Tales from the bright side

SHARKFEST SWIM 2012

2012-01-18T16:39:00.000-08:00

January 18, 2012

SHARKFEST SWIM FINISH 2012

HONORARY SWIM DIRECTOR

THE AUDIENCE

JEAN PASCAL CAN SWIM TOO

The inaugural Manzanillo Bay Sharkfest Swim took place today from Majahua around Majahua Point to the beach at Hacienda Eden on Manzanillo Bay. 13 swimmers representing an international contingent including Belgium, Australia, Mexico and from throughout the United States swogged (swam slowly) their way through the 84 degree water. Nine women dominated the field under clear skies in perfect sea conditions with an escort flotilla of sea kayaks, stand up paddle boarders and the command ponga under the command of Captain Samba. This event kicked off the start of theInternational Sharkfest Swim Series, which includes swims in the following locations: Alcatraz, Golden Gate Bridge, Lake Tahoe, San Diego, Boston, Austin, Charleston and Cape Fear. The group came ashore in a little over 50 minutes at picturesque Hacienda Eden, where post event festivities were hosted by restaurant Jardin del Eden, whose chef/owner Jean Pascal Bochet also participated in the swim. The 2^nd annual Manzanillo Bay Sharkfest Swim is tentatively scheduled for Big Wednesday, January 16, 2013.

Dia de Muertos

2011-11-11T10:12:00.001-08:00

There is a tradition in Mexico on the November 1st and the 2nd the altars are put up to honor the family members and friends who passed away. The Nov. 1st is for the babies and children and the Nov. 2nd for the adults. Every year we honor this tradition here in Hacienda Eden with an altar.

31st of October OPENING NIGHT

2011-11-11T09:57:00.001-08:00

Haloween night was our opening night for the Hacienda Eden, the restaurant Jardin del Eden and our boutique Fruity Keiko. People came and enjoyed the food and drinks, while listening to the music of Jimi Mammou. We had a great time...

SEPTEMBER - New season approaching

2011-11-11T08:56:00.001-08:00

In September we were in a " full swing" of preparation for the new season,

Jim came from Norway to check on the hotel and oversee our bigger projects.

WEDDING in June 2011

2011-07-16T08:37:00.000-07:00

Fruity Keiko in Zihuatanejo

2011-04-13T07:07:00.000-07:00

Our store in Zihuatanejo is becoming a very popular spot. Come to see the shop....I am sure you will find a gift for someone special or just to remember your stay in Mexico.

http://travel.nytimes.com/travel/guides/north-america/mexico/ixtapa-and-zihuatanejo/37137/fruity-keiko/shopping-detail.html

Food & Wine Festival 2011 in Zihuatanejo

2011-03-31T14:36:00.000-07:00

http://www.wbez.org/blog/2011-03-28/food-wine-festival-debuts-latin-america-video-84346#

Mexico, Ixtapa-Zihuatanejo, a popular Destination

2011-03-12T17:11:00.000-08:00

http://www.tripadvisor.com/TCFamily-g147237-cDefault-Caribbean.html

The Index of Effluency

2011-03-04T10:49:00.000-08:00

This is a book published by one of Jim and my old friends. Philip Hubner helped us to finance Eden back in the early days. His confidence and enthusiasm helped us so much!

http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/the-index-of-effluency/13032904?productTrackingContext=search_results/search_shelf/center/2

Good luck Flip!

Eva and Jim

Positive on Mexico

2011-03-03T13:55:00.000-08:00

http://www.nascocorridor.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=107:canada-china-trade-validates-asia-pacific-gateway-initiative&catid=1:latest-news

http://www.latinworld.com/2009/mexican-real-estate-investment-positive-trends.htm

Not everything is as it seems in MEXICO

2011-03-02T13:08:00.000-08:00

http://thecatalist.org/2010/08/violent-deaths-in-mexico-everything-is-not-as-it-seems/

Monarch Butterflies coming back to Mexico

2011-02-17T13:18:00.002-08:00

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/02/15/us-mexico-butterfly-idUSTRE71D7C520110215?feedType=RSS&feedName=scienceNews

Salsa Dancing at Eden to the sounds of Juanito!

2011-02-07T08:05:00.000-08:00

Our new Chef/Owner Jean Pascal hosted a great salsa party, Juanito Zihua and his band played all the favorites, the restaurant had a full house...great food...great music and dancing...GREAT PARTY !!! YEAY!

Our Top guests

2011-02-07T07:34:00.000-08:00

We are so lucky to have many many repeat guests every year. Here is a cute photo of Jane and Mark, and Tisa and Bill. Who have been visiting us since the early days. Hi guys!!

Manzanillo Bay Annual Sharkfest Swim December 2011

2011-02-07T07:08:00.000-08:00

Some of our long term guests Dave & Wendy anre the proud owners of Enviro Sports, which organizes marathons, triathlons and swims in the U.S.

So the tenative plan is that they bring their signature event "Sharkfest" to Manzanillo Bay.

As you can see the t-shirts are already printed!

We are hoping to schedule the event for December 20011.

We will keep you posted.

Sea turtle in action in front of Eden

2011-01-19T13:27:00.000-08:00

This morning after an amazing moon set (video later) our guests discovered this lovely mama turtle laying her eggs. Nature is in full force here at Eden!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdrytQxW_PE

Thank you Mariana!

2010-04-07T05:02:00.000-07:00

Mariana has been working on a new flyer for the Fruity Keiko shop here in Oslo. This is the final version and i think that is it so cute! On the bottom if this image is too small you can see photos of each of the FK's. Nice touch!

Evita!

2010-03-01T07:50:00.000-08:00

Not cute at all!

Frozen Fjord!

2010-03-01T07:35:00.000-08:00

Last week while Nick Brown was here in Oslo visiting us, we went on a shivvery walk down to the Fjord. Now i kind of thought that, ok the fjord freezes, but probably in places where the water is still, and no boats go by. Not so! The Fjord is frozen all over the place. Of course it was BELOW ZERO, and had been for a while. There is ice all over the place. You can see the sea guls sitting on the ice. And we couldn't break though it with big snow chunks no matter how hard we threw them. Apparently the city of Oslo has installed underwater pipes around the very edges closest to the buildings, filled with warm water, to keep the ice away from essential stuff.

It made for a beautiful afternoon, (of course the sun helped!) snow over everything, ice and blue sky. I guess that is why people come here on vacation. (or even to live.)

Introducing....HAM!

2010-02-23T05:39:00.000-08:00

We have a new member of our family! No, it's not Nick Brown! Nick was visiting us last week from England, and was the inspiration for this video, filmed by August. It's always more fun when more kids are involved!

We have actually had Ham for about 2 months. He is from Oslo, and was 36 days old when we got him. He is a good boy, and always eats his supper plus any other chewable items you leave in his cage! He tended to bite a bit when we first got him but he has now figured out what is food and what is hand. Although, one time he did actually bite a piece off of Jim's computer mouse. He recognized the interloper!

Ham is all white and loves dates and walnuts. August has to clean out his cage every 3 days. We thought about taking him out into the snow to see how he would like it but were a bit worried that he might dissapear! We love Ham!

To see on you tube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S02xPeUjpIU

Fruity Keiko Oslo is in full swing!

2009-12-19T06:36:00.000-08:00

Finally at long last i have a moment to write about our latest endevour. Fruity Keiko has it's latest incarnation at Riddervolds Plass in Oslo. We are in a great neighbour hood and we have nice and well established neighbours!
We opened our doors officially on the 19th of November and have been going strong ever since. I have been getting great feedback on all of the colorful things in the shop and how fun it is to have something "different" in this area of town.
Lots of times here in Oslo things get broken up into "areas". The ethnick area, the funky area etc... maybe that is the way of bigger cities in general. But anyway we have bucked the trend and people seem to like it. But then i have said many times if you can't get people to come into your shop at Christmas time you are doing something wrong. So i guess we are on the right foot here at the beginning at least.
We had a fun party on the opening! Lots of folks showed up to have Pink Punch and tost the night away. It was great and a good luck start for Ms Keiko.
It has been super cold lately, as in 10 degrees f. I desperatly need another heater in the shop. For the moment i am so swathed in sweathers that i can hardly move! But hey, I'm warm! I was having visions of putting in a fireplace in the cellar and just sticking to it like glue till sping. But i don't actually think that is an option!
I meet lots of nice people everyday who are willing to converse with me in some seriously funny Norwegian (mine!) Tusen Takk! The only thing that is missing is all of our wonderful friends from the Hotel in Troncones!

The Container has arrived in Oslo!!

2009-11-10T10:31:00.000-08:00

On Thursday our container arrived from Mexico: Yea!! We have been waiting for it for the last two months. It has been delayed several times along the way and we have had a huge, sometimes painful, always patience-taxing, learning experience.

But, in the end, good things do indeed come to those who wait!

The truck arrived in the afternoon with a light dusting of snow swirling down. As the now somewhat rusted seal came off the container and we gazed at its long awaited contents, we were actually a bit amazed at how many boxes there were! We knew there were 112 of them, but . . . !?

By the end of the afternoon, we had moved each one of those boxes many, many times. We unloaded the truck about 100 meters away from the shop on the other side of the street. It added another "leg" to the unloading, but it was by far the best place for the truck to stop space-wise. Once the truck was unloaded, we then "two-wheeled" the boxes over to the front of the shop.

Once there, we had to get them through the surprisingly narrow-seeming front door and up the 2 inside steps into the shop proper. From there, they had to be carried down a long-ish flight of stairs, across a small tri-level area, and through another doorway into the storage room. There were only 3 crates we couldn't physically fit into the shop. We took those apart outside on the sidewalk and carried the merchandise inside by hand. The crates were rather full of styrofoam peanuts though and with a stiff wind blowing, we had a fair amount of cleanup to do all down the street.

