Looking back: Hongfu Temple

Tina headed back to Chicago today; we enjoyed her visit. Katie did quite well in church today - perhaps because it was pretty crowded today and she quieted down with all those people around.

On January 14 when we visited Qianling Park in Guiyang, we visited the Hongfu Temple. This the largest Buddhist temple complex in the Guizhou province. Our guide explained a lot about the temple and Buddhism to us, but we were clearly just scratching the surface. It was a pretty but also a very religious place, and we were not allowed to take pix of everything. It was interesting to note parallels and differences between our family's faith and Buddhism as it was described to us here. On a lighter note, we found out that baldness, big belly, and big earlobes are supposed to be "lucky" - so I am working on being lucky, indeed. Later that day we tried to take Katie swimming in the indoor pool at the hotel, but the water was too cold. The hotel was really uptight about sanitation at the pool - we all had to wear shower caps and had to walk through a six-inch deep pool of disinfectant in order to get to the swimming area.

Tina visits and looking back: Qianling Park

Today Chile had a very large earthquake (magnitude 8.8). I have attached a pic of the USGS earthquake website taken at about 2 this afternoon. Many of the aftershocks shown in this image were about magnitude 5 or 6. About the time the tsunami from this quake reached Hawaii, my sister Tina arrived for a visit from Chicago - no connection between the events :*) . Katie and Tina hit it off rather well, and Katie loved playing with Aunt Tina's iPhone. Katie had a bit of a fever this morning, probably because she had four immunization shots on Friday, but she got better.

Ironically, on the day of the big Chile earthquake I'm about to blog about January 14, and it was that morning of that we found out about the big Haiti earthquake on the jumbo TV screen in People's Square (look back on that date's entry). On January 14, our family headed over to a large park on the northern end of Guiyang known as Qianling Park. The route we took to the park was a bit rough because it passed through construction areas. The park has a lot of things to see and we did not even get to see all of it. It has a "friendly" population of macaque monkeys that we enjoyed watching, from a safe distance. The area was fairly green , even in January, reminding us a bit of the Pacific Northwest at that time of the year.

Looking back: Guiyang Wal-Mart

Things are pretty busy here in Peoria, but we have a couple pix to share from the week. I guess it will take a while to tell that China trip story. When we visited the previously park on January 13, we went on a fun little paddle boat ride on the Nanming River (that's our guide in the picture). Later, we headed to the local Wal-Mart. Shopping in another country is a bit of an adventure - we were always looking for familiarities and yet we often enjoyed finding the differences. It was the grocery portion of the store that was the most unusual to us (anybody want some chicken feet?). A lot of the food (especially the meat) was less packaged than in the states. There were lots of smoked products. There were live fish, frogs, and turtles for sale (for eating). There was not any opportunity for negotiation over prices there. There were lots of New Year's decorations up. We found a snack that Katie really liked, some little round sweet crackers. Our guide found a bag of them and held it up and Katie recognized them and threw an immediate fit - her first meltdown with us. We ate a late lunch at the KFC in the store, but again we accidentally got breaded chicken that was too spicy. By the way, the Wal-Mart is underground. Above the store is a beautifully decorated park called the People's Square. Interestingly, across the street from this square there is a statue of Chairman Mao with his hand up in the air. Someone slyly commented to us that Mao is saluting Wal-Mart. We wound up visiting Wal-Mart (and KFC) a number of times during our stay in Guiyang.

Looking back: Pleasant Goat and Big Big Wolf

The weather flip-flopped between rain and snow today. Katie did OK in church, but kept us on our toes throughout the day. Kudos to all of you who have mutiple kids! Karen and Kris went to a Mardi Gras-themed women's tea at church. They brought an extra mask home for Katie.

When we visited the park in Guiyang on January 13 we found a ride decorated with drawings of cartoon characters, some of Disney characters, and one of Pleasant Goat. The cartoon Pleasant Goat and Big Big Wolf is a smash hit in China and this rather unsophisticated computer-assisted cartoon has produced two movies (the second one released on January 29). Basically, there is a herd of goats - like Pleasant Goat, Fat Goat, and Slow Goat (the teacher - I grabbed some shots of him in a chemistry explosion) - that live in a fortified compound. And of course there are wolves - like the frying-pan-wielding Red Wolf and her henchman Gray Wolf - that want to get the goats and eat them. The cartoons are about as educational as a Road-Runner cartoon, but I enjoy them. They contain a bit of what I consider typical east Asian cartoon characteristics: certain facial expressions and sound effects and of course a smattering of magic and techno-robotics. We got a few DVDs of the cartoons at the Wal-Mart in Guiyang. I can't understand what is being said in them, but I can figure out the overall plot and enjoy the sight gags. Katie enjoys them a bit, especially the theme song, which has a very catchy tune and can be seen here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lqsNe721uwc.

Looking back: elder exercise

Today we had a rather wet snowfall, which enabled me to make some snowpeople with Katie. Actually, Katie more or less watched and I did the building. Alas, Kris missed it, she had a babysitting class that lasted much of the day. I dug a scooter and rocking horse out of the shed - Katie likes them a lot. She also likes watching muppets like Bert and Ernie. She can say "ball" and "banana" now.

The day after we got Katie (Jan. 13) the major event of the day was a visit to a local park. Our guide and driver took us in a car - later we found out it was only 4-5 blocks away and we walked there several days later. One of the thing we saw in the park and elsewhere is a lot of the older population doing morning exercises like Tai Chi, sometimes involving props like swords or ribbons or balancing balls on paddles. A lot of older people are very active this way, and they also do things like karaoke and dancing and playing instruments and writing poems on sidewalks. Badminton is popular among all ages. Some parks have outdoor exercise equipment for adults. Oh, and the kites! It still staggers my memory to think how high they could fly kites - hundreds of feet up, maybe up to a thousand feet based on comparison to nearby high rises.

Happy New Year and looking back: Gotcha Day!

Today we all attended church. Katie is pretty quiet around other people, but she got a little chatty in church. It was OK, but I hope we can keep her from getting a lot louder. After church we went to a Chinese restaurant to celebrate St. Valentine's Day a little, but mostly the Lunar New Year, a.k.a. Chinese New Year, a.k.a. the spring festival. This is the year of the tiger. This is by far the biggest holiday in China: people sometimes take the week off and travel home to see families, and decorating was already in progress while were in China. Part of me wishes that I could be at the People's Square in Guiyang, I hear the New Years fireworks there are great. However, the obscenely long travel there and back is still too fresh in my mind! Later this afternoon, Katie and I went for a walk in the woods - mostly she rode on my shoulders and hung on for dear life as I slipped around.

January 12, 2010, was Katie's "Gotcha Day"! Karen did such a good job describing it I shall refer you to her entry on this blog for that date. I will add only one other pic from that day, of Karen and Katie together.