Beal from my Blackberry handheld

Test post

Hi

We've been in China 3 days now and having a great time. We can't get to
the blog site from a regular browser so we are trying email to post.

Hope this works!

More later if it does.

Rob
-----------------
Sent by Rob Beal from my Blackberry handheld

Almost Ready

Just packing. Seems like it is easier than when going to get a baby, but still not much fun. All those "just in case" items - antibiotics, Immodium, rain gear, gifts for translators & officials, etc. At least the weather is all one temperature - consistently HOT across all areas we will be going to, with some monsoon like rains in Chengdu.

The girls are most looking forward to seeing the Great Wall & the pandas. Lily's goal is to walk the length of the Great Wall - she doesn't quite comorehend that 2000 miles might be a little far for her. And Christine is looking forward to playing with babies in the orphanage where we will be volunteering our first day in Beijing. We will not actually be goin inside her orphanage in Juijiang because of an outbreak of the swine flu.

So, more from China after we survive the lovely, never ending plane trip.

Trying It Out - Michigan Test Run!!

Well, here it is, my very first blog posting! Too exciting!! I thought as a test run, I would first try to blog about our Fourth of July trip to Michigan. If that works, I will know we are ready to go for China!!

Right now, we are making biscotti (double chocolate walnut) for a snack to take along for the weekend.