Our First Adventure

Wow. It's all I can say for our first real experience here in China. There are so many small things to mention about the culture and people, but I will mention those things as time goes on. I want to talk about our awesome weekend.

Because we don't move into our apartment until tomorrow (Monday) morning, we had all Saturday and Sunday to entertain ourselves. After looking at maps and trying to figure out this crazy city, we decided to venture out and try public transport. After a lot of hand motions and charades, we got the front desk to write our destination in Chinese characters for the taxi driver. Public transport (taxi, subway, bus) is super cheap here and we will gladly use it after seeing how people drive here. I wouldn't last for two seconds! Seriously, driving is a total free-for-all here. I'm not kidding when I say pedestrians better stay out of the way, because vehicles don't slow down for anyone. I am amazed that the population of China isn't decreased by the thousands every year by car/bicycle/pedestrian accidents. But, it seems they have it down to a fine art. We get in a cab and have to wince every 10 seconds as we come within inches of another vehicle or bicycle. Anyway, you have to see it to believe it!

So, our first stop was the Capital Museum in Beijing. It was a huge, beautiful building with more than we could look at in a day. Fortunately, there were English titles and descriptions on everything. There was a temporary Brittish exhibit with treasures from around the world. Now, we all know the Greek statues tend to be scantily clad, so as we walked into the room and Barrett saw a bare bum, he yelled at the top of lungs, "Ha ha, I see his bum, I want to see if he has a wee-wee!" Seriously, it was the first time since we have been in this country that we were grateful no one could understand us.

After the museum, the fun really started. We took the subway (yep, we're mastering public transport) a couple of miles to Tian'anmen Square. It is just outside of the Forbidden City (which we didn't have time to see yesterday) and there were tons of people there. Ok, so up to this point, we were getting used to being stared, smiled and waved at wherever we went. But, this is the point where we became famous (hee, hee, my five seconds of fame). People would stop dead in their tracks to stare, they would follow us, and would stop us to get pictures taken with them. I seriously laughed out loud when I would turn around to see someone taking a sneaky picture of us or see someone jump behind us really fast as someone else would take their picture of them behind us. The best part was when we would stop to rest or sit down. People would inevitably come over for a picture. A big crowd of people would then circle around and watch , smile, and try to talk to us in which we obviously didn't understand. Of course, Kaleb and Barrett were the main attraction. People want to touch their hair, take pictures of them, and watch them. At one point, a big crowd gathered around and laughed and smiled at Barrett's every move while eating an ice cream cone...they loved it! Although we had been used to the stares up to this point, we wondered why the extra attention at this place. We figured that since it is a big tourist attraction, there were many Asian people from other smaller places coming to visit. They acted like they had never seen a fair headed child before, and Travis thought that maybe many of them never have seen one in real life. We had a blast and can't wait to see the many other cool things to see here.

Ok, this entry is turning into a novel. I just can't describe everything we have experienced in the short time we have been here! Really quick, I just wanted to mention that we went to church for the first time today. Church is held on the fourth floor of a huge building (weird, huh?). The people are totally amazing and are so excited we are here. We were kind of overwhelmed because there were so many people there today (there was a large tour group on their way to Taiwan for the 50th annivesary of the first missionaries in Taiwan). We have already had two dinner invites and one of the girls is taking us shopping this week...yeah!

Ok, well, lots of reading, but it's our way to keep everyone updated and our way to record our adventures. We probably won't be able to write for a few days because we are moving into our apartment tomorrow and won't have internet for a while. Until then...

Inside the Capital Museum...oops, we got in trouble for using flash photography
View of main entrance of Capital Museum...upper floor looking down (obviously)
Kaleb and Barrett at the entrance to the Forbidden City
Travis took this picture of one of the many times people asked to get their picture taken with Kaleb and Barrett.