We hired two men to help with the unloading & moving. We called a telephone number on your basic streetlight posted moving service flyer and were very happy with the worker's performance. Jim referred to them as our "Eritreans", but we don't actually know where they were from. Only one of them spoke some Norwegian and we never stopped moving long enough to cover our personal histories! Our moving guys needed to break to pray at one point. They did their ritual ablutions at the sink in the back and prayed right in the front of the shop. Jim really wanted a picture of that for the blog, but, you know, we agreed that should remain their private business.

It was a fair amount of toting all told, but from start to finish we got everything into the shop and almost all of it into the downstairs store room in just 3 1/2 hours flat. The 3 hours of wages for the workers only set us back about $350.00 (!). Eva (my mom) & I worked on unpacking on Friday and Jim & I did more unpacking and cleaning up packing materials (35 large black plastic trash bags full of balled up &/or shredded newspaper alone?!) on Saturday. When we left the shop last night there were just 5 more boxes to open! We hope that we may be able to start on displays by Thursday.

There's rather a lot of final & touch up painting & cleaning that needs to be done now though, so we will see, never-the-less we will be working to make it happen.

Fruity Keiko Oslo here we come!!

We are open for the season!!

2009-11-05T14:12:00.000-08:00

Hello Everybody! Eden is open again for the season! All of the Eden team have worked their harts out to get it together in the most beautiful way. Special thanks to the ever wonderful and hardest working guy, Pedro!! Thank you Pedro!! Then to all the "Ladies" Suzy, Vicky and Maria, Thank you! An none of this would gel if it weren't for our fantastic Management team Eva Sedlak, Mariana & Alejandro! Yeah!!
We started off the season with Jennifer Etners wedding party. Mariana co-ordunated the wedding and apparently it was wonderful in everyway! (waiting for photos!) The shop has come together as well after a whirl-wind week of shop preperations from Sherry and Iris. Christian and his team have got the restaurant in top knotch shape (one week early no less!!). Chocolate sprinkle cake anyone!
Yesterday Mariana and the Ladies put together the day of the dead altar. It is deffinatelly the best alter that we have ever done. Thank you to the creative force of Mariana, and the nimble fingers of Suzy, Vick and Maria. It looks marvelous. A couple of sad additions to the alter are our much loved and missed Chef, Duane Mae, and former nanny and "Lady"herself, Berenice, both who passed away in May this year. Duane and Berry i hope you see the lights we have lit for you.

Sweet warmth!

2009-10-09T11:37:00.000-07:00

Today october 9th we lit the fire place (or is it a stove?). Now that i have done my research. We have a Jotun stove here in Oslo. It is from the first stove company to make stoves in Norway, starting back in the 1830's. It's super efficient, apparently. We heated the living room and kitchen for two hours with only 13 Kroner. Not bad. We can also make tea on top of it, dry our clothes by it and use it for getting rid of documents. I love it, multi functional! Apparently it is also easy in Oslo to get free wood from green grocers that get lots of extra crates and the like that they need to get rid of. What more do you want?!

Super Belated Birthday!!

2009-09-30T06:21:00.000-07:00

Here was Jim, Evita, Eva and Elodies birthday. With a larger than life cream cake with a marzipan topping and fruit filling. Wow! It was awsome!! Of course the flaming candels pretty much took it...the cake that is!

Evita starts Ballet

2009-09-05T02:53:00.000-07:00

Who can resist 4 year old ballerinas? They are sooooo cute! This is Evita's new dance class. They have a lovely teacher and lots of enthusiasm. We go once a week and it is definitely the best deal in town. Yeah!

Shopping in Tlaquepaque....

2009-09-01T02:42:00.000-07:00

OK, so we have been back for a while now!! Sorry for the tardy blogging. I have started school here in Oslo and it kind of got me out of my game for a bit....so let me get back on track....
We had a great shopping trip in Tlaquepaque. (and we Shopped with a Mexican Queen too, other wise known as Diana Patino our general manager, doesn't she look great!!) We were also lucky enough to have with us my Mom who flew down from Tennessee and Mariana Sales the manager of Eden while we are here in Norway. Who could ask for a better group!?

Our motto for the trip was "out with the old, in with the new" we jettisoned some of our old maybe a little bit tired lines and were excited to find some new and exciting things. A beautiful line of leather bracelets, a new funky line of coin purses made out of hot pink and gold vinyl. (yes very cool) and some lovely new wrought iron, and painted tin (see last photo). Also some of our mainstays have added new and fun designs. Yay! I felt like the market was better than ever. More people better organized and generally well put together.

On the last day, My mom and i went back to Mexico city were we shopped at the local markets and Mariana and Diana went on to Tonala and found even more beautiful additions.

The orders started coming in last week, so if you are in Zihua come on in and see what we have that is fresh and Fruity Keiko!

Til Leie!

2009-08-11T13:00:00.000-07:00

So, it seems like this is it! We're very excited!! After a couple of months of looking for shop spaces, we are going to rent the very first place we saw! Typical.

Renting (or "almost renting" as I have not yet actually signed the contract!) has been a funny experience. First of all, everybody, and I mean everybody, was on vacation for the entire months of June & July. I received neither return emails nor phone calls from any of the places that I was interested in: zero. Then, lo & behold, on the first Monday in August there was a flood of responses. Don't get me wrong, I am a huge fan of vacations & vacationing, but jeeze we're talking a looong time for whole real estate offices to just disappear from the radar. Anyway . . .

Jim & I saw this place way back in June. It is on the number 19 tram line that we ride a lot. The tram goes from the corner of our street to the other side of town. Along the way it passes all manner of interesting places we like to visit. We noticed the shop because, as the tram enters Riddervolds platz, there is a gradual bend in the tracks that momentarily puts tram passengers on a collision course with our shop to be! One moment you're sitting, tooling along on the tram, and the next, up pops the shop! And that's when it's empty: just imagine when it is full of georgous gifts from Mexico! But for me the "Til Leie" sign was just as interesting. For Rent!

We went back a few days later and talked to the next door neighbours at a nice shop. They stock many lovely things for the urban dweller: all super expensive and cute. It is a popular store. (yea!) The shop employee was very positive and said that we could talk to the owners once they got back from vacation. Luckily it was the first place we saw because in between that day and the day that the owners got back, I managed to see every (other) available space in Oslo under 50 sq meters. Whew!

After 3 weeks of no word, Jim and I had grudgingly concluded that the owners of the shop space were just trying to get rid of us but didn't know tell us "please go away now!". So, as we thought of the shop on Riddervolds Plass as "gone", I found another place that was much cheaper (although not nearly as well situated). We were considering this new spot when . . . the e-mail came!

Our Shabby contacts been on vacation, but now they were back & all looked good. They said they would propose me to the owner of the building as the new tenant. That was the 29th of July and I have been waiting for the contract since then! Jim is wondering how to say "poco a poco" in Norwegian!!

But things seem to be progressing nicely now. We love the space. it is tiny but beautiful! One day I might even be able to post pictures of the inside!!

First Central Jam-e Mosque

2009-08-10T03:03:00.000-07:00

Sure a mosque in Oslo seems somewhat incongruent, but there it is! There are about 5 mosques of note in the city this is the second largest one. It was finished in 1995. The color in the photo isn't that great, it is incredibly bright blue. The tile is from Iran and spain and it is really something. Apparently the inside can hold 1500 members. Supposedly they have the call from the mineret on Fridays. But we have not heard it so far. The mosque is about a 10 minute walk from our house, on a small unassuming side street.

Fretex

2009-08-10T02:14:00.000-07:00

Fretex is the name for the Salvation Army in Norwegian and it is big here! Fretex is the place where Ikea becomes even more affordable and those old dishes from Grama's house (my grandma anyway) are a dime a dozen. OK not exactly a dime, actaully maybe about 10 bucks, but better than regular price!

Everyone in Norway shops at Fretex at one time or another. And you can see why, a fleece jacket at the local sporting goods store will set you back 150$, where one at Fretex will be maybe 20$.

Every neighborhood has it's local Fretex branch. This one is the mothership. It is outside of town a bit. We had to take a bus, but this is where all the stuff comes for distribution and sorting. It is huge, three stories, lots of furniture and big stuff. (in fact i think that i saw my Grandmothers entire living room set) We had fun, the kids got rubber boots and Evita even got rubber pants (apparently de rigur at the kidergarden!!)

Zihua Fruity Keiko is open again!!

2009-08-01T11:05:00.000-07:00

Come one come all, the Fruity Keiko Store in Zihuatanejo is open! All of our wonderful staff from last year are still here! Diana, Rossy, and Sandra are there to give you a smile and make your day. We have lots of new stuff, many new lines of jewlery, new ceramic and glass, a whole new line form Cinta and more!

Coming to you from.....

2009-07-30T10:38:00.000-07:00

http://maps.google.com/maps?t=h&hl=en&ie=UTF8&ll=59.908878,10.768174&spn=0.000264,0.000823&z=19

Norway is a funny place!

2009-07-30T09:22:00.000-07:00

Viegland Park

2009-07-15T05:06:00.000-07:00

The Viegland Sculpture park is one of Oslo's biggest attractions. We had a perfect day to go there, in fact we were chasing the shade around. The park has 212 sculptures by Gustave Vigeland, made between the 19 teens and the 1930's. I have heard that he was a fachist etc... but i get a general good feeling from the statues. The human condition that binds us is the major theme.

