The Great Wall

 

 

 

A room with a view! The building you are looking at is one of the only buildings left downtown that has any resemblance to ancient Chinese architechture. Mao tore down almost all buildings downtown that captured Chinese history. Everything now looks so modern where we are staying. The next photo is outside our hotel before we head out at 8AM for the Great Wall with our trusty guide Arthur and two other HOLT families that are adopting.

One couple with their 15 year old son are  from Wisconsin adopting a 9yr. old boy from northern China and another couple and their 15 year old daughter from Luisiansa.  The group photo at the beginning of our hike on the Great Wall shows us all.   

 

 

Here is a picture of ancient China, where everything is done with care and skill and artistic sensitivity...this is the bathroom at the Great Wall!

This one is for the boys.=0) 
  

Arthur told us the story of the locks strung all along the Great wall tied with red ribbons, how they were brought there and locked by a couple in love pledging their unity and commitment to one another as bound together forever, once they locked it and threw the key over the edge. 

 We only hiked several towers high on this section of the Great WAll, and did not have time to make it to the one you see at the very top. If one hikes all the way there, they can recieve a 'hero award' when returning to the bottom.  It was kind of funny to see masses of people pushing up and down the stairs near the bottom and first tower, walking arond (painfully), some in high heel boots! and others keeled over out of breath (photos do NOT convey how vertical the steps are)  and only one or two heads dotting the ridgeline of the wall at the top tower in the sky!   

Next we drove to a gigantic building that was a famous Jade factory on the bottom and an extremely fancy, sprawling restaurant on the top floor.

We ate first and then went downstairs for a tour and explanation of the history, sculpture and jewelry making of jade in China. There were also spectacluarly intricate, and beautiful silk paintings lining the walls. It was fascinating, and then of course they give you plenty of time to 'shop'! 


Afterwards, we straight away rode downtown again to see 'old China' by rickshaw and visit a resident's house and ask her questions of our choosing.

It was so interesting and so sad that her house will soon be taken over by the government, like most in her neighborhood, and replaced with apartments. Her home is the one she has lived in all her life, and 5 generations before her!  She does not have a choice. It was interesting to wonder if Glory's foster mother lives in a place similar.  She hospitibly served us tea and smiles and I will remember her home always, and am forever grateful for this.

We quickly were ushered out again after our visit, to an acrobatic performance downtown(similar to a small scale Circ de Sole' and quick Chinese food near our hotel before crashing into bed!

...off to the Forbidden City!