On mom and dad’s first full day in China, we decided to start out slow. After a full night’s sleep, we met at 10am for breakfast in the hostel. For some reason, I felt as tired as they did, and I hadn’t been up nearly as long as they had (over 29 hours). After we filled our tummies, we headed to the bank to change money then jumped on a bus for Tiananmen Square.

T-square, as I like to call it, is the biggest public square in the world. It features a couple of large gates, the Mao Zedung mausoleum, and a monument to the “people’s heroes”. We skipped out on the National Museum and the Great Hall of the People, and Mao’s resting place was unfortunately closed for renovation. But we did go through the classic Gate of Heavenly Peace (under the huge watchful eye of Mao himself), spending some time in the grounds of the Worker’s Cultural Palace (which, like most of the city, was also undergoing some major renovation).

Lunch was a monumental event … mom and dad’s first Chinese meal, chopsticks and all. We had some sweet and sour pork (tung cu li ji), a Beijing favorite, and some cooked cabbage (bai cai). They were mostly successful with the chopsticks … but they’re already starting to see that if they don’t learn quickly, they’re gonna be hungry!

After lunch we went to a famous Pearl Market … the first two floors were full of fake goods, artwork, fake historical memorabilia, and low-quality pearls and jewels. I bought some jeans (¥120) and we bought three scrolls with typical artowork on them (¥50 for all three) … mostly so dad and mom could see the bargaining process. The third through fifth floors were full of higher quality jewelry stores … and after looking around a bit, we walked into the nicest store of all and had a delightful conversation with three of the salesgirls. After about an hour, dad ended up buying a beautiful diamond ring for mom!

After a long bus ride home, we had a late (9:30pm) dinner and looked briefly for some shoes for dad (his sandals really hurt his feet today). And now we’re back at home, getting a good night’s sleep before our trip on the Great Wall tomorrow. We’re not going to one of the remote or challenging sections of the wall, but we’re not going to the overly-tourist-y place either. I’m really looking forward to it!

Posted to webeldotnet on Sunday, April 29th, 2007 at 10:48 pm EST in China & My Life & Family (comment feed). If you refer to this post on your blog, please trackback. Thanks!