Here is a blurb from Wiki about the Monotith. (last photo) It is awsome!!

At the highest point in the park lies the park's most popular attraction, The Monolith (Monolitten). Construction of the massive monument began in 1924 when Gustav Vigeland himself modeled it out of clay in his studio in Frogner.

The design process took him ten months, and it is speculated that Vigeland had the help of a few sketches drafted in 1919. The model was then cast in plaster. In the autumn of 1927 a block of granite weighing several hundred tons was delivered to the park from a stone quarry in Halden.

It was erected a year later and a wooden shed was built around it to keep out the elements. Vigeland’s plaster design was set up next to it to give reference to its sculptors. Transferring of the figures began in 1929 and took 3 stone carvers 14 years to accomplish.

On the Christmas of 1944 the public was allowed to admire The Monolith and 180,000 people crowded the wooden shed to get a close look at the creation. The shed was demolished shortly thereafter. The Monolith towers 14.12 meters (46.32 ft) high and is comprised of 121 human figures rising towards the sky. This is meant to represent man’s desire to become closer with the spiritual and divine. It portrays a feeling of togetherness as the human figures embrace one another as they are carried toward salvation.

Loved.

Nettles!!

2009-07-12T04:50:00.000-07:00

Well i know alot more about stinging nettles now! First of all they hurt like the dickens! And funnily enough they are very common in urban areas. Hidden dangers of city life! Go figure. We were on our way up to the sports center to see about Tae Kwon Do classes for August and we took a little short cut through the grass. MISTAKE! In this photo Evita is recouperated but she was stung all over her leggs. August and me too. He was a trouper. We take the path now.

More airline deals!!

2009-07-09T01:54:00.000-07:00

http://travel.latimes.com/daily-deal-blog/index.php/two-day-sale-on-mexi-4641/

Now is the time to book, if you’re seriously contemplating a Mexico beach vacation sometime this summer or fall. Alaska Airlines and Horizon Air have announced a two-day sale, which began this morning, on the eight destinations that they serve in Mexico: Cancun, Ixtapa/Zihuatanejo, La Paz, Loreto, Los Cabos, Manzanillo, Mazatlan and Puerto Vallarta.
Deal: Book a flight online to one of these spots, and you’ll get 25% off.
Tested: Starting via the sale page, I found round-trip flights from Los Angeles (LAX) to Puerto Vallarta (PVR) in late June, traveling both ways on Tuesdays, for $264, including taxes and fees. This represents a $53 discount on the base airfare.
I checked the same flights on CheapTickets.com and the total there amounted to $317 — or, $53 more than the sale fare I could snap up booking directly with the airline.
When: This is valid for travel through Oct. 31. You have until midnight Tuesday, June 16, to purchase.
Caveat: Among the fine print: “One discount is allowed per reservation for up to seven people traveling together in the same reservation.”
Baggage note: You have until July 6 to get one bag checked free of charge. After that date, $15 will be charged for your first checked bag, $25 for your second.
Contact: Alaska Airlines / Horizon Air
- Susan Derby, Special to The Times

Some airline deals!!??

2009-07-07T23:23:00.000-07:00

http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/travel/2009-07-07-airline-cheap-fares_N.htm

http://www.reuters.com/article/rbssIndustryMaterialsUtilitiesNews/idUSN0734299620090707

Ekebergrestauranten

2009-07-06T00:19:00.000-07:00

A couple of days ago we took a small forest path at the edge of our neighbour hood up the side of the mountain. After only about 15 minutes of upish walking we were at the top. There we found the Ekeberg Restaruant, a deco building that has been recently restored. It was lovely! In fact we were so inspired that we splurged for a beer, while enjoying the view of the city. (and the opera house).

Here is a link showing the restaurant, (yeah, i forgot to take photos of it, how lame!) We didn't get to see the inside as only the patio is open in the daytime.

http://www.dehistoriske.com/restaurant/ekebergrestauranten/

If you can't open new doors....

2009-07-05T03:59:00.000-07:00

You can at least paint the ones you have! The building that we have recently moved into in Oslo is in the process of renovation. It is all finished except for the attic and the stair case up to the apartments. Which will be done in one year. (or so we have heard!) Anywho we didn't want to spend the next year looking at a partially sanded and defaced door, so Jim got busy!!
The result you see below! We have the prettiest door on our stairs! (not that it is a competition!) Now we just have to get that door bell working!

Hysterical in Oslo

2009-07-03T08:31:00.000-07:00

Last week i went to a art show, here is a link to a review of it in Norwegian

http://www.kunstkritikk.no/article/73887

And here is the gallery that it was held at

http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/group.php?gid=39148807688

It was a very interesting show that entailed three actress/dancers doing thier interpretation of hysteria in women at the turn of the last century. Their influences were the works of

Jean-Martin Charcot (November 29, 1825-August 16, 1893) French Neurologist. Here is a small blurb from Indiana University.

21st century psychologists are primarily interested in Charcot's research into the causes of Hysteria. Although this disorder expressed itself differently in each patient, most suffered a combination of physical and psychological symptoms, which could include delirium, paralysis, rigidity and contraction of muscles, blindness, inability to speak, loss of feeling, vomiting, hemorrhaging, seizures, joint deformity and distended abdomens. Many contemporary physicians accused the hysterical patients of malingering and fraud, but Charcot was convinced that the patients believed that their symptoms were real, and that the physical symptoms were indicative of a genuine psychological problem (Fancher, 1985, p. 53).

For full info follpw http://www.indiana.edu/~intell/charcot.shtml

It was a wild show and i think that everyone was uncomfortable most of the time. The above photo is my cousin (in flowery dress) looking at the woman on the floor who had just collapsed (as part of the show) that is me behind her looking at one of the other actors. See more photos at the first link above.

luckily it only lasted an hour. In a good way....

Moving Day!

2009-06-27T07:11:00.000-07:00

I am posting this after the fact, but i want to keep everything in order and SOOOO many things happen all the time. In this busy URBAN environment that we live in!

Here we are on moving day. No one that we know in Oslo has a car (or no one that we know well enough to bother) so that made moving pretty interesting. But a couple of very nice taxi guys later it was all done and we were schlepping it all upstairs.

We are on the Norwegian 3rd floor. The ground level is considered first floor and so on. So really it is only two twisty flights of steps up to our place.

Alladin was waiting for us. Thank goodness he was there to explain to us the in's and out's of the incomrehencible european washing machine. Millions of lights and options. No words. Now we have got it down however and our clothes come out practically dry from the spin cycle.

Almost no one in Norway has dryers. That IS a bit odd. But really once you get the hang of it, i like the idea that we arn't using energy for it and that my bathroom has 3 square feet more space. (it's a tiny bathroom!)

It didn't take us long to get everything unpacked. Toys everywhere and as you can see that all important first load of washing done. Yay!
We like our neighbourhood. We have a green grocer right in our building and another bigger grocery store across the corner. That is convenient! The tram that goes right through the center of town has a stop on our corner too. Yeah, i like.

The Opera house

2009-06-26T13:30:00.000-07:00

We had to go and see the latest addition to the Oslo skyline, or water line as it were. The New Opera house, finished a couple of years ago and considered to be a huge feather in the cap of the Norwegian National pride. I am lucky to have such a generous cousin, and got an invite to her work's summer party which was held on the roof. The second photo is from the party (finally going home at midnight, as you see the sun was just casting its final rays on the city)
Anywho it was stupendus at night. Really, The final photo i ripped off of Wikipedia so that you could see the whole thing together. Here is a blurb about it, also from Wikipedia...

The Opera House was finished in 2007 with the opening event held on 12 April 2008. King Harald V of Norway opened the Opera House that evening at a gala performance attended by national leaders and royalty, including President Tarja Halonen of Finland, Chancellor Angela Merkel of Germany and Queen Margrethe II of Denmark. The main stage is 16 meters wide, and can be made up to 40 meters deep.
The structure provides a total area of 38,500 m² and includes 1,100 rooms, one of which has 1,350 seats and another has up to 400 seats. Total expenditures for the building project were planned at 4.4 billion NOK, but finished ahead of schedule, and 300 million NOK under budget.
The Opera won the culture award at the World Architecture Festival in Barcelona in October 2008. Jury member Sir Peter Cook said of the Opera House that it "...in its scale, ambition and quality has raised the bar for Norwegian architecture.

But when the sun shines!!

2009-06-24T04:12:00.000-07:00

The weather has broken and things are looking fabulous! The reason Norway is so full of beautiful forests and lush gardens is those 244 wet days a year. That is a bunch! Last weekend we we lucky enough to be invited to a lovely farm, ownerd by a friend of my cousin.
The farm is all bio-organic. All fertilizer is "made" by the animals, and no chemicals are used on any of the vegetables grown there (huge hot houses full) and the animals are all fat and happy. We ejoyed lovely tomatoes and fresh eggs from the farm and they were to die for!
Evita and August ran around all day, being chased by swans and chasing each other. And the day never ended, since the sun sets at 11:30 at night everybody stayed up late and had a great time!
The last photo is a Norse sea god. Surrounded by a garden with plants from all of the different climates of the country. It was an amazing place.

Our new apartment on an unpronounceable street in Oslo!

2009-06-18T05:29:00.001-07:00

.....................................

