Fiji. It's just paradise. It really is straw huts, outdoor showers, sandy floors, blue/green water like you see in pictures, fly nets over the beds, amazing food with Fijians playing music in the background, beach volleyball, hiking, finding coconuts-cracking them open- eating/drinking what's inside, cave excursions, all on lots of little volcanic islands scattered in the ocean. Some islands are maybe 3 miles wide; some islands (like that last one we stayed on) could fit inside the area of a high school running track. I'll say it's not perfect, but it's paradise. I mean you'd have to love a remote summer camp atmosphere to think it's paradise. Sometimes there are no showers, sometimes you have to do weird dances, sometimes you have to lay in a hammock for hours. To me though, that's paradise.

Below: The Boys

Fiji: White Korovu/ Whitesandy Beach Resorts

Coming home soon. Will be bouncing back from Orlando to Jax getting things organized and it looks as though I'll be in Jax from January to the summer. My international job prospects did not produce much fruit but I'm always looking for opportunities.

If you can send me your phone number via e-mail to esten5@yahoo.com - I'll catch up with you when I get back. My phone was stolen a while back.

Our last night in Fiji really capped off the trip. The night was winding down, after midnight, and about 15 people pulled up chairs together on the beach of this tiny island (you can run around the whole circumference in one and a half minutes!) talking about our trips. Fiji seems to be a final destination for most travelers and we went around the circle- everyone talking about why this had been the best trip of our lives, why they had left home, what this time had meant to them, and having not much of an idea what's next.

At some point in your life, whoever is reading this, I hope you decide to leave. Leave wherever it is that is home, and go. Go to Aisa, go to Africa, road trip around the US; put yourself in a situation that will allow you to see how others live. Go for as long as you can, a week in Italy, or 6 months in Europe. Learn how others work and play, raise families and go to church, cook their meat and what they put eggs on. Listen to how others outside the US talk about your homeland. Listen to how others talk about their own. Hike unfamilair terrain. Listen to the rhythms of traditional music. See stars at night you have never seen. Lose all your things, find what you are looking for. Watch other sports. Find out why Kiwis bicker with Oz but like each other maybe more than the Pomes.

My story is not like anyone else's. You have to find your own trip maybe- but go. At some point before it's too late go! Suggested Reading: Through Painted Deserts (Miller), Ecclesiastes (Solomon)

This place is pretty coup

We just arrived in Fiji and it feels like a sumer in Florida, weather I rather enjoy actually. I'd like to wrap up Australia though with some of their terminology:
G'day Mate: Hello friend
How you going?: What's up?
Schoolies: high school kids going crazy on their first week of school break
Sunnies, Boardies: Sunglasses, Bathing Suit/ Board shorts
Righty-Oh: Ok
Bugger Off: Head out
Heaps: lots (of something)
Good on ya: Good for you, way to go
Reckon: I think
Akubra: Traditional australian felt hat
Breakky: Breakfast
Full on: intense, hardcore
Rubbish: trash
Bollocks: BS (lots of Brits use this too)
Skirmish: Paintball
Esky: Cooler or Refridgerator
For-deen: Fourteen
Cheers: Thanks
No Worries: Your Welcome

You can find other Aussie terms in books- but these things we heard the whole time we were there. It's legit.

We will spend the next 7 days island hopping on the Yasawa island chain (part of Fiji). Fiji is actually an archipelago (meaning many islands) and Yasawa refers to grouping of some of those islands.

There's rumors of a coup with the army and the government over here but appears to by hype from the media. I will advise if Andy needs to fly some Marine Corps helicoptersover from Djbouti to rescue us.

