Mommy gets a turn

Continuing with yesterday…after naptime was over we finally ventured out of our hotel room. We met Anna in the lobby and she walked us over to a few good local noodle joints to give us some options outside the hotel. Then we made our way slowly back and found a market packed with stalls. We bought some pink Hello Kitty hair clips (a few people have referred to Nika as a boy…) and then spent some time picking out a beautiful Golden Piggy bracelet for Fei (I didn’t find out what stone it is but I assume it is amber), and for me a red quartz pendant on a beautiful knotted cord. For this entire one-hour outing I carried her in the sling facing inwards. The afternoon was pretty warm and muggy and we were both soaked! Then we wandered through an electronics store looking for IPhone prices before meeting everyone in the restaurant to celebrate Alison’s birthday.

All the babies were pretty playful at dinner – I think everyone had had a relaxing day. I held Fei Fei for most of dinner and she was pretty active. Gravity games and high fives are her big thing. Uncle Marty will be glad to know that she later took up chopstick percussion activities. The hotel presented Alison with a beautiful cake!

This morning we heard back from Dr. K and got instructions: antibiotics for the ear infection (tastes good, goes down great), Tylenol for the ear pain (also nummy), and saline drops in her nostrils for the congestion (not as fun). I am eager to get some results with this regime before our first airplane ride to Beijing on Saturday.

Last night I spent what seemed like hours managing all our belongings and planning for today. I made up three bottles and packed the diaper bag, checked the forecast and laid out her outfit. This morning we packed up three bags of laundry, including the results of her first Really Big Poop!

We took a bus tour of Chongqing with Michael, our guide and learned a few tidbits. We drove through areas of very old housing that will be torn down soon for modern high rise development and saw people moving out, with their possessions covering the sidewalks. These buildings are on steep hillsides and looked quite treacherous and run down. The tenants are receiving settlement money to move out. Because it is so mountainous there are very few bicycles here. People mostly drive, take taxis, motorcycles, or “Bus Number 11,” which is walking on two legs.

Then we visited the residence of General Stilwell, who is commemorated here for his involvement with supporting China against the Japanese invasions during WWII. Across the street was the Flying Tiger museum where we were presented with a slide show and lecture about the military activities during the war. Wolfgang took in more of this than I was able to as Fei Fei and I were exploring face-out sling carrying, which leaves both our hands and feet free for clapping and kicking!

After the slide show an art professor from the local art school, one of three famous schools in China, demonstrated a peony painting. We learned about the symbolism of the imagery and then purchased a peony painting with Xue Fei’s name and birthday. However, we could not resist the pandas climbing an apple tree or the crane paintings! In the next room we admired a beautiful wall scroll of yellow birds on a tree branch. We tried to be frugal and promised to come back on our next visit to Chongqing and buy a painting then, but this was unacceptable. Once I told them I was an art professor, they were bound and determined that we would buy that painting, and offered us half off. We tossed in 2 banyen leaf skeleton paintings for an additional 200 RMB, one of Old Chongqing, and another Chrysanthemum, the flower of fall.

Then we visited a park and climbed the steep walkway to the tallest point in Chongqing, although the mist prevented us from seeing much. Then we had a wonderful tea demonstration and sampled jasmine, ginseng and lychee/oolong teas, with pickled olives and cocoa biscuits. Fei Fei nibbled on the biscuits and licked tea off my fingertips! She also got lots of attention from all the ladies in the tea shop. There we continued indulging ourselves and bought tea + two beautiful tea cups. It now occurs to me we should have bought three!

Even after her bottle she was quite playful after we came back to the room, but W and N are now happily assuming the naptime position. Boy I wish I could get me some naptime too…