Fast forward: China and Vietnam

Starting Aug 30, 2007 D and I spent two months in China. We had trouble finding a place to upload pictures, so now that we're here in Vietnam and can actually access our blog, here are some pictures of a few of our adventures. We'll follow up more in depth one of these days.



BnD visit the Great Wall of China at Badaling


D flying a string of 30 kites at Tiananmen Square. The big picture of Mao is right behind B, who is taking the picture.


This is one of our favorite places to eat in Beijing. This cook made amazing Chinese hamburgers (dumplings) and fried corn fritter things. He was very friendly and made us feel welcome. Those are our red and blue bikes that we took all over town for three weeks in the background.


B flying the kites in Tiananmen Square.


BnD visit the Great Wall of China at Mutianyu.


D spends the afternoon with some Terracotta Warriors in Xian.


Your typical Chinese guy. There isn't a Chinese translation for "No shirt, no shoes, no service."


We took an overnight sleeper train from Xian to Chongqing.


Random Chinese people we met on the Yangtze River cruise.


The massive locks of the Three Gorges Dam.


D doesn't find the Three Gorges Dam as interesting as B.


Hong Kong.


Caught a flight from Hong Kong to Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), Vietnam on Oct. 28.
Spent almost two weeks there and then took three buses, two taxis and a ferry to Ben Tre deep in the heart of the Mekong Delta. We loved it. One day last week we took a combined boat ride/bicycle excursion on a local island. Definitely one of the best days of the journey yet. This is us seeing where rice comes from.


The local children on the island were really nice and very excited to meet us. They only see white people on TV.


Our mountain bikes and a bridge. Photo taken by our guide, Lan.


The Ben Tre Catholic Church was next door to our hotel. The bells rang at 4:30 and 5:00 a.m. EVERY morning.

We left the delta a few days ago and went back to Saigon to run a few errands and plan our next move. We'll keep ya posted.

Thankful to be in Vietnam

Hey, we're in Vietnam. Flew into Ho Chi Minh City Oct. 28 and have been exploring the Mekong Delta for over a week now.

Yes, they have Internet here, but we've been busy loving this place and have neglected the blog. Don't know if anyone still reads it, but if you do sorry about the lack of updates and we will be back soon.

Happy Thanksgiving, please eat some leftover turkey for us.

BnD

Random stuff we think and talk about...

D: So, in most parts of Asia it is about 3-5 yuan (50 cents) to use the Internet. Here at Lantau Island, off the shore of Hong Kong, it is about 35-45 Hong Kong dollars ($5-7 dollars). The price of a bloody mary or an overpriced beer. So...we have to by a drink in order to get on the net and email our mothers and grandmothers. We are just starting so hopefully you will not tell that we have had about three hours worth of drinks, I mean Internet time (not really).

So let me start us off. I did not tell B we are writing a blog until just now when I handed him the keyboard and he went blank. I caught him speechless...OH MY GOD....HELL IS FREEZING OVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

B: Ha ha ha, D.

D: So today we finally got a bike again and man does it feel good. Well, riding feels good but after about three or four hours on the bike our crotch does not feel so good. And I cannot even begin to tell you about the hills here. Lets just say there are a lot and they are steep. Or are we just weak? Amsterdam and Beijing are pretty flat.

Well, yesterday we decided to venture out on foot and headed to what looked like a seaside seafood restaurant. Say that three times fast!!!!

B: Seaside seafood restaurant, seesise seefoo restaurant, seeseme restroom stop...dang it.

D: Well, we both walk up this hill and take a gander at the menu. It did not fit our taste at the moment so we headed back. Before we looked the menu there was a cute little girl and I am always like, "Aww." DO NOT GET ANY IDEAS ANY OF YOU!!!!! When we walked back after seeing the menu I noticed that there was a hose of water spewing out by both of our feet. The little girl was actually a little boy. He just pulled out his little member and relieved himself only a few inches from our feet. WELCOME TO LANTAU ISLAND BnD!!!!

Things like this should not ever surprise us but they do. Things like what you may ask. The lack of manners and etiquette from the Chinese or Islanders. What ever do you mean by lack of manners, D? HHHHHHHHHHHHHHHMMMMMMMMM...where to start.

DISCLAIMER: We understand that we are foreigners in a foreign land and we take that to heart. We always think before we eat, speak, and relieve ourselves. We do not criticize people for their differences. We always just throw inhibitions to the wind and join in. BUT...sometimes it is hard. When in Rome...

