All Things Good To Eat

This trip is turning out to be as much a culinary experience as it is a cultural and adoption one. We took a morning trip to Hunan University's campus to walk around and explore their Confucius temple. It is the oldest university in China. One of the buildings was built in 976 AD. On the sides of the entry way are 2 quotes from eminent Chinese scholars that basically say that all the best people go to the school and all the best people are from Hunan Province. Of course, we know that already since Hannah is from here. Oh, by the way, Mao once taught at the school.

We had lunch again at our favorite restaurant off the hotel lobby. We continue to explore the many options from throughout the country plus order some of our favorites. Hannah gets to sample almost everything that we try. She is such a good eater. We are very excited. So far she has tried pumpkin, egg plant, spicy noodles (maybe too spicy), fermented soy beans, steamed egg, smoked tofu, watermelon, grapes, and yogurt. We even gave her shad roe at the Japanese restaurant we ate at the other night. It was a big hit.

Lunch was followed by a meeting to go over the paperwork we will need for our meeting at the US Consulate. We are flying to Guangzhou tomorrow for the next to last leg of our journey. Hannah needs to get a visa in order to enter the States. The process includes a medical examine, an interview and a few pictures. The whole process will be complete by Thursday.

For dinner tonight we ate again at the Japanese restaurant, only this time we had a feast. Anli, our Chinese coordinator, accompanied us and whenever she is around the ordering improves tremendously. We must have had about 8 courses. The meal started off with the table side chef preparing really large shrimp. She meticulously cut, peeled and cleaned each one and carefully set the heads off to one side. They were seasoned and cooked throughout the whole meal, at which point she delicately served one to each of us. I told her eating shrimp heads was against my religion, but she wasn't buying it (maybe if she spoke English I would have gotten off the hook). The instructions were to eat them shell and all. I could only bring my self to try a few bites from the neck side. There was no way I was downing the whole thing. As the saying goes 'When in China'. They were very crunchy and tasted a little like overcooked popcorn.

After dinner, we all rushed up to Anli's hotel room where we were met by the lovely ladies from the photo studio with our albums. For those of you not following the blog religiously, you need to know we all went to have our girls photographed at a local place that was recommended to Anli by another guide. The experience was a bit kitschy, but fun nonetheless. Hannah got to try on many different traditional outfits and she was a hit with her big smile and happy disposition. We ordered a package deal that included a book, a small folding screen, book marks, and wallet cards. We look forward to sharing some of the items with the grandparents.

Michelle has done a great job of packing up all our stuff, which has unexplainably grown since we arrived almost beyond the capacity of our available luggage space. I foresee another suitcase in our future for the trip home.

In closing, I have to mention that Hannah is saying Da Da. Michelle claims that she doesn't associate the words with me yet, but my head and heart are swelling regardless.

Andrew