Avatar

Our sailboat through the WhitSundays- Avatar, A "Trimaran" 3 hulled performance vessel. Avatar means 'perfect form' as the shape God would take if he came to earth, the legend has it. Blond/Orange Hair....early in the morning.
Hills Inlet near WhiteHaven Beach. Sometimes you see a painting of a beach and it's beautiful because it looks so much like a real beach. This beach was beautiful because the real beach looks like a painting. The sand is 99% silica- very fine and soft. As the tide draws in and out it swirls the clear blue water with the wispy sand in such a way as a painter would swirl colors on a palatte. The beach looks abstract. When real life looks like brush strokes on canvas- you get the most beautiful beach in all my travels.

Exercise in no worries

Losing stuff is like breaking up with a girlfriend. I just lost my wallet (credit cards, driver's license, a little cash). Your wallet, like a girlfriend, has been with you through good times bad times is fortified with useful and not useful things - but everything you want. Then, when it's gone, everything is very upsetting- you have to now find a new one and work out everything you need. You almost don't want to deal with replacing it. I'm going to have to get over some trust issue with my new wallet- that's for sure.

So we had an air hockey tournament at a truck stop outside a town called Gympie. They had the air hockey pucks but no hitters. I took out my wallet to use as a hitter and to the best of my knowledge I left it there. I only made it to the final round of the air hockey tourney- not much to say since there only 3 contenders. I have to replace the credit cards and all - but the closet storm now seems to be that I have no legal form of identification (no passport OR driver's license) except that Forrest and Andy could promise I am who I say I am. With a domestic and international flights coming up in less than a week- things my get fun. Nonetheless we just booked an awesome sailing trip at WhitSundays.

All in all I've really had no worries about it all. Things happen, you lose stuff, you just work it out. There's always a solution. There's always a greater Hope in it all as well that superceeds all things- good and bad.

Brisbane (give or take)

Rewind a few days- U2 Concert in Sydney. Kanye West opened up and was entertaining but the crowd was not really there for him. Despite his attempts, U2 fans didn't really want to jump up and get low. U2 played an awesome show with many of their greatest hits. Between songs Bono preached propaganda for world peace.

Next stop...Byron Bay (Pictured above). One of my favorite stops though we were there only for a day. Beautiful long beaches with mountains in the background and a lighthouse out on the cliffheads. Easy going and out of the way enough to keep the bustling crowds away. On our way up the Gold Coast to Surfer's Paradise we stopped off at a waterfall for about 3 hrs to enjoy nature. During this time someone enjoyed some of our belongings after breaking into the car. It's done, the only thing worse than that would be if, a few days later I tried to bleach my hair and it turned out orange. If anyone knows a good remedy for orange hair, please advise.

Surfer's Paradise was nice but a little too similar to Daytona or Panama Beach for us. We headed to Brisbane where we've been for a couple days. We took a side trip out to Stradbroke Island and it was a great change of scenery. The Mountains run most of the way up Australia's coast so the past week we have been able to enjoy beaches one day alternating with moutains/rain forrest/waterfalls the next. Full on good fun.

The beach at Byron's Bay. Some tourists bought Australian Speedos and posed at the beach. Ridiculous if you ask me...
The break-in. Administratively we have some issue with getting passports and plane tickets back, but I'm sure they'll work out. We mainly lost items that had heaps of personal worth. It's interesting- what can be taken from you, and what can't.
Me and a Koala enjoying some fine Eucalyptus leaves. This is a set-up, they are not too friendly in the wild and humans can't eat Eucalyptus. In Australia they do have a drink however with Aloe Vera chunks floating around. It's really very good.

Going to another rugby game tonight and then head futher up the coast towards WhitSundays. Type "Whitsundays" into google pictures and check it out. We'll probably take a few days to sail around those islands and then to Cairns for a final showdown at the Great Barrier reef among other excursions.

Ouch

After getting back in the car, Forrest said, "Atleast we still have our Australian Speedos." I said, Atleast we all have girlfriends." Andy, poor lad, all he could say was, "I lost everything." Only my comment proved to be untrue.

