Tigers,Pandas,and Wolves Oh my!!!

All that we did that morning was drive to the Victory and  we picked up the other familly.{ There was a eight year girl named Annie that saved me from bordum} We had to drive for about an hour to get to the safari Park.  

When we got there we waited a long, long, long,{long} time while Helen bought our tickets.  Then, we walked by the pelicans which I ran to see.  We waited in line for the "Safari on Wheels" where we were able to see a bunch of animals.  We saw deer, yaks, rams, camels, tigers, elephants, gazels, wolves, white tigers, golden tigers, regular tigers, giraffes, emus, zebras, and Mommy!

After we finished the "Safari on Wheels" we walked around for a while.  We saw pandas, red pandas (firefoxes), and elephants.  I fed tigers with a bucket of meat and elephants with some bananas.  I would throw the bananas to the elephants who would eat them whole! 

One of the most interesting things about the park is that half of the world's population of white tigers lives in the Guangzhou Safari Park, about 150.  They have a very successful tiger breeding program and we got to see a bunch of tiger cubs of various ages.

Inside the safari park is an amusement park.  My friend, Annie, and I took Johnathan on a merry-go-round.  It was his first time.  He loved it!  Afterwards, Annie and I took a ride in the park that pulls you up and drops you down.  When I got off, I swore I would not do a ride like that again, until I'm a man.

We left the amusement park and headed towards the exit to the safari park.  As we were leaving we passed a river full of fish.  There were also monkies fishing in the river, but I missed them because I was amazed at all of the fish.  We hopped in the van and headed back to our hotel after an exciting day! 

Buddha Mountain

Today we had breakfast at the hotel buffet and I had a big breakfast... again :)  I was famous at breakfast... all of the waitresses wanted to have their picture taken with me.  They took about a thousand pictures each!

Ms. Tang picked us up at 9:30 and we went to buy a stroller.  Then we went to the bottom of Cloud Dragon Mountain.  We climed up to the temple.  At first I thought that she had just gone to pray that none of us would fall off the top of the mountain.  But, then I figured out that the temple was on the mountain and we were actually climbing it when we were climbing the temple steps.  I saw alot of Buddha statues.  They were big and there were like 30 of them.

When we got to the big Buddha at the top (which was the last part of the temple) the priest gave me and Johnathan the apples that had been given to the Buddha.  He was bald.

When we left the Buddha temple Mommy bought a souvenier to keep our car safe.  Then we went further up the mountain and I climbed up the rocks all the way up.  When we got to the top Ms. Tang told us that we were the first foreign guests she has had who made it all the way to the top.  There were alot of steps!

After the mountain we went out to lunch at a local Xuzhou restaraunt.  I had chicken soup, tacos with fried noodles (they were not really tacos but they looked like it), and celery.  Then we went to take a walk around the lake.  We passed 3 bridges on the walk.  I thought I saw a snake once and I thought I saw an alligator once but I didn't.

After that we went to a market.  We walked around and saw the food.  Ms. Tang (very nicely!) bought me some fried noodles, sugarcane, and giant pancakes (that look like tortillas).

Then we went back to the hotel and got stuff from the tea service.  It was a good day!

Trains, Kids, and CANDY

Mommy woke me up at about 6:00 to take a shower, get dressed, and get ready to go downstairs to breakfast before we got on the train.  So we went downstairs for breakfast.  I got Honey Nut Cheerios, Cocoa Pops, dragon fruit, bacon (I get bacon everyday!), orange juice, watermelon, and a dark cherry danish.  That was it.  Big breakfast, huh?
We went back up to the room for approximately 10 minutes and then Lily came up and rang the doorbell because we had to catch the train to Xuzhou.  In Xuzhou is the orphanage where my brother and sister are from.  When we got to the station it got all new and shiny.  It is the largest train station in Asia.  It is still  under construction and has been under construction for 4 years already.  We had to wait for 5 minutes for the train which was 5 minutes early.  Then we got on the train and I immediately started playing on the ipod.  It was a high speed magnetic train that went over 100 miles per hour.  It was comfy and it only took 2 hours to get to Xuzhou from Nanjing.  We had 1 stop on the way there.  I just played on the ipod the whole time until they announced Xuzhou station.

When we got off the train we had to go down an esclatator, put our tickets through a thing, and go out front.  We waited for Ms. Tang and the driver to pick us up.  We drove down to Johnathan's finding spot and then we went to lunch.  Lunch was delicious!  We ate whatever they gave us.  It was a really fancy restaurant with alot of Chinese food.  There were 2 floors and we ate in a private room.  That is Chinese-style.

We left the restaurant and we went to the orphanage.  All the kids were asleep when we got there so we took a walk and saw the new orphanage that they are building. When we went back the kids were awake so we were able to see them.  First we saw Johnathan's old room.  Then we went to the 1-2 year old room.  Then we went to the babies' room on the next floor up.  It was a pretty nice orphanage and the kids are treated pretty well.  Chu Chen Hui was pretty cute but he bit my arm :(  The other kids were pretty nice too.  All of them wanted me to pick them up.  Especially a boy who will be called Max... he was light as a feather.  The kids liked it when I played with them.  I felt happy to be able to play with those kids.  In the 1-2 year old room almost all of the little kids were in walkers that were tied to the wall.  They were watching tv.  All of the babies were in their cribs.  There was one baby who looked like my brother Ben.

