Tourist Day

Last night, we went as a group to McDonald's. It was ok, but the babies were hungry. The dads had to walk over to KFC to get some mashed potatoes for the girls to eat, but Olivia didn't like that too much. The people here are so fascinated by us! A lot of the people try to carry on a conversation with us, and they are so excited for the babies!

The moms and babies went on back to the hotel, but the dads and Doris (our translator) stayed in town and went to the Super Wal Mart again.

This morning, Olivia woke up a little earlier than yesterday, and we played with her a while before going down for breakfast. She didn't eat too much this morning, and they were out of bananas, but she seemed to be doing fine.

We went to a mountain tourist spot today, where there are several Buddhist and Hindu temples built that you can tour. We found out through our bus driver that most people in this region of China are descendents of either the Huns or one other race, and he believes that our girls are of that other race. I'll try to get the spelling of it and post it here soon.

The first temple we went to was a Buddhist temple, and the main chamber was a place where Chinese couples who are having trouble conceiving pray for a baby. They sell offerings and incense that the couples carry around and burn and go to each of several different statues. It was a bit ironic for us to see some of the young Chinese couples praying for babies.

There was one area in front of a river where people gathered to feed the koi. They had a little dress up area, sort of like Glamour Shots, that we took advantage of. See if you can spot those pictures! I'm also going to show what it looks like outside of our hotel room. Guanxi is a pretty big city, after all.

The second temple was a Hindu temple, and the temple itself wasn't too remarkable. One thing that was funny was that Christine and I got scolded for the first time. There was a group of Vietnamese tourists at the temple (remember, Vietnam isn't too far away from here), and they gathered around Christine, Olivia and me on the steps to the temple. The men kept saying a word to us and pointing at us. We thought they were commenting on the baby, so we said "thank you" in Chinese (I know, they're Vietnamese). They kept pointing at Olivia though, and we kept smiling and saying "thank you". They then went to the universal language of charades, and they pointed up at the sun, then at their heads - they were all wearing baseball caps. Then they pointed at Olivia's uncovered head. They were scolding us for not having a hat for Olivia!

Nik, one of the other dads, and I got Doris to stop and see where we could buy one of the cone shaped basket type hats that you traditionally see pictures of Chinese people wearing. They said that the hats were work or gardening hats, and that they had some new ones they would sell us. With the conversion, it worked out to be about two dollars and fifty cents for a hat.

We then went to a local shopping area and bought some articles that are made here in Guangxi province. One of the ladies in the shop wiped her forehead (like "WHEW!:"), and pointed to Olivia. Here we go again with the scolding!!

We finally have Olivia down for a nap, and we plan on joining her. Thank you again for your notes and prayers of support. Please keep them coming! Olivia is SO precious; God is a kind and loving God to bring such a blessing into our lives.

Michael, Christine and Olivia