Our car was broken into. Andy really did lose both bags he brought with everything in them. We lost an ipod, journals, cell phones, my passport, keys, bibles, all our pictures before Sydney, glasses, backpacks. Eeesh.

Atleast we're still alive, healthy, and having a good time! No worries...

Blue Mountains return and Esther

Dayna (left) and Sarah (right) from Ontario Canada hiked with me through the Blue Mountains for two days. They were awesome and really made the trip. The three of us also had an opportunity to name one of the waterfalls in the valley so we chose: Siknah Falls (combining our names). It's a small waterfall really, no more than 6 feet high, and though you may not see it on any maps.....well.....how many people can say they've named a waterfall, eh?
This is a view into the valley. The mountains are called blue because they look blue. Except in this picture. An oily mist rising from the Eucalyptus trees are what gives the mountains a blue haze. Admittedly, the mountains did look blue but I think most mountains look like that from a distance. This waterfall is called Bridal Veil. We were able to walk around the top of it and then trekked down to the bottom of it (seen in this picture).

Back in Sydney I decided to stay at the Wizard of Oz hostel near Coogee beach. This is the first uni-sex bathrooms I've been in where you can brush your teeth, do your laundry, take a shower, and go #1 and #2 within a space of ten feet. Add a few guys and girls- I've never before brushed my teeth amongst so many people and sounds and smells.

As I was eating a BOC (bowl of cereal- Dix family jargon) that night in my room I met a friendly couple from Israel. They said they had met a lot of people from Israel in Australia and seen a lot of "Judiasm food". My obvious lack of cultural knowedge came out when I asked, "Are you Jewish?" Their reply was, "Yes, we are all Jewish." Oddly, the conversation suddenly moved to Halloween. I told them our traditions are harmless but the day represents witches and goblins. They found that funny because Halloween translates to All Saints Day in their culture. Israelis- 2; Michael- 0.

They said the day they dress up is called Queen Astor Day. Back in the day there was this queen who protected her identity by dressing up or something. I thought that was silly until I realized that they were trying to say, "Queen Esther Day." And I was suddenly enlightened. I carry a book with me that has old maps of Israel in it and the Israeli couple pointed to where they grew up- I thought that was just awesome. The guy grew up in a Moshav (neighborhood) in the Jordan Valley. Yeah that's right near the Jordan river. Epic-
I then faulted them for not carrying around a map of where I grew up. Final score: Israelis- 3; Michael- 1

Then next day I visited a beach called Maroubra. I had heard that there was a spot to cliff jump into the ocean. I walked up to the edge of many cliffs contimplating the best spot to jump off when I came to a plaque set into the stone right at the edge of the cliff. Feeling a little better that this might be the spot - I bent down to read the plaque. Instead of reading: "Jump from here" it was someone's grave stone. Something about a guy that died and the stars will watch over his ocean grave. Awful. I decided this wasn't the best spot to jump and walking further I came to another grave marker! Utterly discouraged I did no cliff jumping. The rest of the beach was nice though and I watched the surfers take a few sweet rides before heading off to the University of Sydney for a look-see.

Andy arrives on Saturday and Forrest gets back on Sunday. We have U2 coming up on Monday and might try to squeeze in a Cricket game as well.

Blue Mountains, eh?

This picture is the famous Bondi Beach. Usually littered with surfers today there was a lone jet ski zooming around- usually a sign that a ferocious killing shark dragon found his way in a bit too close and the waters were evacuated to try and scare the shark back out to sea.

The next picture is the Tri-Nations rugby "match" (not game) where the Britain Lions upset the Auatralian Kangaroos. The game is similar to football: There are 5 opportunities to advance. When someone is tackled they get up, hike or push the ball back between their legs and someone else on the team picks it up to run it or pass it to another player (no forward passes though). On the 5th try they usually punt it down field. All this happens with no stoppage of time- continuous play unless someone scores or has a penalty. No pads are worn that we could tell- it was "full on" mate. Scoring is generally the same as well.

