Beijing is amazing!

Here we are on day 3 of our adventure. The first night we got here and went out for dinner with a couple of other families in our travel group, I was freaked out!! I was so thankful that Yulin, our facilitator, was with us to help us order food and navigate the grocery store. I just felt so useless, being in a place where no one can understand us, we can't understand them and I can't even read what any of the signs or menus said. Ai ya!

But then the next day (yesterday) we ventured out. Dean, Amelia and I just decided to go for a wander around our neighbourhood, by our selves! I was so nervous! But we survived! Not only did we survive, but we did great. We stumbled onto some AMAZING places, like the Lama Temple and loads of hutong. Hutong are traditional alleyways of courtyard . They are tiny, but somehow cars still sneak through them. Dean posted a few pictures of the hutongs we saw yesterday. Below are a few more.

This last picture is one of four archways that span a beautiful and quite famous hutong (but I can't remember it's name). So pretty!

So, by the end of the day I had fallen in love with Beijing! People are so friendly and have loads of smiles, especially for Amelia!

Today, Dean, Amelia and I went to Beihai Park. I've never gotten so emotional about a place! When we first walked in I immediately teared up. It's absolutely beautiful. I don't really know how to explain it all, so let's just look at some pictures!

Not only was it beautiful, but Beihai park was absolutely entertaining. It was an amazing place to people-watch. The one thing that really struck me, was the many, many elderly people exercising there. Some were dancing (choreographed performances or ballroom dancing), some were doing a martial art of some sort, some were playing hacky-sack (but with feathers attached to it) and some were doing this cool sort of raquet-ball dance. Again...can't explain it all, but check out the pics...

But the absolute most entertaining part of the day at Beihai was watching how people reacted to Amelia. Many stopped to watch her walk by, some said hello to her and then people started taking pictures of her. She had her picture taken with so many people today! She was a great sport about it...we kept calling her famous! And she also interacted a bit with other children...very sweet.

So that's our experience with Beijing so far. It's been so lovely. And so different from life back home! Pedestrians are definitely NOT the priority...cars will NOT stop for you, neither will bikes, of which there are a ton. But I've already picked up on the skill of jaywalking...quite proud of myself. Personal space is not as sacred here as it is in Canada, which makes sense as there are 17 million people in this city. The other thing we are facinated with are toddlers' split pants. I'm sure you can imagine what goes on with these!

Must go wake up Dean and Amelia now...they are having a pre-dinner nap. A lot of families from our travel group are just arriving today so we are all having supper together in a few minutes. Can't wait to meet them! Wan an!