Day 3 - Exploring Foshan

The Shunde Qinghui Park

After breakfast we loaded up the minivan and headed to Foshan. Foshan is a city about an hour drive from Guangzhou. It is famous for it’s porcelain figurines and is a nice small city by China standards. About 2 million people live inside the city limits. On the ride to Foshan you go through a nice agricultural area although the skyline of skyscrapers all around is never out of view.

According to our folder for today (thanks Kathi) we were to drop off our bags at our new hotel and then head out to see a Chinese garden, hit Wal-Mart, Starbucks, and have dinner at a highly recommended Italian restaurant called Casa Mia which is apparently run by an expat American family.

We were able to check into a nice Sheraton in Foshan. We were very excited as we were going to be spending two nights in this hotel which meant we didn’t have to be all packed up and ready to go to the next hotel that night. This hotel was great and by all standards really well appointed. However after the one we just came from it was still a little bit of a letdown.

After checking in we headed to a Chinese garden/park that was extremely beautiful. It had Koi ponds, waterfalls that you could walk under, many buildings that were replicas one from ancient dynasties as well as amazing flora that was just beautiful. I went in thinking it was just going to be something to kill some time but I really enjoyed it.

Next up was a trip to Wal-Mart to buy some diapers for the orphanage. Apparently Wal-Mart is pretty common now in China. We chose to go to one that was close to a restaurant that was recommended by trip advisor. Little did we know that it was about an hour to that area of Foshan. If we would have known we would have chosen differently but the call of good food won out.

Wal-mart was interesting. It was on the second floor in a mall like building. It was full of people like an American Wal-Mart. You want to talk about some funny looks. Be a white family with a Chinese girl who speaks English and you get some interesting stares and side conversations! You definitely get a mix of reactions. Some people are very polite and smile at you when you are walking around. Others frown and you can tell they do not approve of our family make-up. Overall though, it was a very good experience.

After this we were to go to dinner at Casa Mia. It was supposed to be very close to where we were. Well our driver could not find it even though Kathi had printed out directions in Mandarin. He called our friend Ann and she had no luck helping him either. We decided to go to Starbucks first and get a coffee mug with the name of Foshan on it to commemorate the trip. While there I talked to a US expat to see if he knew of this restaurant. He said he had heard of it and knew it was close but couldn’t figure out just where. That meant we were left with…Pizza Hut. Not what we were wanting but it was better than the Pizza Hut we have in PKU.

After a dinner we headed back to the hotel to relax a little. I took Kade and Sydney down to the pool to do a little swimming. The pool here was more of a lap pool and this hotel was not set up as well for kids. It seemed much more business oriented. Anyway we got in the pool and started swimming. After about 5 minutes a hotel worker comes out to us and says we should have on swimming caps. I was a little confused so asked him to repeat himself. He said it again and I was like, “Really?” I told him we didn’t have any. I asked if they had any at the hotel to borrow. He said he would look. He came back and told us he did not have any. I asked if they had any to buy. He said yes and I told him we would buy them. He left only to come back and tell me they were out of ones to buy. He then left and came back a fourth time with two that he said we could borrow. Syd and I put them on leaving Kade cap free. Mine was black and Syd said I looked like I belonged in a rap video. He was finally satisfied that we could continue swimming. He came back a fifth time and brought us one more. I recognized this one as one that another swimmer who had just left the pool was wearing. Nice! Kade got that one. He was actually very into it. I didn’t tell him it came from a guy that just left.

After that we headed up to bed. We had an early morning wake up call so we could eat a good breakfast and then head out to the orphanage for the big day!

That is a big pot.

Not quite as nice as the previous hotel but not bad.

The Pearl River view from our hotel.

More pictures at the park.

Just going for a walk.

Just let me put my toe in Dad.

This was a live action performance by two senior citizens. It is of a tea ceremony.

At the park you could get dressed up in traditional Chinese garb and get some pictures taken. For a fee of course.

The Circle of Life.

A full day done. Time for some sleep!