Forrest left for a week to go to New Zealand which should be a great side trip. I made plans to head to the Blue Mountains for a couple days and happened across two Canadian girls who wanted to do the same. I guess my Ford Falcon is cheaper than a tour bus (though they haven't seen it yet) and I'd enjoy the company so we're headed out of Sydney tomorrow to the mountains for a couple days.

Another Aussie term: Brekky (means Breakfast)

HAND WASH ONLY

Welcome to Lake Wobegon, where all the women are strong, all the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average. We are now staying on Bondi Beach (rhymes with bonzai not blondie) near Sydney which is best described as a celebrity beach. There are more people there running, working out, flexing, surfing, and looking good than there are people just hanging out. It's an experience. Some women actually forget to wear their bathing suit tops! How embarrassing that must be for them! Most of the beaches around here are very small and crescent inland from peninsular cliffs. I've done some of my best bodysurfing ever here. The water is cold but awesomely clear and even clean to the taste- if that relates. Dodge all of the poisonous things and Bondi is world class.

We have been able to volunteer some of our time working with Hillsongs church and their community outreach. We actually heard about the church from the staff at two of the hostels. They seem to have a positive presence in the city.

During a BBQ last night we met this guy from England who, after scoring some cash from harvesting sugar cane for 3 weeks, got a tattoo on the back of his leg which said: HAND WASH ONLY. It also has the random symbols with it that you can see on the washing instructions on the tags of certain clothing. It made my day. I hope it makes his life. Something else weird, I see the best ice cream flavors all around me. I'll be walking down a muddy sidewalk and see colors that look like Double Death Chocolate Fudge ice cream. Another one I see frequently in the sand is Cinnimon ce cream with Butterfinger bits. Next time you're out and about, try to see all the scrumptous ice cream around you.

I found a scary book in one of the Hostels about the world ending. Despite the scariness there was a good quote I thought I'd share: "A man has to have some kind of devotion in his life, some frame of reference, some surety outside himself. That instinct is born in us. Pervert that instinct, deny it, and Hell will step in to fill the emptiness that should have been filled with God."

Some upcoming events we will be going to: Tri-Nations Rugby (Aus vs. Eng), Australian International Motor Show, U2/Kanye West concert, and maybe a confusing Cricket match. Cheers, mates.

Specky

Out of Sydney we headed through the Snowy Mountains through the Australian Alps, along the way seeing wild horses and 10 old M5 BWM's racing to a town called Thredbo. This allowed us to get up early the next day to hike to the top of Mt. Kosciaskscozzoco (not spelled right out of spite because I could never pronounce it correctly). This notably is the highest peak in Australia. Aslo notable, as Forrest pointed out once we reached the top, "I'm sure this is the only continent that an old person could wheelchair up to the top of their highest mountain." Turns out from Thredbo you can take a chair lift up most of the way and then there is a steel grated pathway up the rest of the way. Austrailia is not known for its mountians. We of course, hiked the mess out of that mountain for 15 mile roundtrip specky adventure. "Specky" is abbreviated slang for "spetacular".

We travelled on to Canberra, the nations Capital city. My brother is always impressed that no one knows the Capital of Australia (and he does of course). From talking with the local Aussies and our tour books, the city was not hyped up to even worth driving through. We decided to anyways and got to see their Parliment building and go to their Museum of History. The most interesting thing about the Museum was that on the exterior they used braille artistically in the architecture with phrases like, "Love is Blind," and "Mate". As a scholar of Braille I was quite impressed and wished my fried Heidi (and her Mom who taught me braille) could have seen it. Heidi incorporates braille into her artwork though I first saw this method used by the infamous artist Cartier Henderson.




