A First for Me!

ABo has been to China for work quite a few times.  He's seen a lot and has always wanted me to take a trip with him.  I haven't felt it was the right time to go that far away prior years, and he usually goes with Kris (his business partner), but it didn't work this time for him.  I felt like this time would be a great time to go, so I decided to tag along.

We left on Monday morning at 7:30 am and got there late Tuesday night around 8 pm (with the 15 hour time change).  Really, it took around 24 hours to get there.  When we arrived in bed, I told Bo that I felt like I just lost two days of my life.  He laughed and said, I know, right.  On our way home, we left Monday at 12:20 pm and got home Monday night at 6 pm (it was about another 24 hours, but all in all, we were up for about 28).  We traveled back in time. :) I was about a day behind in my mind for a couple days.  But I got a day back!

The first few days were mostly business.  After an ok night sleep in Beijing, we hopped a plane for a few hours to the Canton area and met up with Irene, who is the gal that does business for Bo in China.  He met her at BYUH.  She is a fantastic gal and a hard worker.  We also met up with our first factory guide.  We met with factory owners and checked out the products they had to offer, went to lunch with them to get to know them better then drove for about an hour and a half to a new hotel in a new city.  It seemed like every factory was in a city an hour and a half away from the previous one.  The cool thing was that we didn't rent a car.  The factory owners drove us wherever we needed to go.  I always felt bad after they dropped us off at our hotel, thinking they had to drive back to where we just came from.  It was a long day for them.  It was really cool seeing the different factories and how they set things up.  Everyone did things a little differently.  Even though they were producing the same products.  Those Chinese factory workers work really hard.

Here are some pictures of the factories we visited:

While we were driving around, we were able to see the Canton Tower and a brand new bridge they have been building for a hundred years.  It's called the Hong Kong Zhuhai Macau Bridge Zhuhai Port.  The smog was so bad though we didn't get to see much of the bridge.  It goes miles over the ocean and connects to Hong Kong.  It is a huge time saver for many.

Here's an image I took from the internet

Saturday morning, we went to the Great Wall.  This wall is 13,000 miles long and began being built around 221 BC and started looking the way it does today around the year 1600 AD.  It was a constant project for hundreds of years. This is what I was looking forward to the most.  The wall did not disappoint.  The first climb, I thought I might die.  It was so steep.  But, after that, it was mostly downhill, so it got quite a bit easier.  As I walked around on the wall, I pondered those who had come before.  It was built by forced labor and so many deaths to those workers.  Many wars were fought on this wall, with many deaths again a reality.  But, now to those in China, it is a beacon of strength and hope.  They are so proud of their wall.  It was so intricate, and the blocks of stone were cut very precisely.  The workmanship was outstanding.

Here is the little shopping center where we started

You can hike up to the wall, but with all the walking on the wall, we decided to take the tram.

Irene and Me

It just keeps going and going...

This is inside on one of the towers you can see

Sunday, we went to The Forbidden City in Beijing.  It was really neat and massive with entire city is surrounded by a 26-foot wall.  It took us at least 4 hours to walk through.  We got ten miles in walking that day.  There were many neat buildings, gardens, old artifacts, and some beautiful old clocks that have been collected over time.  We learned a lot about the emperors.  It was interesting how they lived.  I'm not sure I would have wanted to live there at that time. It was pretty much emperors, wives, concubines, and workers.  But, it was fun to see how skilled the builders again we and detailed these buildings were.

 Here are some random pics:

This is what the city looks like from outside this 26-foot wall.  You can't see anything.  But, go inside, and it's pretty incredible...

There were large basins all over this city.  They used to be filled with water year-round in case of a fire.  

Check out the year of the stone in the above picture!

So many cool buildings and SO detailed!

Check out the walkway.  Even it was intricately detailed.

Sunday night, we headed to Tienanmen Square.  This is where the Chinese Government is located.  It was closed up because we got there late, but it was cool to see.

Then we headed home.  It was so nice to be back on American soil, even though we got stuck in customs, which I was really grumpy about.  It just feels different here.  Every time I've left mainland America I always have the same feeling when we hit US soil again.  I can't really explain it, but it just feels right.  This time as I've pondered it all, I've felt so grateful to have the freedoms we have.  The saddest thing I learned while I was there was that the Chinese Government wants everyone to be an Atheist.  They teach this in their schools, and if you are a part of the military, you must believe this way or at least never show any difference.  It makes me beyond grateful to be able to worship how I want.

The hope and peace I receive from the gospel of Jesus Christ are what gets me out of bed each day.  Life would be so much harder without this knowledge.  Why are we so blessed to live here and have the gospel in our lives?  This is a question I often ask myself.  Especially in the past week.  I hope that someday soon, the gospel will be allowed to be taught throughout the world.  The population in China is so large, and so many people could really use spiritual enlightenment.  I realize much more now why I need to be praying that it will.

As we flew out of Beijing, you could see the cloud of pollution, but a little further out, you could see the great wall stretching over the mountains.  It was really cool.  If you make the pic big on the computer, you might be able to see it just above the plane engine.

Those are not clouds!

The mountains the great wall is on.

The kids were so excited to have us back.  The three younger boys even made us a sign and taped it to the garage.  It was so fun to see them again.  I felt so far away.  Thank you so much to Gini and Dan and my parents, who took so much time out of their lives to come to our house and watch the kids.  They had such a great time with you all, and I don't have to worry when we leave them with you.  We know they are in good hands.  Thanks again, we love you!!!