This will be our address here in Oslo:

Eva Robbins & Jim Garrity

Grønlandsleiret 46

0190 Oslo

Norway

Here is a link to more photos of the apartment that were on the local real estate website. finn.no.We used that to connect directly to the Landlord. It is a great system and more economical for everyone. Yay!

http://www.finn.no/finn/viewimage?finnkode=17648549&reference=9/176/485/49_-1488845454.jpg

How cold IS Norway

2009-06-14T13:28:00.000-07:00

Hei Hei as they say over here! We have been in Norway for one week and have already worn all the clothes that we brought with us. The surprising thing is that we wear all of them every day! Ok, well maybe it isn't that chilly here, but this weather will most certainly take some getting used to (I'm just saying it is JUNE!!)

This photo is of us arriving in town from the airport on our first day here (150 US$! taxi ride). It was pouring rain and chilly and August was thrilled: his only pre-arrival wish was for cold and rainy weather. He will be ecstatic when it sleets!

The second photo is from the little house here at my cousin's place. It is available to all of the owners here in the building. Barbro booked it for us for 2 weeks. It has lovely heating cables in the floor!

Since our arrival we have seen three apartments and are waiting to hear from the renter who's apartment we liked the best. But, as the were literally dozens of other folks looking at it, and as we don't have a Norwegian credit rating (!?) we are not as sanguine as we might otherwise be. We have also been to the botanical gardens, the Natural History museum & Ramme Gaard. All fun and elightening activities!

We have had lots of yummy cheese and bread, and our share of marzipan and chocolate too. Now I'm making myself hungry ....

A visit from Wendy and Dave

2009-06-04T05:50:00.000-07:00

Wendy and Dave guests from Eden ended up in East Tennessee at the same time that we were there visiting my parents. Serendipity is a wonderful thing! They stopped by for the weekend and we had a lovely visit! My brother was there too with his kids, so it was really one BIG happy family.

Dwayne Eric May 1961 - 2009

2009-06-03T19:36:00.000-07:00

This is the saddest post that I have ever made. On Friday, May 29th, Dwayne passed away in Troncones. He did not suffer. Dwayne leaves behind a huge following of friends and fans. Christian hosted a memorial last night at Cafe Sol and it was attended by many of Dwayne's friends, locals and expatriates alike. There was not a dry eye in the house.

Dwayne was the heart, in the true sense of the word, at La Cocina del Sol. He made sure that all of his team was happy and taken care of, he also cared for his many clients and friends that came to enjoy his cooking and TLC. He rarely missed work and would come in on his days off to make sure that everything was as it should be. Dwayne's BBQ day was the most popular in all of Mexico, he always said that it was his favorite day of the week.

Dwayne, was a sweet man and a good person. He never failed to give August and Evita treats, and made sure that Estrella was so fat during the season that it took her all summer every summer to trim down. He never complained and was never judgemental or prejudiced in any way: a lovely friend and an integral part of the Eden family

The following is written by Christian:

Dwayne Eric May was born October 28th 1961 in Berkeley, CA. He attended Cardinal Newman High School in Santa Rosa, Ca. He went on to Santa Rosa Junior College and then received a scholarship for football to Texas Christian University. Dwayne was a two year letterman in football, playing a wide receiver, at TCU and graduated with a degree in Criminal Justice in 1985.

After College Dwayne began working in Forth Worth, TX, area restaurants. He was an apprentice to Phillipe Lecoq at the Restaurant Le Chardonnay, where he received his first formal training in 1989.

Later Dwayne moved to Hartford, CT where he was a restaurant Chef. The next stop was Los Angeles, CA where he worked for notable Chefs: Michel Richard, Mary Sue Milliken, Susan Feniger and Kazuto Matsusaka. Starting 1999 he was the Chef of NFL football player Keyshawn Johnson's highly regarded restaurant Reign.

In 2002 he moved to Troncones, Mexico and became the Chef of his longtime best friend, Christian Schirmer's restaurant La Cocina del Sol. It was here, that Dwayne became an icon and well known locals and visitors alike. His Sunday BBQ-s were known world wide. His time here was spent doing what he loved and enjoying the community. Dwayne was never married and had no children. He is survived by his parents, John Edward and Rose May of Santa Rosa, CA, as well as his brother Darrin May of Sacramento, CA and his sister Melanie.

Jim has chosen this poem:

The corn is sown again, it grows;
The stars burn out, the darkness goes;
The rhythms change, they do not close.

They change, and we, who pass like foam,
Like dust blown through the streets of Rome,
Change ever, too; we have no home,

But gathering as we stray, a sense
Of Life, so lovely and intense,
It lingers when we wander hence,

That those who follow feel behind
Their backs, when all before is blind,
Our joy, a rampart to the mind.

from The Passing Strange by John Masefield

An interesting talk on Suburbia...for no reason!

2009-05-22T20:12:00.000-07:00

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/lang/eng/james_howard_kunstler_dissects_suburbia.html

Good-Bye Eden, Hello Norway!

2009-05-16T16:13:00.000-07:00

Ok, so that is a little premature, we will be stopping along the way in Florida for fun and frolicking with Jim's parents and then on to Tennessee to visit mine. Yay!

Parting was sad indeed. We left our work of 12 years, something that we have pored our heart and soul into. And then our wonderful guests that we will miss terribly. Sniff!! Every month their visits have made this place special for us, and in no way like a "job". We are so lucky that our guests have shared so many perfect vacations with us. There will be no replacement in Norway that is for sure.

There is no doubt that we will be pining away for beautiful sunsets, and wonderful stories. Rufies tacos, Minie's Pozole, and the sweet smiling faces of all our friends and staff.

Hasta la proxima!

Ladies who Lunch Rock!!

2009-05-12T15:03:00.000-07:00

Soooo, the last ladies lunch for me for a while, and it was ever sooo sweet. Isn't that just the way! We enjoyed fabulous food, made by the hands of Jill and Ann and basked in the ambience of Casa Colorida. Truely Lovely! Thanks Ann!! Everybody was there, The two Eva's, Lois, Jill, Eloisa, Janelle, our newest convert Tiffany, and Kimberly.

A great time was has by all!

Teotetlan de Valle

2009-05-07T10:04:00.000-07:00

We finished up our trip in Oaxaca were we went to the rug village of Teotetlan de Valle. It is a small village were it seems everyone is in the rug business. We drove by house after house with thier wares in the window untill we picked one at random to visit. We met the Gutierez brothers and they showed us thier HUGE showroom! They have been making rugs for many generations and have established a family co-operative so that each of the brothers has thier own style and workshop but shares in the profits of all the sales. They use all natural dyes and the wool is from another co-operative of sheep farmers in the region. It seems to me that there is very little negative impact from the industry, no polution and all of the workers are in nice open airy conditions. The weather in Oaxaca is great. Cool at night and warm in the day. We bought lots of rugs for the new shop in Norway! If you want rugs like these you can go to La Zapoteca rug store in Zihuatanejo.

Africam

2009-05-07T09:54:00.000-07:00

We had the most fun at the drive through Zoo outside of Puebla. We were such sceptics, we thought that it would be sad and a bit underfunded, but NOOO. It was fastistic! You drive your car through all of the open seaming enclosures, all of the tameish animals come right up to your car and you can get a great view of them, and visa versa!! Yikes, we did have a pretty close up encounter with a rino, THAT was exciting! And we got to see Benghal Tigers sooooo close it was great. Such beautiful animals.

More Taxcoans

2009-05-07T09:40:00.000-07:00

Those Crazy Taxcoans

2009-05-07T09:36:00.000-07:00

Well we have been back from our trip for quite a while now, but with the FLU and packing, closing the hotel and everything else things have been a little hectic! So i am just going to post photos as best as i can. Cuz i also want to start posintg about our move etc... but first things first!!
Taxco is one of the most beautiful citys in Mexico. I go there often to buy silver for the shop, but i have never been there for Semana Santa, and boy i have been missing quie a spectical!!
For three days they close off car trafic to the center of the city. This is a pain as Taxco is built on a steep incline and it is nice to have the random taxi to schlep you back up the hill at the end of the day. So we just decided to stay on top! Our hotel was my favorite the Posada San Javier, def the best hotel in Taxco. Out side of our room there were parades daily and oh what parades. Not the happy go lucky things, but lines and lines of men carrying huge bundles of thorny branches (supposedly weighting 45 kilos!) and these guys didn't look like they were in shape or anything! They walk an entire circut of the town it takes about 4 hours with these things tied to thier backs. Then after them there are bunches of ladies in black outfits with bare feet and chains tied around thier ankles. And lots of others carrying life size crosses and a bunch with cats-o-nine-tales that were beating themselves on the back till boody. A good education was had by all.

Mexico travel industry bowed but not beaten

2009-05-03T07:45:00.000-07:00

By CHRISTINE DELSOL SPECIAL TO SFGATE.COM

Could there have been a less auspicious beginning for Mexico's Tianguis Turistico, Latin America's biggest travel trade show? Well, perhaps. There could have been a tornado.
With headlines of drug violence battering Mexico's travel industry, this year's Tianguis, which ended April 29th, was seen as a crucial opportunity to combat the overheated press coverage and move Mexico's vast and varied tourist offerings to the forefront. Then, as thousands of travel industry representatives and hundreds of journalists were winging their way to Acapulco for the annual gathering, the news broke that Mexico City was locking down to try to contain the swine flu .

President Felipe Calderón, scheduled to give the inaugural speech Sunday, bowed out in favor of remaining in Mexico City to manage the health crisis. There was some talk of canceling Tianguis, but the show went on. Then on Monday, a 5.6 earthquake struck, centered in Chilpancingo, 50 miles north of Acapulco, but also felt in Mexico City, where tall buildings shuddered and sent workers rushing out into the streets. At Tianguis, people ran out of exhibition halls and conference rooms, and subsequent press sessions were shuffled around, with some of the larger events moving to open-air spaces.