We are now in Sydney. We're staying at a hostel called "Jolly Swagman" in the dodgy Kings Cross area of town. Somehow Forrest has managed to make it this whole trip without shower shoes. Amazing. These are bathrooms where I have liberally been applying the toilet-paper-on-the-toilet-seat method for protection. Jolly Swagman. Also, you can order almost anything in Australia with egg on it, culinarily speaking.

peephole INTO people

Alright, I stuck my hand inside a Kangaroo's pouch thing. And a Wallaby's (like a kangaroo but smaller) pouch as well. I'm not sure if that breaks a law, violates animal rights, or simply goes against a standard of decency- ask me about it later if you want details. The picture here is me feeding/hugging one of the many "roos" at an animal conservatory park on Phillip Island off the coast near Melbourne. We were able to see Kangaroos, Wallabies, Taz Devils, Dingoes, Wombats, snakes, birds, and other random local beasts. The night before we were audience to little fairy penguins coming in from the ocean and walking up the beach to their nests. Goofy little buggers they are. For the next few days we will head up through the mountains towards Sydney. Looking forward to meeting up with our buddy Andy Cochran on the 10th!


about people: Sometime after midnight about 20 people gathered from around the globe- from Israel to Ireland to Korea sitting on the side of the street on milkcrates drinking somehting squeezed out of a bladder in a blox, smoking and singing along with two guitar players trying to collect money in a hat from people walking by. You might find this at a University, Church, or Company event; what separates this group is that they are all backpackers staying at the Melbourne Travelers Hostel on King St. (similar to OBT in O-town or Phillips Hwy in J-ville).

They all have a similar interest for a certain kind of travel. I've seen it within the culture of surfers, people of faith, and probably astronauts. There is instant credibility between backpacker travelers and everyone looks out for each other. They live for the moments- singing old songs on the street, losing stuff, going somewhere without directions, trading stories about cars not starting up, and the big moments when they know they have arrived at something beautiful - walking around the corner to see the perfect beach, the top of some big rock. Its about the moments: good, bad, fun, sad - when the sum of all these in past present and future are worth whatever they had to do to get there. That's what every backpacker knows and respects when they meet another on the same journey.

Serve's Up

Forrest and I dueled out some tennis at Rod Laver tennis complex show court #1 where the Australian Open is every year.
This is at the "Breakaways" where the sea used to come up to. As we headed further south we saw a lot of dried up lake beds full of salt- we figured those were left by the receding sea as well.
Two beauties in this pic:
1. Our '91 Ford Falcon Station Wagon
2. Ayer's Rock (not to scale- the rock is much bigger)
We found this place in the middle of the night in search if Pimba. This is us trying to sleep on the top of the station wagon. When we woke up the next morning we realized the camp site butted up to a dried out lake bed used for ammunition and bombing tests.
We found this place after we woke up in Portland, Australia. It is reffered to as Yellow Rock and is a surfer haven in this small town.

I have been in Melbourne for the past few days. I get up in the morning and walk around the city and by afternoon find a grassy park to take a nap. Today we walked around, played tennis at the Rod Laver Arena and then took a nap in the Royal Botanical Gardens. Backpacking is tough.

It's interesting, traveling and seeing sights and meeting new people is a most awesome time and I would not trade this experience. I would also never trade my times at home though- like going to Sonny's with family and friends after a ballgame. Mmmmm BBQ.

A dingo took your sandal?

Listening to old tapes (beach boys, eagles) or a rigged up ipod, drinking iced coffe out of a carton, eating cold soup out of a can opened with pliers, in a beater '91 Ford Falcon station wagon, always looking forward to the next sunset and the always clear night sky that follows, sleeping outside in just a sleeping bag, searching for Ayers rock, searching for the Breakaways and a little town called Pimba where you can spin and see a dead flat horizen for 360 degrees, passing road train Semi trucks with 3 to 4 trailers on a 2 lane highway on a road with no speed limit, cooking my own meat on the barbie, foiled by the dingo that took Forrest's sandals; not to much to fill your head except open space, earth colors, and animal crossing signs, and when taking a shower is therapeudic you know you've traveled 3500 km through the Outback of Australia.

