We found it! The Warehouse to the World

I wonder if this country will ever cease to amaze us? I think not . . . You gotta come on over and check it out! We'd love to go exploring with you!




As we were going back to our hotel we drove past this street. I couldn't help myself. It looked far too much like a bargain lovers paradise! And what we found was AMAZING! This had to be the market where places like Wal-mart and Target, possibly even Pier 1 shop! It was shop after shop after endless shop of STUFF. For our white skinned faces, however, there was not a bargain to be found, well, until I shamed a woman who was flaunting a bubble blower toy in front of Rachel into giving it to us for half the price she started with. Hey, she only had 10 rmb / day to do business with, ya know? (see posts below for that story)

One of the many halls in this enormous place!

And then there was the upstairs where there was all kinds of home decor . . .

A very weak attempt at showing the hugeness of this place, I feel like the apostle John trying to describe his revelation (ok, that's kind of reaching, but seriously!)

The Warehouse for the World . . . continued

Here i found coffee mugs with scripture on them . . . hmmm? As my friend Tracy said, "impossible!"

And then there were a few places that made me feel like I was back in America . . . yes, I still have a dish fettish, to Jerry's great displeasure!

Rows and rows and rows of the same . . . seriously, 12 football fields square, at least! and two floors!

OK, you have to understand that candles in China are functional only. They either provide light when the electricity is out or they keep food and tea hot. They are not yummy smelling, they are not the finishing touch for home decor . . . but this . . . this little oasis of joy was filled with yummy smelling candles of every kind . . . sigh. . .

Family Memories in Guang Zhou

Our wonderful little hotel had a "roof top garden" which consisted of four plots of green, green grass looking out over the Guang Zhou skyline. Rachel thought we needed family night with our left over pizza hut from lunch, so we rounded ourselves up and had a little family picnic. One of the housekeeping staff watched over us closely . . . assuredly wondering what these crazy foreigners might be doing! (yes, i was already in my PJ's when Ra made this great decision, so on went one of Jerry's big shirts over them...lest you think my fashion sense has gone up in smoke in the last 10 months =-)

Friday was "Children's Day" in China. All the kids were out of school and many were out playing in this little park area. Ra was thrilled to have some friends to play with!

Guang Zhou was the last stop on our adoption trip nearly three years ago. Rachel loves to hear the "precious baby girl" story, which includes a visit to the doctor in Guang Zhou, Shaiman Island where he checked out her " head and her toes, her fingers and her nose" to make sure she was ready for the long flight back to America. We went back there to do some shopping (they cater greatly to adoptive parents). This store was there three years ago, the owner was from the same province as Rachel and gave her a beautiful silver bracelet. We have a picture of me with them from three years ago in Rachel's first year scrapbook, so we thought we'd take another with these girls, one of which just moved to Guang Zhou from Changsha! crazy.

The riverboat. Remember this AHH families? Our last night in China, I think, and we took the riverboat cruise. All the girls (and parents, I believe) were dead tired...we decided that since we don't get to see you all this month at the reunion, we would just take a little trip down memory lane and share it with you! OH! how we wish we could come to the reunion! Please send pictures!!

We didn't take a picture of it, cuz it's kind of a gross story, but we even went down the street on Shaiman Island with all the bronze statues (do you remember that John and Rita) where we first were able to "clean out" Rachel's nose! She has always had a dry nose issue, nose bleeds and the like, and those first days I thought she had some kind of breathing issue . . . but walking down that street, Daddy finally got a huge hunk of dried mucos out of her and she could breath without sounding like darth vador . . . ahhh, the memories!

More of Guang Zhou

Rachel got a 10RMB / day vacation allowance . . .
(yeah, I know, big spenders that we are! about $1.50 US, hey, it was a bargin trip after all!)
these fun colorful rubber bands were her first purchase of the trip
and we decided to do her up in true Chinese-girl fashion.
How cute is she?!?



Ra was thrilled to find this arcade where she and Daddy spent his vacation allowance
but we found it humorous to spend money on a "crazy taxi" video game . . . we do that
nearly everyday here in China!

And then we found the street in China where all the world's neon signs are made . . .
maybe this one was headed back to good-ole Illinois?

Just call me "MIss Spontaneity" . . . if you believe that . . .

Well, miracles CAN happen, you know, and this past week was the very proof of that! This highly organized, think things through completely so as to avoid the slightest margin of error girl, found herself surfing the internet last week and looking at airline tickets to random places in China while Jerry was testing the English level of some students for next year's classes. Let me first say that the one thing that surprised me the most when moving to this wonderful country was the extremely high cost of flying to destinations within the country. It nearly gives me, the extreme bargain hunter, a heart attack anytime we have had to fly in country this past year, to the point that I try not to even ask Jerry how much it cost until we arrive back home. . . so for me to be randomly searching prices of plane tickets was a strange fact in itself . . . but even stranger still?

I found tickets to a southern port city about an hour flight from here for $35 US each . . . one way. "Wow!" I thought, "I bet getting back home will cost a fortune!", so I checked and found that tickets home would be even cheaper . . . hold on to your hats folks . . . less than $18 US each to fly home! I thought for sure there would be no way to find a place to stay (well, to meet my hotel standards, which, yes, girlfriends, has not changed in the least!) would be impossible putting this ridiculous little pea-sized idea to rest at last . . . however . . . I found a wonderful web-site for discounted last minute hotel reservations in China and there, as if the heavens had opened up and the angels were singing the hallelujah chorus, was listed the newly opened in 2006 (read: assuredly meets LaWanda's hotel standard) Ramada Plaza (double confirmation of the standard being met) of Guang Zhou, China for $50 per night (read: gift from Dad cuz he knew it was time for the Joneses is get away for some family time by themselves!).

So . . . off we went for a few wonderful days in the even hotter, even more humid city of Guang Zhou, China! Here are a few pictures, i will post a few more shortly (we are having to get into our blog through the back door once again, so the process is a little time consuming and I can only post four or five pictures/post). We are so very thankful for the time away . . . as many of you know, sometimes you just don't know how convoluted life is until you step away from it for a few days to get some perspective. . . thank goodness Dad knows what it will take to get me to take those steps back . . . and he came through with flying colors! His little bargain-loving girl was quite pleased . . . and her husband? Floored by the spontaneity of it all!



Rachel enjoying the great pool with her new floaties

I love coffee as much as the next guy (well, maybe not you, DK . . . )
but I just couldn't make myself go in and check this one out.
I'm going with "the cat likes to eat coffee" shop, not the many
alternatives to the interpretation of this sign.

And here we found "rubber band street"
store after store after store of these bags of rubber bands.
Amazing.

Rachel finally figured out a way to keep everyone at bay . . .
if they can't see me, they can't poke at my cheeks and say the
same thing over and over to me in Chinese while I stare blankly
at the spot directly behind them and to the left!
She's brilliant, I tell ya!