If there is a silver lining for Mexico, it's that swine flu has pushed drug violence off the front pages. Journalists, expecting that to be topic No. 1, found themselves preoccupied instead with surgical masks and rerouting around Mexico City. Even the earthquake, which made Mexico look like a target of the seven plagues, receded into the background by lunchtime. The risk of getting kidnapped or shot by drug runners seems puny compared with a virus that you can't see, with behavior you can't predict.

In Acapulco, about 250 miles from Mexico City, life goes on pretty much as usual. The bulk of the surgical masks appear on workers who deal with great volumes of people — bus drivers, hotel workers, a few vendors. No swine flu cases have been reported in Acapulco, or anywhere in Guerrero state.

The Tianguis presentations so far have strived for a balance between acknowledging the health crisis and focusing on the positive. Undoubtedly inspired by tourists' hesitance in the face of the sensational headlines about drug-related killings — which affect only five out of Mexico's 2,400 counties — the tourist industry has been busy conjuring new ways to attract visitors this past year.

Secretary of Tourism Rodolfo Elizondo, who stepped in for Calderón at the inaugural press conference, emphasized that Mexico has not and likely will not establish a quarantine.
"There is no restriction to visit our country from any latitude of the world," he said. "It must be emphasized: Mexico stands, and Mexico will live hereafter."

The Mexico Tourism Board echoed the sentiment while encouraging travelers to follow recommendations from the World Health Organization, the Centers for Disease Control and Mexican health authorities. Tourism representatives here are resolutely looking ahead to the time when life returns to normal and offering a sneak peek at what returning tourists can expect:

Some highlights from Tianguis' first two days:
New airline routes: Low-cost Mexican airline Volaris announced new daily flights from Oakland and Los Angeles to Toluca and Guadalajara, connecting with 21 other airports throughout Mexico. The airline has formed a partnership with Southwest Airlines, which provides a link to the Mexican carrier on its Web site. The airlines plan to enter a code-sharing agreement by early next year.

Aeromexico, which flies out of numerous U.S. cities, including San Francisco and Los Angeles, is adding new routes and will serve more than 40 destinations throughout Mexico by the end of the year.

Mazatlán: The venerable Pacific resort city unveiled a logo emphasizing its historic center's unique juxtaposition with its seaside resort area. Continuing renovation of the Centro Historico recently brought underground wiring and European-style lighting. Two new golf courses, at Marina Mazatlán and the expanded Pueblo Bonito resort, will bring the total to four. The all-inclusive Riu Emerald Bay is scheduled to open next month on Playa Las Brujas beach north of the city, and a new access road to the airport is under construction.

Los Cabos: The Cancún of the west is also busily building more golf courses, soon to total nine. San Jose del Cabo is an emerging art center, with more than 20 galleries along Calle Obregon in the historic district, which hosts a weekly Art Walk. Cabo San Lucas, meanwhile, is widening its main avenue and moving utility wires underground. The expanding airport has remodeled one terminal, and an additional one is slated to open next year. The recently designated "Cabo Riviera," on the undeveloped East Cape between Los Cabos and the capital of La Paz, will eventually become a large resort area, with a marina and golf course scheduled for completion next year. Spanish developers are funding a paved road running from the airport all the way to the East Cape. The federal, state and municipal governments have negotiated an agreement that has finally resolved problems with local transportation and taxi companies and is serving as a model for other Mexican states.

New tourism route: Ixtapa-Zihuatanejo has teamed up with Patzcuaro, Celaya and San Miguel de Allende to promote "Del Sol a Corazón, a route running from the Guerrero coast to the Guanajuato highlands. Celaya, the least known of the four, is a sweet colonial town best known as the birthplace of architect Francisco Eduardo Tresguerras and for its cajetas (caramels), which come in a variety of flavors. A new museum is expected to open there this year.

From EVA

Of course the latest news is that the deaths from the flu have been re-assesed from 159 to 16. Whoah!

Popo this!

2009-04-23T10:07:00.000-07:00

We have just come back from a BIIIIGGG trip all around Mexico! It was so wonderful, we went to all of the colonial citys plus a drive in Zoo! Yes, it was awsome. One thing that we noticed is that there was no "problems" anywhere. All was calm and peaceful. Everyone was buzzing along doing thier thing. From our point of view there seemed like less American tourists around. Probably because of all the coverage in the states on the violence in Mexico. But we met many, many, Canadians, and Europeans having a great time!

It is a shame that the media in the US loves the gore, and i suppose it does sell. Luckily for us most of the violence is near the US border a three day drive from here! Yay!

So this photo is the volcano that the Mexicans call Popo although it has a much longer and imposible to say name, Popocatépetl which means smoking mountain (!). It was cool. Just sitting there smoking away like nothing was going on underneath. But in 2001 it sprayed ash 25 km and all of the surrounding villages were evacuated. The last major erruption was in 1947 before that. So people seems to think that one is due...yikes!!

Vearing back to politics

2009-02-24T06:03:00.000-08:00

http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/02/24/bipartisanship/index.html

Aeromexico Launches Denver-Mexico City Flights

2009-02-03T10:21:00.001-08:00

Check it out!!

http://www.topix.net/world/mexico/2009/02/aeromexico-launches-denver-mexico-city-flights

Yea!!

2009-01-23T08:57:00.001-08:00

http://www.ireport.com/search.jspa?peopleEnabled=false&q=trocones

Fruity Keiko in Zihua one year Anniversary Party!

2008-10-09T10:31:00.000-07:00

We welcomed another year of fun and shopping in the FK Zihua store last Friday. Coconuts did great food and a lovely pink Champagne punch to die for. We had a huge turnout, partially because once the party got going so did the rain and no one could leave!! Muahahahahah!!
The raffle was a huge success and alomt everyone left with a little something! Including our esteemed owner of Another day in Paradise! Yea, Catherine!
So thank you Zihuatanejo for making it all possible!!

Lions are getting ready to....spit??

2008-10-09T10:00:00.000-07:00

Well our new entrance is really shaping up! The lions are installed. A process that required a backhoe to lift each one up. The base where the water goes...the "pila" in spanish. is done and the tile is going on. We figure we can add a hot water heater and use it for a jacuzzi!
We love it!

Sunday you tube pick

2008-09-28T09:27:00.000-07:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLBE5QAYXp8

The top!

2008-08-29T14:14:00.000-07:00

The header beam went up today, rain and all. It looks great! Of course there were a few inconsistancies in the product from the stone carver, but we will work out the kinks, and hopefully you will never notice. I won't say what, you can tell me when you are here!

Before and after

2008-08-28T09:40:00.000-07:00

Plants come and they go! Some faster than others. Here is our lovely albiet too fluffy and wet garden in front of the suites at the entrance. The next shot is the same area today. sniff. I found good homes for all of them. We will start the fountain as soon as the entrance is finished. Which you see below. We have to put on the header next with the moulding ect.. excellent!!

South of the border where the Lions play?

2008-08-26T14:58:00.000-07:00

Hola! We are back and doing our thing! Change is afoot at Eden, and as usual it involves wild animals! Or something like that! We have bought 4 pretty large stone lions and will be making a fountain out of them to greet our guests with a roar! (or a splash).
We also ordered from the same stone carvers some new columns and stone moulding to replace our wooden ones that were featured here last year under "moldy" and "gross". Our mason, Pedro (not my Pedro) and his helper put one up today. The column is in 4 parts and officially is heavy as hell. He will put the other one up tomorrow! Yee ha!

Our last full day in Beijing

2008-08-12T08:51:00.000-07:00

Today was our last full day in Beijing, and we made the most o it!! First off we did what many visitors to Beijing do, we went ice skating! August was keen to make igloos and throw snowballs before he saw the rink. But he soon re aligned his expectations and was struggling along the edge. Not for long! I was so impressed after maybe 4 laps around he was in the middle with me and skating along on his own. Evita too got a pair of skates and did her laps, but she decided ice cream was more interesting. Go figure.

After the skating we decided to go and visit the Birds nest and the Water cube. None of our events took place in these venues so we hadn't gotten a chance to see them yet. Well we used the new subway line and it got us close. We milled around there admiring the view of the buildings but from afar. Then magically we were picked out from the crowd to receive "Olympic Green Passes". We were escorted to the green and could walk up to the buildings and generally felt like royalty. What a great way to end our visit to Beijing and a cherry on top of our China Vacation.
Tomorrow we will begin our journey back to Mexico. We have a night flight from here and then one night in LA before our toes can bask in our warm tropical waters.

Jim highly reccomends that all of our readers begin planning an extended vacation immediately: It's the only way to travel.

Hasta la vista!

Let the games begin

2008-08-10T08:36:00.000-07:00

We went to our first event and it was super fun. The Venue was the Beijing Technology University Gym. It was beautiful and looked like it had been finished yesterday. We saw badminton, which is very popular here in Asia. We watches many many games, but the most exciting one was the doubles match between the Japanese and the Chinese women. China is in yellow. The teams were so evenly matched. I felt bad that one had to lose, but the Chinese did. I am sure that they were sorely disappointed.

after all the excitement was over, we did what any self respecting Mexican far from home does...Nachoes and burritos! yeah!!

Opening Ceremony of the 2008 Olympics

2008-08-09T05:53:00.000-07:00

I have clipped these photos from Google images...
For any of you who have not gotten a chance to see the opening ceremony of the Olympics, try to see the first 30 -40 minutes, before all of the athletes come out. It was amazing!! The money that China must have spent and the sheer number of people who participated was phenomenal. truly wonderous!