Relative to other circumstances, we're not roughing it too bad, but it has been marvelous to spend a few days when you just look forward to sunrises/sets, stars at night, and driving through peace- the boonies of the red center.

Ayer's Rock. You may have seen pictures of this before, maybe not, but it is a gigantic rock in the middle of approximately nowhere. We got to it and took about two hours to walk around it the first day. The local Aboriginals actually call it "Uluru". We figured when the white men settled the area and found it some guy said, "That's a big arse rock!" in Aussie drawl and the guy writing stuff down on the map figured he said, "big ayer's rock". The Aboriginals don't really want you to climb this rock but the next morning when Forrest said we was gonna climb it, I couldn't let my mate (aussie for buddy or friend) go alone.

We followed a chain rail fence up the first part and then I followed Forrest up the part with no gaurdrail, or net or anything that would catch you falling. It was pretty smooth until we crested a part mid-way up with sustained winds howling through so hard that you could lean forward it the windforce would hold you up. I most certainly was about to panzy out when Forrest smiled and said it would be alright and kept going. Somehow we made it safely to the top of this rock and it was truly amazing. Many thanks to Forrest or I wouldn't have done it.

For tracking purposes we've been: Darwin-Tenant Creek-Devil's Marbles-Alice Springs-Ayer's Rock-Coober Peady-Pimba-Adelaide and today we drove through the Great Ocean Highway which is a road that runs along the bottom of Austraila's coast to Melbourne. Beautiful beaches and waves off cliffed shorelines that separate the ocean from farmland. Postcard material and reminded me of NZ.

We'll be in Melbourne for the next 3 or 4 days. Currently we are investigating the Australian people to determine why they are so friendly. It's truly amazing- from gas station workers to DMV clerks to students to business people young and old - they all will drop whatever they are doing just to inquire how they can help you out. More on that later. We also bought classic Aussie hats- Forrest has an "Akubra" and I bought one that is "Jackaroo" brand. Most excellent those hats are.

No Rules, Just Right

We came across some weird statues. This one had his butt stuck up in the air. Some other tourist decided to pay due respect to the Chinese culture.
This was taken cruising through one of the great gorges on the Yangtze River. The Crocs are working out great by the way and seem to be popular around the world.
Reed Flute Cave. This picture came out great though the cave had been "Disneyed up" a lot. It had the Stalacktyes and Maglites and the usual cave stuff. To make it more appealing they tried to convince us to see all of these shapes made by the cave walls- like flowers and lions and fruit.

This family took us in while we were in Singapore (Jade, Dan, Forrest, Julie, Me, and Kim - the Long Family). We are eating dinner at a great local Indian restraunt served quasi-Texas de Brazil style on a Bannananana Leaf. The two little girls Jade and Julie were adorable.

Singapore was very modern and very exciting with a flair for cultural style from a lot of backgrounds and apparently a hub for Financial, Shipping, and Industrial stuff for Asia.


I get to ponder life a lot on this trip. Something I started to see is that there are layers to life. People have layers - any given day you meet someone and get a snapshot of who they are but they have layers of experiences and influences and everything else that has brought them to where they are right now. Buildings have layers; and food, and wars and songs and seasons and atomic fire ball candy. To better understand something it helps to understand the layers and the process they came to be.

You can just look around and, if you want, you can start to see things in layers. Not sure if it will help you or anything, but it seems to give depth to everything- if that's what you are looking for.

We are now in Darwin and are about to buy a car. 1990 something Ford Falcon. It seemed to be the best way to get around so we went for it. We'll be heading down through the middle of Australia for the next few days in hopes to catch Ayers Rock.

After that to Melbourne- and I'll have an update for you then.

Visual aids

The first picture is a little kid on the streets of FengDu city.