They made me some bread (they did not have to do it!) that was really yummy.  There were different kinds.  One had ham.  Another had black seeds.  Another had sugar.  I had the sugar one.  The bread is a special Xuzhou kind of bread.

There was also a reception room with alot of candy.  I liked that.

Adoption Day

The day started off with me getting Johnathan breakfast.  Unfortunately, he spilled his milk.  Then our guide, Lilly, picked us up at 8:30 to go to the Civil Affairs Office.  We did all of the paperwork to finish the adoption.  I watched Johnathan while Mommy and Daddy finished the process.  Johnathan ran away once and pinned me to the wall.  Then we got back in the car and headed up to the observatory on Purple Mountain.

The drive up took a while as the road was crowded with people.  When we got to the top we purchased tickets and walked in.  We saw one of the old telescopes and a bunch of pictures about the buildings.  One of the pictures had Albert Einstein.  We also got to see some of the ancient astronomy instruments.  Towards the end of our visit we went up on a big building and saw the whole city beneath us.  One of the interesting things was the cable car ride going to the top of the mountain.  Lilly, told us that the cable card ride took 50 minutes.

After driving down from the observatory, we had lunch at a restaurant that served duck.  Mommy was very happy with the food, but I was not.  We had duck "tacos" with celery dipped in plum sauce.  Following lunch we went back to the hotel and took naps.

We ended the day with a walk outside.  We tried to take a boat ride but were not able to work it out.  However, we enjoyed the walk through the canal area.

Getting Johnathan

So of course in the morning we woke up and got breakfast.  Then we went upstairs again for like 8 minutes to get ready to go to the stores.  We went to a pharmacy and a bank.  We had to go to the pharmacy because I hurt my ankle.  We went to the Aqua City and saw a water show.  There was lights in the thing that projected the water and it made the water look colored.  It was cool.  When we got back we had like another 8 minutes before we had to go on the 20 minute drive to go to the place where we got Johnathan.
When we got there Johnathan was already there.  He looked so cute with his little tiny walker.  Mommy did not know they were there so she had to whip the camera out at top speed to take some video.  Then we took out his monkey backpack and he and I started playing with it.  At first I didn't think that he liked me and then he gave me one of his toy cars and we crashed cars for a little while.  Then I started to play on the ipod for a little while and I showed Johnathan a video that he really liked.

When we left the building we went to the store and we found out that Johnathan wanted everything in every store we went to.  So we got him a little snack and we got me some Pocky Sticks.  We called the driver to come and get us and we left.

When we got back to the hotel we played out the wazoo together and now I think he really likes me.  He calls me GeGe (which sounds like Guh-Guh) and I call him Jia Yu (which sounds like jeye-ewe-eh).

A Long Day

Yesterday we went to the Forbidden City. We had to ride on the subway to Tiananmen East.  Daddy took (alot) of pictures. Then we went inside the city.  We were not able to go all the way inside the city because we were running out of time.  However, we walked along the outside moat.  Somebody asked to take a picture with me.  Then we walked back outside and took even more pictures on our way to Tiananmen West subway station. 

We got back on the subway and headed back to our hotel.  The subway was fast and bumpy.  I really liked the adds that were made on the subway's walls with lasers or special lights.  The subway was really crowded and we could not find a place to sit.  When we got back to the hotel, packed up, called the bellman (who never came), and went to get our taxi.  We needed two taxis to fit all of our luggage.

It took about 40 minutes to get to Terminal 3 at the airport.  Once we checked in we tried watching the Notre Dame v. USC game at the airport.  We were able to watch the start of the 1st quarter, but then it went out and we had to leave for our flight.  There was congestion at the airport and we had to sit waiting for our turn to takeoff.  I fell asleep to touchdown and felt much better!  We met our tourguide who took us to our new hotel.

Today we get Johnathan.  I hope he likes me.

The Great Wall and Summer Palace

We went on a tour of the Great Wall and the Summer Palace. We had to wake up at 5:00. We had a nice breakfast, until our tout guide, Helen, came to our hotel.  We got in the van and then headed to pick up eight other people.  Once we finally had everyone, we headed to the Summer Palace.  I slept a little on the way.

We saw the Marble Boat and several "guard" animals.  We took a lot of pictures and my camera battery went out twice.  When we left we headed to a jade factory to learn about jade and have lunch.  When we were going in and leaving there was this hairy thing in a bowl of water.  I thought that it was alive, but it was really a toy called a "Beaver Ball".

We left and headed to the Great Wall.  It took about 20 minutes.  We had to stand in a really long to get to the cable cars.  After we got into the place we saw how fast the cable cars go.  Mommy and I were a little bit scared.  We made it and had a great time climbing on the Great Wall.  We got to climb in one of the guard towers.  It was really steep in some places.  We ended climbing at about 3:30 and headed back to meet Helen.  We went back down the cable cars and rode down facing backwards.  Going up forwards ended up being scarier than riding down facing backwards.  I wanted to buy a souvenir and asked Helen to help.  She ended up buying me a medal made out of jade and gold with my name and the date on it.

We got back in the van and started driving to a Tea House.  I slept most of the ride there.  On the way there we passed the Birds Nest Stadium and Aqua Cube.  I didn't drink much tea because I was not feeling well.  Once we were done at the tea house we got back in the van and started dropping everyone off.  When we got back we headed up to the lounge and got chocolate and fruit.  Then we went downstairs for dinner.  Mommy had a steak sandwich (no bread) and I had a burger.  After all of that we went upstairs and passed out in our beds!