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Feb. 5th, 2007 08:26 amWe're home after a long weekend of traveling. We went back to Suzhou, which some of you may remember was the first trip we took when we moved here in August. This time we accompanied the students on their trip. Right now in China it is Spring Festival vacation. School is out and everyone is traveling. As a result, we weren't able to get train tickets so we traveled by bus. It took about twice as long. I suppose the plus side is that we can be picked up and dropped off right at the dorms. Aside from that, I much prefer train travel to bus travel.
While in Suzhou we went to the North Temple. This is the first Buddhist temple that I've been to. It was amazing. The boys were very good when I explained to them how important it was to be respectful while we were there. They were especially interested in the burning candles and incense sticks. We also climbed our first pagoda. Well, we only climbed to the 4th floor. It's a scary prospect to imagine one of my kids tumbling over the edge of the low guard rail.
After a short rest at the hotel, we decided to go find the Daoist "Temple of Mystery". We hired some pedicab drivers to take us because the kids always enjoy the ride. They took us about a block and then dropped us off at a garden instead, insisting that the temple was already closed for the day. We should have known they'd scam us, they always do. I guess it goes to show that we are getting used to China because we weren't even upset by the scandal. It's almost like we couldn't expect anything else. We didn't go into the garden though, because it was pricey and we'd already seen a beautiful garden that morning at the North Temple. Instead we just wandered around and ended up at a park. I think perhaps a dog club was meeting there because it was full of dogs and most of them were the same breed (Pomeranian). We even saw one there that looked exaclty like Josie! When Chris asked the owner what kind of dog he was, the guy said "a regular dog" :)
The next day we went to Tongli, also a place we visited before. This is a canal town. I enjoyed our visit this time much better. For one, the weather was gorgeous. We're having a warm bought and it's wonderful. We didn't have to wear our coats! We went for a boat ride and wandered around another garden. This one had a goldfish pond where the kids got to feed the fish. Also, it wasn't crowded which was really nice. The best part has to be that since it was a Sunday, all the people who live in Tongli were going about their daily life. Sunday is usually peoples' only day off of work. Women were washing their clothes and dishes in the canal. I took a lot of pics, but since I'm only using the manual camera these days I can't post them. I'm hoping to get a CD of the pics when i get them developed.
As for the boys, they did really well traveling the first and third days. However, on the second day they were miserable. I don't know what the difference was. It's nice to be home. Zou took Josie and we're all looking forward to seeing her again. They'll be here in about a half hour.
While in Suzhou we went to the North Temple. This is the first Buddhist temple that I've been to. It was amazing. The boys were very good when I explained to them how important it was to be respectful while we were there. They were especially interested in the burning candles and incense sticks. We also climbed our first pagoda. Well, we only climbed to the 4th floor. It's a scary prospect to imagine one of my kids tumbling over the edge of the low guard rail.
After a short rest at the hotel, we decided to go find the Daoist "Temple of Mystery". We hired some pedicab drivers to take us because the kids always enjoy the ride. They took us about a block and then dropped us off at a garden instead, insisting that the temple was already closed for the day. We should have known they'd scam us, they always do. I guess it goes to show that we are getting used to China because we weren't even upset by the scandal. It's almost like we couldn't expect anything else. We didn't go into the garden though, because it was pricey and we'd already seen a beautiful garden that morning at the North Temple. Instead we just wandered around and ended up at a park. I think perhaps a dog club was meeting there because it was full of dogs and most of them were the same breed (Pomeranian). We even saw one there that looked exaclty like Josie! When Chris asked the owner what kind of dog he was, the guy said "a regular dog" :)
The next day we went to Tongli, also a place we visited before. This is a canal town. I enjoyed our visit this time much better. For one, the weather was gorgeous. We're having a warm bought and it's wonderful. We didn't have to wear our coats! We went for a boat ride and wandered around another garden. This one had a goldfish pond where the kids got to feed the fish. Also, it wasn't crowded which was really nice. The best part has to be that since it was a Sunday, all the people who live in Tongli were going about their daily life. Sunday is usually peoples' only day off of work. Women were washing their clothes and dishes in the canal. I took a lot of pics, but since I'm only using the manual camera these days I can't post them. I'm hoping to get a CD of the pics when i get them developed.
As for the boys, they did really well traveling the first and third days. However, on the second day they were miserable. I don't know what the difference was. It's nice to be home. Zou took Josie and we're all looking forward to seeing her again. They'll be here in about a half hour.