B: Some of the cultural differences I really enjoy and are trying to work into my repertoire. One of my favorite is that in mainland China if you're in a nice restaurant and you get too hot it's totally acceptable to just take your shirt off at the table. The Chinese have never heard of "no shirt, no shoes, no service."

Another thing I like, which Deni thinks is just great, and I know my sister would love, is that you can spit just about anywhere and anytime you want to. We've been walking down streets in Beijing and hear a noise that makes us expect to see a lung just flop down on the pavement beside us. No, it's not a transplant patient rejecting a lung, it's grandma putting down one of the biggest lugees we've ever seen. No big deal in China. Also, it's okay to do this at dinner. We've been in pretty decent places and see people spit on the floor (which is also the place to ash your cigarettes--everyone smokes in China).

D: I actually got backsplash on my foot when that guy did that.

The Chinese have NEVER heard of Pampers or Huggies. This Chinese custom I am sure is older than the Han and Ming Dynasties put together. So if it ain't broke don't fix it right???? Folks, I am talking about N.B.B.!!!!!!

B: D, maybe the folks at home do not know what N.B.B. is. Maybe you should explain.

D: Guys, it's not some new disease like SARS. It stands for Naked Baby Butt. Hmmmmm. Where to start with NBB. Man. We both get freaked out thinking about it because we are afraid we may get sent to jail for 10-15.

The babies in China do not wear undies or dipers. They have a slit in the back of their pants and when they have to use the potty...they just go.

B: D, where do they go?

D: They go right there. No dipers. Just pavement, flower planter, wall, trashcan (possibly our foot). Just them and and the wind. I cannot even begin to explain this because it makes us feel weird. You just see naked baby butts everywhere. We have seen naked baby butts and other unmentionable naked baby parts that make us feel uncomfortable. We have seen naked baby butts poop in flower pots at the mall. We have seen naked baby butts pee in bottles at the Forbidden City. We have seen naked baby butts piss on the wall and on our feet instead of the trashcan less than a foot away from the handwashing station.

B: Even weirder is how parents baby their kids in China, especially the boys. We've seen some kids that are probably 8-10 years old getting their butts wiped and being carried around by their parents. We saw one 10 year old who still had to have his shoes tied by his mom.

D: Don't be jealous B.

B: I have good reason to be. I had a lot of trouble in kindergarten mastering shoelace tying. Mom can tell you. I really liked velcro.

Anyway, in China they have the One Child Policy and a culture that encourages the whole family to be very close. So that means, especially with a boy, the grandchild has four grandparents and two parents that spoil and dote on the child to an amazing degree. It's gotten so bad that the government now requires this new generation of "little emperors" to attend bootcamps to toughen them up.

D: You see alot of discipline for the girls but not the boys. I will see girls sit at the table and be perfect angels with the evil eye of grandmother. Then, you see the little boy hit, slap, an punch grandmother and she thinks it's the best thing ever. So weird.

B and I try to perfect our Chinese and right now...it still sucks. We walk through town and constantly say, "Nee-how!" which means "hello" in Chinese.

B: Actually, that means hello in Mandarin Chinese, which worked great in Beijing. In Hong Kong they talk Cantonese Chinese, which is completely different. So now we really can't communicate...luckily everyone speaks English here.

D: So when we are walking down the street and we see a little kid we are always like "Nee-how! Nee-how!". They are then encouraged by their folks to either a) say "hello" in English or b) talk to us. So, we have a three month old Chinese baby, who's hand is being waved wildy by grandmother or mother, saying, "HE-ROOOOW! HE-ROOOW!" Not to mention the younger schoolaged children who are encouraged by their folks to speak to us because we speak English. So B and I are enjoying our adult drinks (only a couple ;) ) and the view and we have a scared as hell ten-year-old boy being forced to practice his English by his hovering and scary father. Actually, I am not sure who was more frightend...us or the little boy.

B: They are seriously fascinated by us (actually white people in general) in large parts of China. In Hong Kong, of course, there are white people everywhere. In Beijing they're used to the tourists, but we got used to hearing the occassional "helloooooo" called out as we sped by on our bikes.

In central China it's a much different story. In Wushan, a town we overnighted in during our Yangtzee River cruise, we had people staring and following us around.

D: I know we said we like the attention, but when it's about ten o'clock at night and you have crowds of people following you, it can be a bit of a frightening experience.

