Today was a more low-key day and I (and my legs) am thankful for it! We started off by heading to Olympic Park. We had driven by the Bird's Nest, as the Stadium is called, several times already, and were looking forward to seeing it close-up. Olympic park is HUGE and was completely built in about four years to host the 2008 Summer Olympics. At the height of construction nearly 17,000 workers worked on the stadium. The 100,000 tons of steel used to construct the stadium was all manufactured in China. 7800 square meters of grass for the field was laid in 24 hours. The Bird's Nest cost $423 million (US) to construct and was designed by two Swiss architects based on studying Chinese ceramics. The stadium currently seats 80,000 people (321 less than Camp Randall). ... read more

Today Roger took us to the Forbidden City in Beijing, which served as the Chinese imperial palace from the Ming Dynasty to the end of the Qing Dynasty. For almost 500 years, it served as the home of emperors and their households, as well as the ceremonial and political center of Chinese government. Built in only 14 years (1406-1420), the complex consists of 980 buildings and covers 7,800,000 sq ft, making it the world's largest palace complex. There are over 9000 rooms throughout the complex, so if the emperor lived in 1 room each day it would take him almost 25 years to live in each room! Luckily for me, we had a tour guide who spoke English and took Liang, Roger and I on a 2 1/2 hour tour of the City. We first toured ... read more

We have arrived in China! After an 8-hour layover in Detroit (during which I learned how to say "Do you speak English?" in Mandarin), followed by a 13-hour flight, we are now in Beijing! Our flight took us up over Canada, Hudson Bay, the Northwest Passage, the Artic Ocean, Russia, Mongolia and finally into China. A friend-of-a-friend of Liang's family picked us up at the airport. He spoke no English, but was happy that I thanked him by saying "xie xie" after dropping us off at the hotel. I think him and Liang were also laughing at the few Chinese words that I knew, since I could understand that much (and no more) while we were driving. Oh well, you have to start somewhere! Even at night, I could sense that traffic was going to be ... read more