Day 4

First, we want to thank everyone for your posts. We are really enjoying hearing from you when we login each day. Last night the families were rolling in, and we were able to have supper with Ken and Rossette, Ed, Lisa and Josh, and Juleen and Jim. It's so exciting to have everyone here with whom we were conversing via the Internet.

The smog is really bad here today. It's probably not unlike turning on your car and closing your garage door. Mmmmm, so fresh. It's basically a "clear" day, but the smog has made it not only cloudy, but it's foggy as well. The view into the distance has been cut down by about half.

Today we ventured into the Forbidden City, so named because it was off limits for 500 years. This was the "home" to two dynastys of empires in China. We are going here again tomorrow with the group, but considering its size, we wanted to have an opportunity to adventure into some of the nooks and crannies. One slight disappointment there is the construction -- Beijing is really gearing up for the Olympics -- so some of the complexes largest structures are rimmed and hidden by construction tarps and scaffolding.

We also returned to Jingshan park across the street, as it's only 25 cents to enter. This time we vistited the tea house, where we relaxed and were served tea in traditional Chinese style. The young woman there spoke excellent English. She is from western China, near Tibet, and is in Beijing studying English and computers.

Tonight our group activity begins as we head out to see Chinese acrobats. Sweet.