Leaving for China

August of 2007: My two sons, Michael and Rodrigo, and I at the Longmen Grottoes in the south of Luoyang City. It is regarded as one of the three most famous treasure houses of stone inscriptions in China. Literally thousands of Buddhas!

So Departure Day for my second trip to China has nearly arrived. In spite of the earthquake, I'm still going!

I leave from San Francisco tomorrow, May 14, at 1:30 p.m., and arrive on May 15 at 5:25 p.m. It is a 14-hour flight. I have an aisle seat, thank goodness, because I'm the sort that can't stay in my seat for very long! My itinerary lists "Lunch, Lunch." So I guess we'll be served lunch twice as we chase the sun across half the globe. These are photos from last year's trip, in August. Just random stuff. I didn't have a blog then so I couldn't take my family and friends along like I hope to this year! My cousin, Laurel, says she's never seen the photo I have of a chinese toilet, so here it is. This takes a little getting used to! Thank goodness (and thank Jazzercise) for strong thighs! And this is in a very nice, upscale restaurant. You don't even want to THINK about what I saw in the outhouses!This is Tiannenmen Square. Michael, me, and two of Michael's friends, Arnold and Uri. Rodrigo, Arnold, and Michael. This is in Beijing where we had a great dinner at a restaurant famous for Beijing Duck (formerly Peking Duck). You can see the server in the background carving the bird. That was an awesome meal.
A little different type of meal, lunch at a roadside stand. A lot of different foods all deep-fried in the same oil. De-lish!And yet another meal; this time at an outdoor "barbecue." There is a huge pan of boiling water in the middle of the table. We were given a variety of meats (some of the meats the guys ate was unbelievable) and vegetables that we put in the water, let cook, then fished back out to eat. Very interesting!! That's Selena, me, and Rodrigo in the photo.Another picture of Selena, Michael's girlfriend (although she wasn't at the time this picture was taken). We're in a taxi. She is very sweet and a lot of fun. Needless to say, I'll be seeing her again very soon!
The Great Wall. They are hard to see in this pic but if you look very closely at the square tower area, on the left-hand side Rodrigo and Michael are standing on top of the wall. I'm telling you, those two never change, you can't take them anywhere! Here we are in a shopping area in Luoyang City having lunch at a very short table. There were yummy veggie/meat-filled dumplings and a doughnut-like fried sweet bread.
Last, but certainly not least, we call this picture "Chinese Daycare." These babies are in a cart near their mothers who are cooking food in an outdoor booth. So cute!

As I've been telling people, I will try to update my blog while I'm in China. Michael doesn't live anywhere near the epicenter of the earthquake and he says everything is back to normal in Luoyang City. I'm traveling alone this time instead of with Rodrigo, so that's just a tiny bit scary. I expect I may run into travel delays, but don't expect any problems once I arrive in Shanghai where Michael will meet me. I believe his plan is to spend a few days first in Shanghai and nearby Suzhou (I think that's how its spelled), where Selena lives, so it may be 4 or 5 days before my first post.

I hope you'll check back!