Our Daughter Lina

Today we went with four other families to the Summer Palace. Later we made a short stop at the Beijing zoo to see the famous pandas, then made a shopping stop at the pearl market (which is by no means limited to pearls). While we all impatiently wait to meet our little ones, we’re having fun getting to know each other (great food and good beer doesn’t hurt, either).

Detail of painting on palace building at the Summer Palace

Michelle is our local guide for the optional organized tours

Virtually every gate in China is guarded by a pair of lions. In yesterday’s pictures, you saw Mama with her cub. Here’s an example of Papa with his ball. Stephanie asked Michelle what the ball represents. Michelle’s answer was that the ball just represents a ball. “Chinese people like to play ball. Chinese people had basketball and football one thousand years ago.” Stephanie still thinks it must represent something more grand, like infinity or longevity.

Morning exercises are a part of traditional Chinese life. Here, a woman practices calligraphy on the walkway of the Summer Palace as part of her morning exercises.

The longest corridor in China is at the Summer Palace. It’s opensided and is nearly a kilometer long. Each rafter has a unique painting.

The lake at the Summer Palace is man-made and even though it’s quite large, it’s only 3 meters deep.

The landing by the marble boat is a popular posing spot; these gents were posing for their friend to take their picture.

This cute couple posed, too.

The Gate Tower of Cloud-retaining Eaves

A shopping frenzy on the way out of the Summer Palace grounds.

Laura’s new hat

Those of you who know our cat Lula will recognize her here.

Kids at the zoo

At the pearl market

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 10th, 2005 at 08:45 and is filed under lina. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.