The Temple of Heaven

2008-08-08T08:12:00.000-07:00

This is one of the iconic views of Beijing for the Olympics, it is on every coffee cup and even made out of gold and available at the Olympics souvenir shop. It is a perfectly round temple that the emperor used to go and pray for good crops. It is part of a huge complex with multiple gardens and buildings, all beautifully restored and in perfect condition for the onslought of tourists.
Throughout the gardens and the long corridor there were groups of clubs. Dancing club music club etc. which was really cute seeing people use the area for other things rather than just viewing.

Tonight is the opening ceremony of the Olympics, the foreigners are coming fast and furious. It's great!

Wa Fo Temple and the Botanical Gardens

2008-08-05T07:55:00.000-07:00

Jim has been interested in going to the temple of the reclining Buddha for a while, but it is a bit out of town or so we thought from looking at the map. We decided to make a go of it and were pleasantly surprised at the less than 10 dollar taxi fare. When we arrived at the temple gates we were surprised again to find out that the temple was IN the botanical gardens. We headed directly to the Buddha and a well preserved temple with the best stocked gold fish pond in China. We bought some food for the guys and they were jumping out of the water by the thousands to get to the stuff. The turtles in the pond were herded together on a small raft to keep safe from the swarms. The temple also "sold" fish and turtles to release....back into the pond! Then the next day they go and pick more out of the same and sell them again. I don't really know what Buddha would think of that...

The rest of the garden was equally nice. There was a LARGE tropical conservatory (the biggest in Asia..) full of all of our common plants from the beach, just kidding. Actually there were many different ecosystems inside. The desert one was the most unusual i thought. That is a golden barrel cactus that Jim is next to. I have never seen that before,. Also check out those Lily pads, they look like plastic, but they are 100% real. i would like to bring a few of those home, but the suitcases are full to the brim. we will be buying another one shortly.

Templeside Home Hostle

2008-08-03T20:31:00.000-07:00

We decided that we wanted to spend a few days in a traditional Chinese Hu Tong. Hu TOngs are the old houses that popular with the multi generational Chinese Families. Many of the Hu Tong areas have bee torn down by the government putting up new high rise apartment buildings. And in a way you can see why. The tall apartments we have calculated can hold about 1,000 people in a big one, the single story homes, even if they are packed in, many less i am sure.

As is common in many places the old has become popular again even here in modern Beijing, so the remaining Hu Tong houses are being bought up and turned into ....boutique hotels! Luckily we found a plae that was only a guest house, and not pretentious at all. Bobby the owner of Templeside Home Hosle, was a delight and very helpfull. An excelent English speaker and of course knowlageable about all the ins and outs of the city. His Hu Tong had 10 rooms and a lovely rooftop terrace over looking the neighbourhood and the local temple. Evita and August were entertained by the captive cricket in the office. A good time was had by all.

The Wall

2008-08-03T20:19:00.000-07:00

Of course no trip to Beijing is complete with out a trip to the Great Wall. We opted to visit the Mutianyu section of the wall as that is supposed to be less touristy. Ha ha hahahhahahahahhahah less then every square inch of the path up filled with hawkers and tricksters. Just ask Jim about the pancakes...
We bypassed most of it by taking the ubiquitous cable car up and down. Not like we were trying to avoid the slog up or anything....
It was as beautiful as it looks in photos and we also got to share it with the french Olympic soccer team. Cool.

The sights

2008-08-02T20:01:00.000-07:00

Well so far in Beijing we have seen Acrobats riding bikes, the forbidden city, the wall around the city, the geological museum and many more, but noting beats the salad bar at Pizza Hut!
The local PH here in the XiCheng district only allows ONE TRIP to the salad bar. Well we though that was kind of strange until we saw the masterpieces that people were making!
Not a single person who went to the salad bar (and we were sitting right beside it) failed to take at least 15 minutes to meticulously pile his or her salad in to a leaning tower of Piza like extravaganza. Most of them had consultants at their side, advising on the clingability of this or that vegetable. Most used piled cucumber slices to make a ring wall above the edge of the bowl and then filled in the ring and continued piling from there.
Jim and August had a go, and although i can't say much for the taste it was a work of art.

Beihai Park and the highest point in Beijing

2008-08-01T04:25:00.000-07:00

One of our first excursions in Beijing was to Beihai Park. We discovered t ws one of the more popular parks in the city after we arrived and viewed the throngs. Never the less there was still a paddle boat left to let and we cast off into the large lake surrounding the 1,000 year old stupa in the middle of the island in the middle of the garden. Jim was a machine and paddled us all around the lake in 90 degree heat no less.
Then we crossed the street to the Jing Shan park which is home to the highest point in Beijing. Unfortunately you have to climb to get to it! The pagoda was beautiful. Obviously recently restored and with unbeatable views of the Forbidden city and the rest.

The last train to Beijing

2008-07-31T03:52:00.000-07:00

Our last train trip in China is a short hop from Datong to Beijing. Just 6 hours, but our kind travel agent still arranged for us to have a soft sleeper. What a guy! Thank you Young Fan for a great trip around China!

We like the soft sleeper. Plenty of room to spread out and of course sleeping. Some get to fit in more of that than others...
We arrive to Beijing in the early afternoon and find our hotel in a nice quiet residential neighbourhood. Soo we made a bee line for the hoards at Tienanmen Square and were not disappointed.
What a madhouse! Of course in a good Chinese way! After braving the inferno that was the square we found a quiet tree lined sidewalk on one edge of the square to sit and enjoy some ice cream with 50,000 other people.
Got to admit though for all of the foreigners that are supposed to be decending on the city we see barely a one.

Datong and the Yungang Caves

2008-07-28T03:34:00.000-07:00

Datong is full of interesting stuff most of them the largest, We visit the 9 dragon screen. The largest in China. There used to be a palace in Datong like the Forbidden city and it was destroyed a few hundred years ago. I bet they are kicking themselves for that one! Anyhow the screen remains and it is a doozie. Funny though it is just sitting there in the middle of the city. No real park or other monuments surround it.
Not too far away is the Shang Huayuan temple, built in 1062, the largest temple room in China. It did seem pretty big....
Finally we trekked out to the Yungang caves. It is a huge complex more than 2 k in length. It is full of caves with Buddhas inside, anywhere from 20 meters in height to 2 centimeters.
The caves were built by an emperor in the 5 century A.D. This particular man was the grandson of another emperor who had a beef with the local monks and had mercilessly killed many of them. The grandson fearing the bad karma and having become quite devote in the interim, looked for a protected area to dedicate to Buddha.

Good stuff on the way to Taiyuan

2008-07-27T03:15:00.000-07:00

We left Pingyau after the big party and made a couple of stops on the way to TaiYuan. The first was the "Hanging Monetary". It was pretty impressive as far as elevated 1300 year old monasteries go. Apparently it was elevated many times over history as the level of the river rose. Recently however a dam has been built to control the water level.
The building is very thin and narrow pressed against the side of the cliff. Tourists are aloud to go all over the building and in my opinion many of the poles were dangerously rickety!
Luckily we survived to view other dangerous tourist attractions, like this humongous stone cabbage in the lobby of our hotel in TaiYuan. Yeah, you can see how the children are effected by it.
In the morning we were off to our final destination before Beijing, the Wooden Pagoda and Datong.

The Wooden pagoda is the oldest wooden pagoda in China. It is 9 storeys tall and more than 1,000 years old. It is also blessed by a huge Buddha inside.

Happy Birthday Evita!

2008-07-26T02:58:00.000-07:00

We celebrated Evita's birthday in Pingyau at a lovely restaurant. We had a nice lunch followed by presents and the most AMAZING cake of all time. This photo does not do justice to the massive flame that erupted out of the middle of the lotus flower decoration. All of the petals of the flower began as a pretty pink flower bud, After lighting the...dare i say fuse, the middle of the flower napalmed the ceiling while daintily lighting all of the candles on the rest of the decoration. Sweet!
The cake tasted as good as it looked and, Evita raked in various trendy Pingyau prezzies for the three year old set.

Hop skip and a jump to Pingyao

2008-07-22T08:05:00.000-07:00

Relativly speaking that is! We took a regular day train 6 hours north west from X'ian to Pingyao. The small town was on a major trade route for north eastern China, and is the home of China's first bank. The town fell into obscurity at the end of the 19th Century, with the arrival of European banks and the shif to a more industrilized economy. Lucky for Pingyao!
Consequently none of the old buildings nor the ancient wall were ever torn down. The wall with the city inside is intact, all of the Ming dynasty buildings, little allyways and of course the requsite passle of temples.

We stayed at this beautiful hotel. All of the rooms were decorated in Ming dynasty style with a large (about 8x10 feet) elevated bed, and cool furniture that you could bring into the bed with you. All that plus A/C and hot water. The movie "Raise the Red Lantern" was filmed down the road! We loved waking aroudn the streets, there were plenty of bikes and these golf cart things that were popular to cart people around in. (Just like they had in the Ming dynasty i am sure!)

Terra Cotta Warriors

2008-07-22T07:41:00.000-07:00

Who says you can't take it with you? The first emperor to unite China made so many enemies during his life time that we wanted to make sure some one had his back in the afterlife, to the tune of more than 7,000 warriors, horses and weapons. All larger than life size, no two faces alike.

The first pit was found by two farmers in 1974, and over 1,000 warriors have been fully restored. The rest lie under a clay layer that formed over their 2,200 years of rest, waiting to be carved out. The tomb of the same Emperor also is nearby, supposedly huge and full of goodies. The Chinese have never opened the it. Go figure.

We also went to a workshop where they make replicas of the statues, using the same techinques that they used oh those eons ago.