B: The next day we visited the "Three Little Gorges" and a brand new city, built to replace one submurged beneath the rising waters behind the Three Gorges Dam. It was like nothing we've ever experienced. D and I walked into a town square and we had a crowd of 200 people stare at us and say "hello" in unison. We walked around them waving and saying nee-how. It was like we were celebrities.

D: We thought we were in trouble at first. Just 200 pairs of eyes and the sound of crickets chirping in the background. Finally after the first couple of "hello's" and tons of smiling and waving we knew that it was all good for us to be there. We felt like Bran-gelina...but only sexier. We told everyone we were Brad and Angelina and B just about gave a kid his autograph as "Steve Nash."

B: A few days later we got to Yichang, a small city by Chinese standards (population 4,000,000). It's not a regular stop on the tourist route, but we liked it. One night a woman approached me, handed me her baby and made me stand for a picture. Just because I was white and they'd never seen one of me before.

D: Maybe you forgot that I coaxed you to go to do dance at the public dance lessons being held in the middle of the city square. There are always public dance lessons being held and I got B to do some ballet with the rest of the children.

B: There were grown-ups there too.

D: Yes, B. All three of ya'll...the two dance instructors and you. Anyways, the sight of my six-foot butt tripping over the wall and my hiney in the air also attracted attention. Dontchya just love Americans!!!!

"You know what I would eat right now"

D: So there is this game. I started playing it with some of my girlfriends from Texas Girls' Choir when I was about 13 in Bangkok, Thailand or Warsaw Poland. It's called, "you know what I would eat?" It is a lot of fun, a bit depressing, and quite sad at times. Sad because there is no way in hell that we will get what it is that we want to eat. It is really a lot of fun because we laugh at ourselves then cry. Cry because where in the hell are you going to get a whataburger with cheese, mayo, no onions or tomatos in the middle of Valdai, Russia? NO WHERE!!!! That is when we cry and continue eating our horse meat perogis or stir fried dog.

B: That's been one of our favorite games to play over the last three months. We've been playing it a lot since leaving Beijing, because, believe it or not, China has a whole lot of Chinese food and sometimes you'd prefer something that doesn't have rice and you don't need chopsticks to eat.

D: These are the rules...there are none. Just, what would you eat. This is how it goes a lot of the time.

D: Dude, B. You know what i would eat right now???
B: Not Chinese food?
D: Yeah...I would eat a freaking Bloomin' Onion from OUtback Steakhouse and some chicken wangs!!!!

D: Now see? This is how it starts out. It starts out at , not so much high-end places, but very tasty places. As you will see in our game, the stakes do not get higher nor does the quality of places that we would eat at.

B: Man, I'd eat some Doe's steakhouse right now. I'd love a juicy steak and baked potato.
D: Man. I do not eat steak but I would eat that right now too. You know what I would eat? I would eat some of my grandma's caldo (Mexican chicken soup) or some El Tequila!!!!!!! Man, a margarita that would lay us out and some carnita's!!! Chips and salsa, OLE'!
B: You know what? I'd love to go to Dot's in Claremore for some biscuts and gravy, or man, Goodies Again, in Oologah, if it was still there.
D: Hell's yeah!!! Some of Wes' mushroom soup! DUDE.......SIX WORDS....OOLOGAH LUNCH LADIES CHILLI FRITO PIE!!!!! Top that!
B: Don't tell Dad I said this, but I'd love a Grand Slam from Denny's right now.
D: Whoa...you must be hungry. B, at this point...I'd eat Ponchos. Man, I would eat Cici's pizza. (For you Okie's...it's the equivalent of Pizza Time Buffet...NOT GOOD!) That is how hungry I am.
B: Dang D. You are hungry. Okay, I'd eat an unheated can of off-brand ravioli.
D: I can trump you...I would eat the jar of two year old expired Peter Pan peanut butter, a carrot, and a packet of Taco Bell mild sauce!

B: You get the idea...there are no winners to this game, but it gives us a chance to laugh
D: and cry
B: and think about some of the things we love about home. Well, in the last few days some of our wishes have come true and we have the city of Hong Kong to thank for that.

We got into town four nights ago and yes everyone, they have an Outback Steakhouse here where they made us the best bloomin' onion we've ever had. We had Italian food last night and believe it or not, there are not one, but two, Mexican restaurants on the other side of the harbor.