Our time in China has been filled with moments of, "Oh I'd love to climb this or that." When we arrived in Guilin with an afternoon to kill, out of our hotel window we saw this mountain a few miles away. After winding through a few neighborhoods we eventually found access and blazed our way up to the top. This place makes you want to write poems, or paint pictures, or simply be thankful.
Gator Chomp on Mao
This is Guilin as well. The mountain behind me actually looks like an elephant and is the symbol of the city. I promise this is an ancient Chinese dance that everyone does with elephants....
This was from the flight over to China. This stuff went on as far as the eye could see out the little plane window.
Also my beard is as long as the hair on my head. I know that's not saying much, but I'm proud of it. You may be thinking that is either great or really really awesome. Also last night I ate the meat, stomach, kidney, and skin of a cow and/or sheep. That's what happens when you walk into a restraunt and the only way to order is to point to what the guys at the next table are eating.

Bits and pieces

About a week ago we found ourselves on a cruise ship headed down the Yangtze river from Yichang towards Chonqing (chon-cheeng) about. Most of the passengers were about 40 years older than us and came from the lands of Canada, Singapore, Malaysia, Australia, China, and Germany (I wrote and performed a song w/guitar about this to the whole ship during talent night!). Every tour group we have been on they instinctively refer to us as "the boys".

The boys, the only two passengers from the US, lived it up on the cruise seeing the Three Gorges Dam, the actual three gorges (huge and beautiful- my favorite part), Shennong River (almost naked locals paddle you around in pea-pod boats), FengDu City (a ghost city - I think they made it up but had great scenery for some more Kung-fu pictures). We learned how to play Maijong- a traditional chinese game similar card games and dominos.

We have found out that by saving $150 USD off the total trip cost we opted not have service provided between airports and train stations and tour guides. We arrived in Yichang knowing we had to find our way to a cruise ship at some port by the end of the night. All we had was piece of paper with a phone # on it. No name or instructions or address. Just a phone number. Through a series of events of having very friendly Chinese people call and take us around in taxis we somehow have found our way on this trip. The morning comes to leave the cruise ship and all our itinerary basically says is, "Flight transfer to Guilin" - no directions - we didn't even have the tickets! As we leave the ship, someone mysteriously comes up to us, hands us plane tickets, and we're off using hand signals to communicate to the taxi to take us to the airport. All in all this has proved to be very exciting and adventurous....always waking up not knowing how to get to the next destination haha.

A few cultural things: many guys roll shirts about half way up to cool off their bellies. Many people ride bikes. The childrens' mannerisms are the same in China as in US- playing games, nagging their moms, and trying not to step on cracks in the sidewalks. The public toilet really is a hole in the ground- but with correct posture can prove to be very efficient. Spicy food eaten will mostly likely be spicy coming out the other end. Everyone knows how to say, "Hello" and love to say it to westerners. Smog is everywhere and it is ridiculus- can make for great pictures though. China is building (construction) like they are going to take over the world. We haven't seen very many animals. Everyone wears pants (never shorts) and shoes (never sandals). Chinese people take on Classic American names like Bob and Lucy; in response I have taken on the Chinese name of Qin after one of their dynasties.

We've also seen the terra cotta warriors and are now in a city called Guilin which is beautiful all over. Hope all is well back home-

Lost in time

Oct 4th- we saw Tian'nenemenen Square, Forbidden Palace, and Temple of Heaven today. Basically these were very important places to the Emperors of the Ming and Qing Dynasties. I'm not sure who the Mings and the Qings are but they had some huge houses. They used lots of symbolism in their architecture and artistic design which I found most interesting. Apprently lots of other Chinese people think this is interesting as there were lots of Chinese tourists there. Lots of them. Very very many.

Of all the things that you might think would cause a major mishap- language barrier, money, directions, indigestion- we ended up missing our train to Xian because we failed to translate the military time posted on our train ticket (20:28 is 8:28 not 10:28)- Lt. Yi will be ashamed.

