2 Hours To Go

I finally fell asleep around 2 am. I wouldn't really call it sleep though. I was partially awake the whole time. I don't sleep well in hotels to begin with. I really don't sleep well on slate boards. I'm not exaggerating on this one either. While our hotel is a 4 start hotel and I've been very happy with everything so far, the mattress is has hard as a rock. The tiny sofa in the living room is rock hard as well. It's not even large enough for K2 to lay on and stretch out her legs. I'm happy that we have this little suite though. It gives us a little room to spread out.

I was back up at 5 am. I thought for sure Pete's clock was wrong so I spent 20 minutes channel surfing trying to find a TV station that would show a digital clock on it. I thought we should have a digital alarm clock/radio in our room somewhere. Then when Pete woke up, he told me that there is a large clock on the bedroom wall. At least now I'll know for tomorrow.

I tried to relax and spend some quiet time alone but that only lasted until 6 am. By then I was done trying to waste time and was ready to get on with the day. I got everyone's things ready to go for the day, packed Kaiden's diaper bag, and packed a snack bag for the girls. We had a few things that we needed to get done this morning before we met our guide at 11:10 am in the lobby so I thought we should get started on them so we weren't rushed and didn't miss anything.

The girls were up and ready to go by 7 am. A breakfast buffet is included with our hotel so we headed down to the restaurant for that. Pete's had them before and he said that we'd be able to find things to eat. We did. But I'm still hungry. And so is Pete. It was an interesting combination of foods. I think it's going to take me awhile to get used to some of the funny ways things get translated. For instance, what looked liked chocolate rice krispies on the cereal bar, had a sign that read 'popcorn'. Somethings just looked too odd for me to even think about for breakfast. I had a few tiny croissants and a piece of what I think was nut bread. The girls were all happy and full with their breakfasts. Good thing I brought 5 cases of granola bars.

After breakfast, we headed outside. We were told that there was a supermarket just one block over that sold large bottles of water. It was only 7:30 am but the clerk thought that they might be open. I thought we found it but it was closed. Pete said that was not the right place anyways so we kept walking. It was interesting people watching. I wanted to get fresh air after being stuck on an airplane for so long but fresh air it is not! it looks over-cast and cloudy but it's really just the smog.

A few more blocks and I was ready to turn around and so were the girls so we did. By the time we got back to what I thought was the market, it was open so we went in. Of course everything on the products was written in Chinese but you could tell by the packaging what many things were. I recognized a lot of brands like Nestle, Coke, Safeguard, etc. just by the color and design of the packaging. I had to leave after we went by the meat/seafood area. All of the meat is just sitting out in open cases. Nothing is wrapped. Imagine your local butcher shop but without the glass covering all of it. It didn't look like it was cooled either. If it was, it wasn't kept very cold because the smell was awful!

We also had not exchanged any of our money yet. I thought for sure that a supermarket would take credit. Nope. Our guide told us not to expect many places at all to accept credit. Good for them I guess. But I'm not used to carrying cash around. So back to the hotel we went.

Pete exchanged money while I went to the business center. We needed to take care of a few things that we weren't told about ahead of time. We needed part of our home study for the orphanages records so luckily I had all of that archived in my email account and could print it out. We also needed copies of our Visa pages with the stamp on them. I copied those before we left but they obviously weren't stamped and we weren't told that they needed to be. Easy enough to take care of here. Pete then went back to the market (which is conveniently located just next door practically) to get us some bottled water and pop.

We should get back from the Orphanage around 3:30 pm today. Pete asked me what are we going to do for the rest of the day. I said I think we'll put Kaiden in his playpen in the living room in front of us and throw goldfish crackers at him like you do to the animals at the zoo. The girls thought that would be a lot of fun. We all laughed but seriously, don't freak out. We're not going to do that. That just tells you how deprived of sleep I am.

Pete is now napping and the girls are working on their travel journals. They are also watching some Chinese cartoon I found on the TV. They can't understand a word of it but they like it anyways.