Off the train into X'ian

2008-07-21T18:23:00.000-07:00

We got off the train in X'ian, it goes on to Beijing, but we had places to see! We were back in China, home of the pagoda and yeah, truth be told a bit of haze. Our first stop was the Big Goose Pagoda, which apparently has a set of footprints and a piece of bone of Sakayamuni himself. The pagoda is of an older more Indian style before they became Chinese influenced with all of the swoops and dragons etc.

X'ian was the capital of China for hundreds of years. They walled the entire city to protect them from outsiders. The X'ian wall is intact still. The whole dang thing. It goes 14K around the center of the city. You can walk and ride bikes on top of the entire thing.

The higest train in the world

2008-07-21T18:08:00.000-07:00

At more than 16,000 feet the train from Lhasa is in serious need of oxygen. Luckily they have it. Each cabin has four little outlets that keep you breating. Still one time when i lifted Evita down from the bunkI thought that i was going to faint. Cool!

We saw lots of Yaks, lots of snow and nomads in the middle of nowhere. The Tibetan plateau is huge and took us more than 24 hours to cross, it is full to the brim with water, like a giant sponge.You can easly see why it is the sourse of the Yangzi river (and no doubt others). We survived in our nice comfy beds with plenty of instant noodles.

After passing out of Tibet, our trip continued through the Loas Plateau, which is, made up of a yellow earth cut into terraces. The same earth is used to make the local bricks so all of the houses are yellow too. It is very dry on the mountains with crops on the rivers edge below..

Our last day in Tibet

2008-07-21T17:44:00.000-07:00

Our last day in Tibet was a busy one, We bought a rug from Doma "come home to Doma!" Which hopefully is already on it's way to Tennessee. (You should be seeing it soon Mom!) We also enjoyed some lovely Indian Food with Nema, and a walk through a busy Tibetan bazaar.

Then we went to Saraje Collage, which is a monastery, it has the largest chanting room in Tibet, 180 pillars, it can hold three thousand monks! The collage is also home to the horse of Buddha. Supposedly a good thing to protect children. The place was sooooo packed! The line to get to the altar went around several different rooms.

The smoke from the Yak butter was intense. Nema kindly took us to the head of the line line (i felt kind of bad about that but it was hugely claustrophobic) where a monk blessed the children with two soot smudges on their noses.

Jokhang Temple

2008-07-21T17:12:00.000-07:00

In the center of Lhasa lies the Jokhang temple the most holy of the Tibetan sites.
All Tibetans, if they are to be considered devout, are supposed to make a Pilgrimage to the Jokhang Temple once in their lifetimes. They have to circle the temple clockwise as many times as they can before entering. They also can circle the block to make their pilgrimage extra effective, and we even saw pilgrims circling the city(!). Prostrating is also a part of the process.
That is what the folks in this photo are doing. They are prostrating in front of the temple before they go in. As you can see they have special mats and stuff to make it less hard on the bones, but of course there are many who don't. Nema says that it is good to prostrate every day. No specific number but in his family they do it the number of thier age. There are also many pilgrims that prostrate the whole circuit around the temple and Nema told us of some who will prostrate their whole pilgrimage route from their village in the country and take years to get to Lhasa.
The next photo is a large prayer wheel. They might have these in India or Nepal but not China that is for sure. The Prayer Wheel is full of religious scriptures, and each turn of the wheel is like "reading" the scriptures inside. It is important to read scriptures to counter act any bad things that you have done in your life. We saw people all the time walking around with prayer wheels spinning them all the time. I don't see how anyone can be as bad as all that.

The summer palace

2008-07-20T18:52:00.000-07:00

The Summer Palace was started by the 7th Dalai Lama who was a major mover and shaker back in the day. Apparently he was under the weather at one point and consulted an oracle who told him to look for a spring on the outside of town and bathe in it to cure his illness. He followed the instructions and was subsequently cured. The spot was developed into a retreat and later became the official summer residence of the government. It is a huge place surrounded by lovely gardens. As with everything we have seen in Tibet, it is in wonderful condition.

All of the heads of state have added to the complex, including the current Lama. When he left Tibet in 1954 he left from the Summer Palace.
The torch of the Olympic games also was conducted through Lhasa beginning on this road in front of the Palace.
Below you see the Dalai Lamas personal quarters with the a balcony for viewing performances. Nema told me that there used to be a large spring celebration here with all of the nomads from around the area and of course Lhasans camping in the gardens around the SP. Sounds like fun!

PP Continued

2008-07-20T18:42:00.000-07:00

The paintings on the inside of the entrance are the best preserved that we have seen, They represent the guards. The Palace is full of artifacts. Every Llama is buired there, in massive gold tombs. Each one bought by donations. The Tibetans use Yak butter to offer to spirits a light to find thier way to the next incarnation. Consequently there are large tray/chalise things all over the place with multipul wiks in them. The pilgrims, bring the butter from thier farms, or buy it in town and scoop it into the large candels. I could definatelly smell the animally scent of the butter. But Jim didn't notice it.

We are not alowd to take photos of the inside, so you will have to take my work for it, it is an amazing place. There are multipul chanting rooms where hundreds of Monks can do thier stuff, and huge chambers of scrolls and documnets that are more than 1000 years old.

Behind us in this photo is the current Llamas chambers (which we saw from the inside. Small and unassuming) and the balcony from which he can watch presentations on the terrace where we are standing.

The Potola Palace

2008-07-20T17:41:00.000-07:00

I am going to post these photos now and add more later. Leave it to be said, 999 rooms and one cave are pretty impressive!

It was a perfect day to climb stairs above 12,000 feet. We actually got up to 13,000 feet when we reached the top of the palace.

The Potola Palace is the center of Lhasa. It is the former wiinter residance of the Dali Llama, that has now become little more than a museum since the Tibet has been part of China.

The Palace was started by the 33 King of Tibet about 1600 years ago. Although he was the 33 King he was the first King of consequence and really put the kingdom of Tibet on the map. He started the palace around a cave that was found on the mountain that the king used as a meditation room. He also build some basic rooms around this cave. Many of the later Kings and Llamas added to the palace untill it became the size it is today.

We had to go through a security check to get in. Then we got cracking on those stairs. Nema was kind to us stopping every 25 or so for us to catch our breath. On one of our stopps we met three Nomads. Nema spoke to them and they inpromed him that they had 60 Yaks. They had met foreigners once before. The guy on the end by Jim had a long braid with a large bead in in and a big red tassle attached to the end. When i asked to take the photo he wrapped the tassle around his head. The guy next to me lamented the fact that they didn't have thier traditional gear on for the portorate. I was happy to meet them whatever.

When we got up to the entrance to the palace it is covered with a huge cloth with "endless knots" on it. The fabric is made from Yak wool and protects the paintings that are just inside.

Beautiful Tibet!

2008-07-19T19:15:00.000-07:00

We were met at the airport in Lhasa by our smiling guide Nema. We could not have asked for more informative and interesting introduction to Tibet. He is a devout Buddhist, and kindly presented us with prayer scarfs when we arrived. Nema started off his carer in tourism as a Sherpa carrying packs up Everest. He had climbed it many times! He loved his job and only became a guide when he and his wife started a family. Tibet is so clear and fresh such a stark contrast to the other places that we have visited. It is considered an "autonomous prefecture" by the Chinese government.
Tibetan culture is unique and singular from the Chinese culture. The language (Tibetan) is written with a 30 letter alphabet and is derived from Sanskrit. Tibetans are Buddhists, but a very different kind of Buddhism from China that mixes it liberally with Confucianism. Obviously the Dali Llama is very important to Tibetans and consequently reincarnation in general is BIG BIG BIG! Basically if you are reincarnated, you never really go to heaven until you reach Nirvana. Just re-incarnation over and over! (with hopefully some chance of enlightenment). I am telling you if any one is going to Nirvana it is the Tibetans, they were praying and visiting temples, doing prayer wheels and chanting ALL THE TIME. They are seriously spiritual!
The landscape is an inspiration to spiritually as well. Just to start off, Lhasa is at 12,000 feet. the sky is blue blue and the mountains are all around. Nema told us that on average there are 7 hours of sunlight a day. There are no trees on the mountains as they are all above the tree line, but that makes the peaks all the more impressive, as they are just huge rock masses looming overhead.

We arrived at our hotel with a few stopes along the way to see Yaks. We could all feel the altitude, and were happy for an afternoon free looking at the view from our room. Bottom photo. The Potala Palace.

Panda Breading Center in Chengdu

2008-07-18T18:07:00.000-07:00

The first thing that we did in Chengdu was to go to the Panda breading center. It was a beautiful facility. We learned lots about Pandas (as would be expected!). There are about 1200 Pandas in the world. About 300 in captivity. There is a Panda Reserve about 5 hours from Chengdu at a much higher elevation. I am wondering if that is were most of the 900 other ones are. (forgot to ask). I can't imagine that there are many wild ones as it doesn't seem like they would last too long these days. Pandas have a tuff time reproducing in captivity as we have all heard.But it seems like the big barrier is that they are only in "heat" for one week a year. Which cuts the odds down pretty drastically for getting pregnant. So most of the work at the breading facility is artificial insemination. Which apparently works pretty well. If you are willing to pay for it...and the Chinese are.
It was a little disappointing when we were there as there were no new born baby pandas to see and it was sooooooo hot that all of the Pandas were inside in the air conditioning. Where as the outside Panda habitat was huge and full of plants and climbing things the inside area was a cage with a cement floor. Not too nice, but it was very air conditioned and the Pandas were frolicking around and eating lots of Arrow bamboo, the only kind that they eat. A fun Panda fact is that they can only digest 2% of the bamboo that they eat, so they have to pretty much eat all day long, and consequently what they poop out is almost the same as what they put in.
Cool. The top photo is of the "Red Panda" It is not as endangered as the Giant Panda, and apparently likes warm weather. August took the shots and wished that he could live closer to the Pandas.

