Unusual customs

On Wednesday the driver picked us up as promised and took us to the bank. The whole front of the bank was a glass wall and when you went in you went to the booth where the teller sat behind a glass division. When I was about to leave I started walking back to the door to leave when the driver signaled me to stop and hit this button on the wall. The glass panel slid aside and let us out. You wouldn’t have known it was a door otherwise.

The driver then took us to RT Market, which is the closest thing they have to a Walmart. When he dropped us off he was very apologetic but said he couldn’t wait for us and there was no charge. We went into the market and wandered around. The first floor was much like a mall in the US with lots of little specialty shops. We decided to go to the second floor and went to the escalators. The escalators here are quite different than in the US. Instead of having stairs they are completely flat just like a conveyor belt. It turns out that the escalators skip the second story and go to the third. This floor was much like a WalMart without the food. You then go back down to the second story, which is the grocery store. The first thing you see when you enter on the left is dried, dehydrated ducks. It made Rosetta’s stomach do flips just looking at it.

We bought a few groceries and made it thru the checkout line and back down to the first floor and out. We wandered around the city a little bit trying to find our hotel but ended up taking a taxi back. Fortunately Lucy had written the name and address of the hotel in Chinese for us so we just had to show it to the driver. The taxi cost 10 RMB, which is about $1.30.

This morning we went down to breakfast. Yesterdays breakfast had been pretty decent so I decided to try a little of everything. This was fine until I got to one dish and realized it was chicken with the bones still in it. I remembered reading in the travel guide that they cook the chicken with the bones in it and its perfectly acceptable to spit the bones out on the floor. I decided not to push my luck and instead put them in the ashtray on the table. Oh yes, you can smoke just about anywhere over here.

After breakfast we took a stroll around the city for about two hours and were proud that we were able to do it without any difficulty. We went to the supermarket again and bought some produce .

We went back to our room and packed all our stuff for the move to the hospital. The one piece of sage advice I’d have is “when you travel internationally, pack as light as you can”. Now granted we’re living here for a month so it’s a little different, but man, we have a lot of stuff. I think it came to 7 suitcases, a laptop bag, a diaper bag and a backpack. Ouch. It took two trips to get it to the hospital in the car.

We’ve been here since noon just getting settled in and talking to the doctors and other patients. There are people here from all over the world. Currently Malaysia, Australia, Azerbaijan, Canada and the USA are represented.

We ordered out for dinner. It was two large rice bowls and cost 10 RMB, which, as stated above, is about $1.30. There wasn’t even a charge for delivery and they don’t tip here.

That’s all for now. Thank you for all the prayers and please keep them up. Sierra needs them and we need them.
Posted from Hangzhou on 4/9/09 at 7:55 PM China time