Deni said one night that while we're having fun out here on a long trip, it'd be nice to go home if just for a day or a week to be in our old skins again and then head back out. Hong Kong is as close as we've come. There is really no language barrier here and they have all the benefits of Western culture. The only drawback is the price...it's like visiting Manhattan.

D: This is not the Hong Kong I remember but I do like it. It seems to be very culturally challenged though. Oddly enough, I miss Beijing. Hong Kong is VERY westernized. If you want America, come here. If you want hu-tongs, cheap Chinese, bicycles and friendly people Beijing is it for you. We were told that people that ride bicycles were considered poor. Everyone here rides public transportation. Damn, give me a bike!!!! I do not care if I look poor because it gets me all over the place while I am burning calories. Maybe that is why people are fatter in Hong Kong than Beijing.

B: We're gonna be here for a few more days. We have hotel reservations up until Oct. 17. We'll see how we (and our bank account) feels after that. We've been looking at airfare for Bangkok. We really want to see a beach.

Miss ya'll.
DnB

By the way...

An "X" in Chinese is pronounced "Sh."

So..."She-an...more like She-ain't".


Ha ha ha

Xi'an...more like Xi'ain't

We'll make this short and sweet. We are here in the famous little town (3 million people) of Xi'an, home of the Terracotta Warriors. We were very excited to get here and see this world heritage sight. Amazing, it was. But this place is no Beijing. We have not seen drunks in the streets since a continent ago. WOW...seems like ages. We have not seen beggers in while either so they tend to offend you senses. You do not want to dislike people who are so nice and have smiles on their face but they constantly have their hands in your pocket.

Xi'an...XI'AIN'T!!!!

The place is alright compared to Moscow and that is not saying much.

We are heading south and where exactly we are not sure. It is turning fall here and getting cold quick. It's Friday and it feels like we are getting ready to head out to a high school football game and eat chili frito pie...big ups to the Oologah lunch ladies! (that means hello)

Thailand? Sounds Thai-riffic!!!!

This was written by deni d.

Nee-how from Xi'an

Hey everyone, it's been a while since we've blogged, but we've not forgotten about all our friends and family back home. We spent an extra week in Beijing. We finally left a couple days ago though. We took a sleeper bus, a bus with about 25 beds in it on an 18 hour trip to Xi'an, China, home of the Terracotta Soldiers. We'll be back online soon and give ya'll a complete rundown of what we've been up to, including:



1. The rules of bartering: Lowball. Take 95% off the asking price. Then walk away...don't worry, they'll chase after you, grab your arm and bring you back. Don't believe them when they tell you about how they made the item themselves...the next guy has one just like it. Voila! You've paid 35 RMB for something that started at 180 RMB...but you've probably still paid too much.

2. Mao under glass...Good, but no Lenin.

3. Violent and sexy movies on sleeper buses, with drivers that don't know the way. Stop in the middle of the road and call for directions. The bus ride was the longest we've gone in this country without hearing someone hock a lugie...they ran public service ads on the bus between Jean Claude Van Dam sex scenes and Hong Kong kung fu blood baths.

4. Hutongs and delicious food...it's nothing to see an old man with a cigarette in his mouth, petting his cocker spaniel while he's cooking your food.

5. How we miss the clear and fresh air of Dallas and Oologah (downwind from a coal power plant). It looks weird to see a picture of a Chinese person wearing gloves and a surgical mask riding a bike, but when you get here you'll understand.

6. They really are bad drivers. The stereotype is very true.

7. The butcher shop is not only a place to get meat, but to see cats roaming around.

8. We could tell you how your seafood is prepared, but believe us, you don't want to know. Luckily, we have video (that we had to dodge flying blood to get).

9. If you think you get hit by a bus you will. If you think about getting run over, you will. If you just charge out into traffic you'll be just fine.

10. The Great Wall is exactly that: great...on a clear day.

Xi'an has been cold, windy and rainy. Fall is setting in. We're heading south to Chonqing and hopefully a Yangtzee River cruise. After that we're ready to hit the equator and some tropical weather.

Ya'll haven't heard from us in a while. I guess in a way no news is good news. We've not been able to upload pictures in a while and that takes a lot of the fun out of blogging for us. We've only had one good confrontation in a while, and we almost rushed back to blog about that. We think we do some of our best blogging to burn off steam, so I guess when you don't hear from us for a period of time that means we're doing pretty good.

Hope you all are too.

