Part of getting approval for a visa to enter the US is the fact that our little spicy girl is healthy and normal, so off we went to the doctor’s office to get a quick checkup. As expected, all of the little girls in our group were found to be alive and well. A quick check and Sarah had the last piece of paperwork signed off. Tomorrow is the big Consulate day – although our guides do the sweating at the US Consulate while we just need to be available in our room if there are any questions. It’s nice to be finally closing in on the last bits of the process in China.
On the walk back to the hotel, we passed a number of people exercising in a park specially designed for it. In every city, we’ve seen people doing exercise, Tai Chi, dancing or some other form of morning group activity. Some people think it’s billions of Chinese doing this, but it’s not – it’s just groups of 2 or 3 or up to 20 or so doing something in the morning to get their blood pumping. We’ve even seen little old ladies doing morning stretches on their own. It’s really a great thing
, and there seem to be a lot of different activities they do. Jordan and I tried out the exercise park, and then a little while later played Chinese hacky-sack with several Chinese people in the park (the old guy was great – we were not so great).
We also had an opportunity to tour Guangzhou. We visited a Buddhist temple where a few families chose to have their babies blessed by the Buddhist Master (not us, but a few did). It was interesting to see a 1400+ year old temple that is still in use every day. There was plenty of incense burning and people coming in for blessings and to “say wishes” as our guide put it. It was a completely new experience for us.
Later, we went to “Old Chen House” which is now the Guangdong (that’s the province) Folk Art Museum. We saw ivory and bone carvings, porcelain and many other traditional southern Chinese arts. One particularly interesting piece was an ivory carving that included an ivory ball that is 54 layers deep. To carve these, the artist starts with a ball of solid ivory and drills some holes into it. Then, using knives and saws, they cut and carve it in such a way that they create a ball-inside-a-ball. Then they do it again and again. Along the way, they carve intricate patterns on each layer. This one was 54 layers inside an ivory ball a little bigger than a softball. The pictures can’t do it justice, so I won’t even post them. This seems to be a repeating current in Chinese arts – extreme patience in creating an extremely intricate piece of artwork.
In any event, our part of the paperwork is now done and we’re almost free for the next two days (just a few little appointments to keep) until the swearing in on Wednesday afternoon. It will be nice to get home, but we will also enjoy the next couple of days of family time.