Chong Qing to Chengdu

2008-07-17T18:41:00.000-07:00

We took a short train trip to our next destination Chengdu. Home of the Panda! The train was interesting...as so many trains in China are...as it was two levels, so our seats ended up below ground level as seen by the view of our neighbours feet in the window. we started the trip by encouraging Evita to drik some yogurt out aof a bag. She was game as usual. The rest of the trip passed in relative calm after we bought a "magic cube" from a toy selling lady.

Fun in Chong Qing

2008-07-17T17:29:00.000-07:00

Lots of good fun was to be had when our guide David helped Jim to negoatiate the purchase of a big bunch of fireworks! I don't know how many were in the roll but they went off for a long time!

Chong qing Baoding rock carvings

2008-07-17T17:24:00.000-07:00

Our Cruise finished in Chong Qing formerly Chung King. Well guess what, the new and improved Chong Qing is the largest city in China!
At 33 million people it is also the largest city in the world. Who would have thunk it? Our guide David whipped us out of the city so fast that we didn't have much time to gawk. We instead went to the Baoding rock carvings. The rock carvings were also part of a Buddhist temple, that had been mostly out of use for and extended period, and only had been restored to accepting tourists in the 80's. The carvings date to the 12th century, and considering are in really good condition. Some of the statues are huge as you can see by the size of the person at the foot of the one. The Pagoda in the hand of that same statue is over 500 kilos. Looks like he is about to drop it on that guys head!
The reclining Buddha is equally huge, but i didn't get anyone in the shot to give perspective. TO give an idea the smaller statues in front of him are much larger than life too. Later that day we also went to the Stillwell museum and the Flying Tigers museum. I don't know anything about the Sino Japan War, but did learn that Chong Qing was bombed by the Japanese for 4 years from 1939 to 1943. We saw one of the bomb shelters, huge long tunnels into the mountain. Didn't look too pleasant!

The rest of the cruise in a nutshell

2008-07-17T16:39:00.000-07:00

The rest of our Yangzi river cruise was taken up by many diverting activities.
We had a lovely outing on a sanpan, visited the mini Three gorges, one of the tributaries of the Yangzi. While on that trip we passed hanging coffins. Placed in caves along the river by Chinese some 3,000 years ago. The coffin in the photo has got a small bush in front of it. The cave is about 80 meters above the water level but imagine how high it was before they raised the water. The speculation is that the folks who put the coffins in these caves lowered them down from above. Jim also informed me that over 10,000 relics will be flooded then the river reaches it's final resting point.
We also went to FuLang ghost city. It is a temple to honor the place were all ghosts go, with many trails to go through to prove this and that. Also with lots of nice visual representations of what hell will look like if you don't behave well etc... The temple was built over 1,000 years ago, and had a large village next to it. Because of the flood waters the village has been moved, to the other side of the river above the 175 water mark. Now this was a large village of over 75,000 people. It was completely rebuilt (it took 10 years). Every person was given a new apartment, bigger and more deluxe. In addition 25,000 more people moved to the new city from the to be flooded country side.
Never-the-less the temple is to be saved. A huge dike was being constructed to preserve the temple. It was allot of fun. We had to go over the marriage bridge, the wealth bridge and the longevity bridge. August picked wealth, and has been spending his money ever since, Jim and I went over the marriage bridge so that we would be married in the after life and we sent Evita over the Longevity bridge. Jim also went up the long life stairs with out taking a breath (and carrying Evita). All the children had to spank the spoiled child statue so that they could learn what it is like to punish children so that they in turn would be better behaved. We have been enjoying the benefits of that ever since!

Bye Bye Bridge

2008-07-16T07:17:00.000-07:00

This is what locals call the Bye Bye bridge, we saw photos of it were it was high above the water connecting one cliff side to the other. Now the water is just at the bottom supports, and in october when they raise the water level the last 60 meters it will be gone. A new bridge is being built now. The bottome photo is one of the markers that shows were the new water level will be. Yikes!

Three Gorges Dam

2008-07-16T07:05:00.000-07:00

The first day of our cruise we started out bright and early with a tour of the Three Gorges Dam. It is as we were told many times by our guide, the largest hydroelectric facility in the world. The size is menured by the number of turbines of which the 3 gores has 26, and the next largest has only 18. It was a foggy day so as you can see from the photos you can't even see the other side of the dam. It is one mile accross. The dam provides electricity for towns all the way to shanghai, and cotrols the flood plane where 450 million chinese live. Nothing is done here in small mesures, that's for sure. One of the other aspects of the dam is that it has allowed the government to "adjust" the depth of the Yangzi river up stream as well. We saw the effects of this every day of our cruise. In the past the river was quite shallow and
choppy, basically only for the smaller boats. Now it is a wide meandering thing. I don;t know the depth of the origional river but the dam is not finished and they plan on raising the water another 60 meters! All over the river you see signs for 175M which will be the final depth of the river. The Chinese government had to move1.5 million people allong the river. New "towns" are visible everywhere. They look weird suspended high on the banks waiting for the water to rise to it's final resting place.
What we saw most up close and personal was the lock that the Ship had to go through to reach the higher river level. The lock it self was huge and could hold about 8 large ships in each section. There were 5 seperate stages till we reached the top.

Victoria Empress Cruise

2008-07-16T03:40:00.000-07:00

Now for the luxury part of our trip!!! Yeah! The Victoria line of river cruise ships is run by an American company, and hosted by an American manager. The operation is very well run and 100% first world. They run 7 ships and most were full but ours. This was great for us. There were 37 passangers and ~100 staff. Yeppers, apparently the following week they are going to be full. All of China is suffering somewhat of a slup in tourism according to most of the people that we have talked to. Most say since the Earthquake in May (which we have seen no evidence of) and the new strictor visa requirements are to blame. We arrived from Wuhan and had nice poorters carry our bags on and August and Evita immediatly had french fries and hamburgers. Yum.
Our state rooms were truly delux and the service was great. We enjoyed real western breakfast with cereal and everything and a Chinese banquet every night. Oh and HBO too. Yeah ha!

Bonsai Garden in Wuhan

2008-07-15T16:02:00.000-07:00

I can say that one of our most popular destinations in China so far has been the Bonsai garden in Wuhan. It was a museum of sorts and we were escorted around by a sweet English speaking woman who explained to us the basics of Bonsai, which means "plant in pot". Whoa, there are only a few elements that can be in a true bonsai arrangement according to her. The tree, the pot, rocks and a pagoda. At the entrance of the Garden there was a HUGE bonsai arrangement, with a few pagodas, mountains out of rock and a river running through the whole thing. August wants to build one at Eden. So be prepared when you come visit for Bonsai Mexican style.

Guiyan Temple in Wuhan

2008-07-15T16:01:00.000-07:00

One of the four main Buddhist monasteries in China, it has a jade stature of Sakaymuni, which to our mind from the story seemed to have been snagged from Cambodia. Who knows the real story? There were also over 500 Arhat statues, kind of disciples of Buddha that have also reached Nirvana. The Arhats had been created by a father and son team of sculptures over a 9 year period. I can't believe that i don't; have a photo of them. Many of the temples that we have gone into do not allow photos in the place where the final statue or worshiping place is. Rightly so since people are actually trying to be spiritual in spite of the many many tourists(mostly Chinese and a few gringos) milling about.
As we found in Guilin, Buddhists are fond of turtles and this monastery was no exception. The main pond (square shape vs circular shape is pool) was so full of them that August at first thought that they were rocks! Then on closer inspection.....

Yellow Crane Pavillion

2008-07-15T15:56:00.000-07:00

One of our other stops in Wuhan is the Yellow Crane Pavallion. In the vein of many chinese buildings it had been rebuilt and moved several times. The last time being in 1983. So basically it is a new building made to look old. It has 363 stairs to the top and Jim ran the whole way up carrying Evita in his arms. She is one lucky gal!! August and I schlepped ourselves and enjoyed a tremendous view of the city from the top. Wuhan has about 8 million residents. Yeah, i had never heard of the place either. Below you see the huge tile painting of the Yellow Crane. The Yellow Crane apparently was a creature that befrended a restaurant owner, coming and sitting outside his place everyday, the restaurant became very popular and the owner lobbyied to have the pagoda built.
Below you see Evita befriending another Chinese baby. The baby in question has an old fashioned baby outfit on. Like a little hankerchie tied on the front and nothing on the back. Sure saves on daipers!

Train to Wuhan

2008-07-15T15:54:00.000-07:00

We took the night (soft sleeper) train from Guilin to Wuhan. The train experience was fun, the train station was CHAOS!! Seemingly there is never a time of day or a train that is not mobbed by it's occupants. All Chinese run at top speed to the train cars even though the berths are pre assigned and fixed. We still don't understand this except maybe it is a carry over from days when the seats wern't fixed and it was every mn for himself.
We arrived in Wuhan at around 8:00 in the morning bright eyed and bushy tailed to see the city. Wuhan is a big industrial like place that at one point in it's history had quite a large foreign presence du to it's position at the interection of 6 rivers. So it boasts a number of out of place European inspired buildings that used to be foreign consulates but now are hotels and the like. See bottom photo.
We went to the provincial museum first and saw thier collection of relics which include some 2 thousand year old bells. The musum sages a sho with bell replicas playing compositions from the period. It was great. They allso played "greensleaves" or something like that which was less enchanting!