BnD

I CAME TO BEIJING FOREST AND LAND HOTEL...

and all I got was this stupid bike lock!!!!

D: I am not exactly sure where to start with this blog. All I can I say is that we might be wearing out welcome here in Beijing and might be leaving soon.

So, hmmmmmmm. Let's start at the very beginning. A couple days ago we go around looking for hotels because one we were staying at is loud and roaches are free to roam around on your bed. NOT COOL!!!!! So, we get lost in a hutong and run into a little place that is poppin' and called Forest and Land Hotel. Bill goes in and looks for a price and it was not reasonable. (You can haggle with these people, so anything above $35 was NOT reasonable) So, we get the guy, Harry, down to 200 yuan. The thing I VAUGELY remember is Bill telling me that we should never pay LESS than $35 dollars....this place $26.

B: I mean, what can you expect for less than that? But I got a little hypnotized by the thought of knocking $10 off our nightly bill -- I mean, that's two meals right there!

D: So, we move in the next day just thinking that this place hung the moon. Well, at about 6:30 am the next morning my opinion started to change. We were next to the maid station. I HAVE NEVER IN MY LIFE HEARD SO MUCH DANG RACKET AND DOOR SLAMMING IN MY LIFE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I cannot emphasize how loud these ladies were. I can hear a mouse fart, so's I hears ever-thang! I go downstairs to explain the problem. I am very nice and polite, although I look liked death warmed over. You know, you can only be SO nice when you are met with laughs and grins and you have been woken up too dang early. I keep my cool and I bring the gentleman upstairs and "SHOW" him the issue. You are better off "showing" than trying to explain. I slam the door and get loud to explain that their maid sevice was loud. He apologized VERY quickly, but there was no return to sleepy-town. We go downstairs later on, with sugar in our veins, and demand a new room. They were quick to give us a new room and very apologetic. Sometimes, A LOT OF TIMES, you meet very sweet and accomodating Chinese that will do backflips if it will make you happy. THEN...you meet GOLIATH, that David (Bill) met today.

Bill got us a good deal...man, he is learning from the master (me)...how to bater and get dang near everything for free. I mean, everything's already made in China right? He got us a really good deal on some phonecards.

B: I learned the hard way. First I paid 1oo yuan ($13) for a 100 yuan phone card, about 41 minutes to America. Then I read the Lonely Planet book, it does come in handy sometimes, and found you should never pay more than 35 yuan for a 100 yuan card, and haven't since.

D: The first woman who sold us our 100 yuan phonecard saw "SUCKER" written on his forehead. Hey, we were just happy to get a card to call home!

We wake up this morning to make some calls, (sorry moms and dads) and he finds that the phonecards do not work as normal. He goes downstairs to get some help and is met with a bit of a roadblock. Bill is amazing at getting through roadblocks.

B: It's hard to explain, but the card we've been using to call home used to have a #1 for Mandarin, #2 for English option, but for some reason this morning it did not. I called the help line and they said that it had to do with the hotel phone being automatically set for Mandarin. We had not had this problem at either of our two previous hotels. The operator told me to talk to the hotel people and see if they could help.

Well, I walked down the stairs (we were on the fourth floor, no elevator) and they weren't much help, even after I put the girl at the front desk on the phone with the operator. Eventually, the front desk girl told me to try another phone in the hotel and sent me up to an empty room on the fourth floor. I made my way back up, but even though she sent me up there, she did not turn the phone on to make local calls. In Beijing, you have to have your phone turned on to make calls outside your hotel. It costs about 0.3 yuan ($0.04) cents per minute for a local call, and for that sometimes they make you leave a deposit.

By the time I made it back downstairs after my wasted trip up, I was livid. "Why would you send me all the way upstairs to use the phone if you didn't turn it on," I asked in my most measured and rage-concealed tone possible? (I'd been at this for probably an hour now.) She smiled and giggled. It is very frustrating to me not knowing if the person you're dealing with is being a bastard on purpose or is just trying their best to manage a conversation with an irate person in a foreign tongue and doesn't know any better.

Finally, I'd had enough. "I want our money back and we're going to another hotel," I say. (This place was shady for a lot of reasons, as Deni has mentioned. I mean, they had dog on the restaurant menu, for God's sake.)

D: I just had a feeling about this place. We have been in China for almost TWO WEEKS and THIS is the only place that had dog. We thought is was a joke!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! NOT COOL!!!!!! R.I.P. BEVO!

