Finishing up from yesterday

To finish up from yesterday, I mostly have just a bunch of random pictures.  Strange foods, our hotel and the area around it, dinner, and TingTing....

Hot soybean milk, maybe.  Hot orange juice - I don't think so!

This one glared when we took a picture, but the top line is what we thought was funny.  It says, "Autumn Pear Grease".  Ewww.  That's about all I can say to that.

This is our hotel here in Beijing.  The Wang Fu Jing Grand Hotel.  It's quite nice - a nice breakfast and dinner buffet, and a nice enough room, although not all that big.  The area around the hotel is quite walkable which is nice.  We walk out onto a city street, and in one direction there are lots of stores, a mall, and a decent amount of restaurants.  Although even with all of that, we are feeling ready to move on.  It's a very noisy and busy area, and when we want a break from it there's nowhere to go except our small room.

The front of the hotel

The lobby

The other side of the lobby

Walking back to the elevators.  There are several shops inside the hotel.  Most of them we haven't even been in, except one of them is like a gift shop/convenience store.  That's our source for bottled water.

We went to a bakery down the street.  Our guide told us about it and we finally remembered to go there.  They had all kind of things that we didn't know what they were.  We tried lots of different things, and most of it was good, with only a couple of things that we didn't like.

The front of the bakery

The case of cakes

Making our choices!  We got a tray and tongs to choose what we want, then when we paid they bagged it all up for us.

Our bag of yummy things to try - all of this for only $6

She likes riding in the stroller that we borrowed from the travel service!

The mall that is near us.  It's nice for walking around, but not really useful for buying many things because it is a really high-end mall and things are way overpriced.

She protests naptime in a big way if we try it in the room.  But in a stroller or taxi she can't help but fall asleep!

As if we weren't getting enough stares already being a Caucasian couple with a Chinese daughter, we got even more having a child in a stroller because it seems there just aren't many parents who use strollers with kids.  Add to that scenario a sleeping child in a stroller and we felt a little like we were in a parade

For dinner last night we went to a pizza place with Kirsty and a group of her friends from the International School.  They knew about a great authentic pizza place (not sauceless like Pizza Hut!) and they offered for us to meet them all there.  We immediately accepted that offer!  It was a really great place called the Kro's Nest (like Crow's Nest).  It was like a little bit of Western culture in the middle of Beijing!  It had a really unique atmosphere and they had delicious pizza!  Thank you again Kirsty for the invite and for the great company!  Any adoptive families reading this - if you end up in Beijing - remember the Kro's Nest!  It's a great place to get a familiar meal!

The outside of the building was really neat.  It was a big brick wall painted with a black crow.  And the sign was facing the ground instead of out at the street.

The front of the restaurant.  The door was like an elevator door in the middle of this brick wall.  You had to push a button to open the door.  Otherwise you can't see into the restaurant at all!

Their logo in lights on the floor

Funky wooden crows are part of the fun atmosphere

TingTing getting reaquainted with her Chinese speaking buddies - Kirsty and her daughter Yuan.

The whole group.  Really great company for the evening!

Aiyo!!  This pizza was HUGE!  Now we're showing TingTing how it's done in America!

Now THIS is good pizza!

TingTing thought so too!

Ok, last pictures from yesterday.  Now you see why I didn't want to finish last night!  The only Play-doh that TingTing has played with until tonight was just a tiny container and only in the van on the way to places.  Tonight Kirsty brought a whole tub of Play-doh to give to TingTing - along with several other very fun and kind gifts.  She loved the Play-doh, as do most three year olds I suppose!