This poses a problem considering that even if we had caught the train to Xian, we weren't sure where to go to next. We found ourselves now a day late to a tour that was confusing to follow already. As we searched for a hotel for the night in an unknown part of Beijing- many locals offered to take us to a hotel. We've learned in touristy places that many people that come up to you are trying to scam you. We decided to follow this one local through series of dark alleys to this hotel that he kept saying, "Just a little bit further". Some of beijing looks peaceful and friendly, this part did not. Every other shop in this alley appeared to be a hair salon with girls inside watching TV. I thought this was sketchy, Forrest reasoned that, "Well there ARE a lot of people that need haircuts here." We didn't know the culture enough to know if this is OK or if we were about to get jumped.

Somehow we arrived unharmed to this hotel that appeared mysteriously out of these alleys of death and the guy wanted to take us up to the room. For some reason the lady at the front desk did not need any sort of deposit from us. We reluctantly got into an elevator for this local guy to take us to our hotel doom. I honestly thought when the doors opened on Floor 2 that we would be done for. As the doors opened and we did not get ambushed- we decided not to get out of the elevator to see the room. We went back down and left the hotel very quickily. Ultimately we found took a cab to a hotel near where we had stayed the past few nights and it worked out just fine. God has certainly been with us this trip and everything has worked out when we weren't sure what to do or where to go. Many thanks to those who have been keeping us in their prayers.

Hope everything is great in the states- keep me up to date!

Lost in translation

DONG DA HOSPITAL FOR ANUS AND INTESTINE DISEASE. We arrived safely in Beijing. Our flight path from the U.S. to Beijing took us over the northern latitudes of the globe which provided great views of the vast expanse of ice and mountains that existst there. The only point of reference I can recall is that we eventually flew over Sibera. Hard to explain but I have never seen terrain like that before.

Coming to China I thought that Forrest and I would stick out a lot and draw a lot of attention. More of the opposite happens as it seems like wherever we go, not many people give us notice. So far the atmosphere has seemed very peaceful despite the business all around. I think because we can't read any signs or ads or understand any of the language we are less bombarded with information and marketing. You have to use context of what's happening to figure out if what is a restraunt and what is a "massage parlour" (a british bloke on our tour said the massage parlours can be a bit dodgy however)

Our first night in Beijing we hit the streets for some local cuisine and found a restraunt that had some guys sitting outside preparing meat on a stick that they would give a guy at a grill to cook. Other people were eating there and showed no signs of diarrea so we tried it out. Very good, I think it was lamb or aisan pork. She asked if we wanted to try some Beijing Beer for $2 a bottle. After trying to negotiate a discount we realized that our whole meal (8 sticks of meat and 2 Beijing Beers) was going to cost us $12 in chinese money- that's less than $2 dollars american! No worries!

Oct 3- we saw the Ming Tomb, and climbed up a section of the Great Wall. Both were impressive historically, visually, and architectually. The tour is laced with tourist traps to sell all sorts of things that we have been wise to stay away from except for a t-shirt that says "I climbed the Great Wall of China". towards the end of the day our tour stopped by a Hospital for us to get a free foot massage. Upon taking my pulse. the doctor, who was my age, determined that my "Chi" was slim or low and that I would be very suceptible to catching a cold. I told him I had been jacked up on Airborne for a while but he still seemed to think I needed to buy a speacial herb supplement.

Very big and interesting country. The people seem to be very communal- and walking around late at night seems quite safe.

Sorry for the typing errors and no pics- have the stuff on the screen is in symbols. Oh yeah, DONG DA HOSPITAL FOR ANUS AND INTESTINE DISEASE- the translation from Chinese to English on many signs is way off. We saw this on a sign above a urinal and determined that we never want to go to that place- whatever it is.

Final Preparations

Thanks for checking this out. A few more days before I leave- still doing some final planning. Please leave me some travel advice or words of wisdom if you'd like!