Travel and tears

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Well bloggers we have surfaced in Shanghai,arrived in good shape and none the worse for wear this afternoon.The cone of technical silence has been lifted in a big way and the computer I write to you on now is in room 703 of the Pacific Hotel.Jazz saxaphone is floating on the breeze and we have piled our dirty clothes in a bag for much needed laundry.But I am ahead of myself again.It seems like a long time ago now that I last wrote and so much has happened since then.Close your eyes and travel back with us to Nanjing on our last night there.We decidied to take our wonderful hosts out for supper as a small gesture of our apreciation for their warm and complete ospitality.We decided on Indian food and off we went.Well 2/3 of our generous hosts went along with us as Chris had a previous engagement with a young woman and a scooter.I am sure there is another story in that but not mine to tell.Anyway off we went to a place not far from Noah's appt.It was authentic enough with a room full of Indian students,or so it seemed,all eating with their hands.The food was good and we had a fine meal.After the restaurant we loaded into a cab. Cabs are metered and cheap and if you can put an address on a piece of paper in Chinese off you go.We had Noah and Kyle to navigate us to the night market.Normally a bustling place and stil quite lively but as the hour was late probably a shadow of its potential hub bub.We wandered around the small streets,as always a source of curiousity,and equally a sure thingthe cries of 'Hello' coming from the shops to entice us into see their wares.Ann bought some unidentified street food of the nut variety I think.Not a huge hit but interesting.We saw various vendors setting up the food stalls for the late night snackers.Assorted meats and vegetables on the menu,s.Back to Noah's and the seven flights for bed.
The next day was get away day and we had a 2 pm train to catch.We roused Noah about 10 (see past blog about living with night owls).The three of us wandered out to Starbucks for some coffee then to a restaurant for breakfast.After breakfast we packed and Noah accompanied us to the huge train station of Nanjing. Sitting in the waiting room talking and knowing we weer saying good bye was difficult and by the time we were at the platform and hugging Noah foh the last time in a while tears were flowing.He is a great guy and we can not say enough about the way we were treated and how well he is doing on his own in the big world.
Our travels this day was to Hongzou another city of several milion.Another smiling Speak sign met us at the train ststion with a small woman named Slingqi (slinky) attached to it.We loaded into a cab and went to our hotel.It was a comfrtable place and slinky left us with instructions for the next day.After a wash we went across the street to have a bite to eat and ran up against the language barrier again.There was hot pot available and despite our pointing to it we ended up with noodles.Ah well it could have been worse and we could have ended up with some frog delicacy.After our meal we walked along a row of street meat vendors and watched the cooks prepare things for what we later found out were likely students as the University was close by.Off to bed with a belly full of noodles. Night!

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