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It’s my turn to write a spot now. Sorry about not writing more but I have already mentioned my horrible writing skills.

First I would like to put everyone at ease about our experiences here in China. Cory and I feel that we have misled everyone to thinking that we are miserable. This is not true. I think that we have our ups and downs and we stress the downs much more than the ups. We both know that this will most likely be the most memorable country on our 3 month tour. Last night I think we ended up having the most memorable event since we left the U.S.

We had left our hotel to roam the streets and think about what to do for food when 3 chinese students about 17 years old came up to us and asked us if we would be will to go to an English party at their school. What is an English party exactly we did not know and I must say I was a little apprehensive at first. Cory said ok and off we went with the 3 girls and more that joined along the 15 minute walk to the Wisdom Girls School down somewhat darks streets. Out thought was that this was too elaborate to be a scam so we continued to follow them. When we arrived in the courtyard we were greated with the applause of about 100 15-18 year olds. My understanding is that this school is an english focused highschool. They took us into the office and explained what we would be doing and gave us a refreshing hot water to sip on while we waited to see if the girls could find other foreigners to join the party. Keep in mind that it was really hot and humid and we had not eaten yet and it was around 7pm. After a bit we made our way into the courtyard and each took a seat in a different circle of girls. Both of our groups had about 2-3 girls who spoke almost perfect english with many girls who had just started the school a month or two ago. Both Cory and I really enjoyed the experience and it was a real eye opener to learn more about the young people in China. Most of the girls, it sounds like, will not go to college but will go on to work as secretaries and may never actually get to visit places outside of China and possibly not outside this province.

All in all we had a great time and Cory even gave up eating until about 10pm. Anyone who knows him knows that Cory doesn’t tolerated hunger well. We did find some comfort in an apple crumb cake at a resturant down the street from out hotel.

Today we made plans to leave Yangshuo and move on to Kunming, China. This apparently from all that we have heard is the most beautiful part of China. We will experience a new way of travel in taking a 9-10 hour sleeper bus overnight to Nanning and then getting onto another 9 hour bus ride to Kunming. Needless to say neither of us is super excited about October 1-2. We also planned some activities hear in Yangshuo. Tomorrow we will take a 7-8 hour bike tour around the countryside with Robert, our ENGLISH speaking tour guide. I will warn you all, however that we may not survive the heat on a bike but we will send Robert back with the camera and ask that he post the pictures for all you to see that we died in the cause of viewing spectacular scenery.

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Photos

Bridge to Heaven
This is in the Ghost City. Only 'good people' are allowed to walk across. The figure on the left is a good guy and the guy on the right is bad. The whole complex is related to Buddhist atonement. Our Chinese roomate on the boat who is 22 years old found it to be very frightening.

New Friends
Some of the girls that Sherry and I met at the 'English Party' at the English high school in Yangshuo.

Gate of the Forbidden City, Beijing
That's one of the few remaining large public photos of Chairman Mao

Gate of the Forbidden City, Beijing
That's one of the few remaining large public photos of Chairman Mao

Yangtze River Gorge
Passing thru one of the Three Gorges, I think. The tour was in Chinese.

Coal Storage Bins
Coal storage bins along the Yangtze, which the Chinese call Chang Jiang. The river, not the coal. Anyway, we saw trucks dumping in coal, and presumably then they slide it down the chutes into ships for transport along the river.

The Fairer of our Traveling Couple
From a Pagoda along the Yangtze. No elevator.

Yangtze Pagoda
Our roomate, English name was Amanda, took this really nice photo for us. During our Yangtze River cruise.

Stars and Sights Forever
It is really funny how much pop-culture works its way into the tourist industry in way-off places. At the forbidden city in Beijing, yes, a Chinese treasure, they offered recorded audio tours in English guided by Roger Moore! Reading about this beforehand in my bood, I had my heart set on it. Unfortunately, they didn't have any available. Ask Sherry sometime how mad she was when we walked the length of the city to the other gate to see if they were available there (they weren't). ; )

Touring with the Chinese
Just a glimpse of what its like to be part of a Chinese tour group. We always, ALWAYS, disembarked enmass, about 300 of us. Here we got to mingle in with a couple other tour boats. Just masses, masses of people... We had fun though ; )

Arches in Great Wall
If you're a regular reader, and have scored well on the reading comprehension portions of standardized tests, you'll remember that the part of the wall that we visted was not open to the public. It was quite overgrown in places and 'unrestored'. In short, it was really cool!

More Great Wall
Really overgrown with foliage, or as Marge Simpson pronounces it, 'foilage'

Great Wall from Afar
View of the wall from the portion that we were on. It is amazing to see in person, massive, absolutely massive in scale.

Terracotta Warriers
In Xian. Amazing.

On top of Xian Wall
For Rawley.

Comments

[Cheryl]

photos
Love the photos and am so glad to hear the locals have some interesting positive experiences. Keep up posted. Love you both.

[Aunt Sharon]

Terrocatta Warriers
Beautiful Pictures, we are so enjoying the trip around the world through your eyes. Cory truly should write a book or something. What is the Terrocatta Warriers in Xian story? Be Safe! Should we send TP? :)