B: The front desk girl apologized profusely and I backed off, I mean it wasn't her fault the phones didn't work right? Anyway, I call the operator again and about that time Deni D. comes down the stairs (she thought I'd got distracted checking my email!, whatever D). She's standing by my side when I hang up with the operator a second time, quite frustrated. I slam the phone down and by now a "manager" is there who doesn't like my attitude. He says something to me.

"You do not speak to him like that," D says. "We're customers. Don't you ever speak to your customers that way!"

Blah blah blah he goes on in Chinese. Screw this, we say, we're out of here. So D and I go upstairs and grab our stuff. We come back and demand the 200 yuan we'd paid for the next night and the 100 yuan deposit. He only wants to give us 200 because we'd "stayed a half day" (it was about an hour after noon at this point)

Not a smart move buddy. We might talk a lot about trying to avoid Americans and how we're annoyed by them, but we can sure make a scene like one when we need to (and there is 100 yuan -- $13 -- at stake).

We progressively get louder and louder with this guy in the middle of the reception area. He won't budge, and as we've mentioned before, any conversation with us in China usually attracts a crowd, so you can guess what this one was like.

"I ensure you that I will stand outside and make sure that not one more person stays a night at this hotel," Deni said.

"THREE-HUNDRED-YUAN," B said, in very slow and deliberate tones.

D: SLAM, SLAM, SLAM!!!!!!" went my hand on the counter. Do we like making a scene? NO! But do we like being taken advantage of? NO!

B: The girl I was originally dealing with tried to interject, explaining it was all her fault.

"No it's not," we said. "It's this guy's fault," pointing at the "manager." He wasn't actually the manager, we found out later, but he sure said he was at first.

As she tried to help, the guy put his hands on her and pushed her out of the way. That really set us off. We're afraid men get away with this all the time in China.

D: "DON'T YOU EVER PUT YOUR HANDS ON HER!!!!!" said D.

B: "You do not do that," we said to him.

"Oh no, it's my fault," the girl said.

"No it isn't, it's his."

Finally, we made enough noise and enough of a scene that a couple other employees showed up, one of whom also claimed to be the "manager". We couldn't understand what he said, but I knew he was saying 'just pay them off.'

So they did. And we left, but not till after mentioning a few more times to the girl that she should not allow someone to put his hand on her.

"Thank you, goodbye," they all said, over and over again until we were out the door, on our bikes and down the street.

We went straight to the hotel we should have stayed at in the first place.

Great people for the most part here in China, but they sure don't like a scene. Of course, you're always going to have someone who's the jerk.

Three months ago, before we left on this trip, I can't say I'd have fought like I did this morning. I'm glad I stuck to my guns. I have Deni D and Russia to thank for that. Pictures and babuska dolls aren't the only things we'll be taking home from this journey.

D: This blog seems like a drag to us, but this is the first encounter we have had with someone who is a jerk. We feel bad spaeking of it, but it needed to be said. We feel like after Russia everything was "sunshine and puppydogs!" as I say. But today was not and we do not like blogging about bad things. We just got in the groove blogging about bad things being in Russia where people were not kind to us. But not in China. People are amazing here and we thought long and hard about blogging this. It has to said though.

WE STILL LOVE CHINA!!!!!!!!

But we are probably leaving in a few days...for Xi'an and the Terracota Soliders.

Moscow...yea

Our hotel came with matching shower caps.


D: Just as enchanting as it was seventeen years ago. This is what I was looking forward to the entire trip. Now, four days left. Yea.

B: Check another off my list of "places to see before I die." Red Square is not as big as I thought it would be or as it looks like on television. I'm finding that's true about a lot of things in life, but more on the Mao picture later.


B: We wanted some sushi pretty badly, so we found a decent place just off Red Square. We ordered a big sake, but turns out that a big Russian sake is a lot larger than a big American sake.

D: "I ain't sharin'!"


D: This is what we looked like after our big Russian sake. I told Bill not to pee in the pitcher!


B: The one thing Moscow has on New York: its subway system. It costs less than 50 cents to ride anywhere, you never wait more than three minutes for a train and the stations look like museums.

D: This subway station was supposed to be turned into a palace for royalty.


D: Each subway has its own story. This has a mosaic theme. All were very beautiful. Moreso than some of the museums we visited.


D: What is everyone looking at?


D: The changing of the guard was something in itself. These guys walked with such valor. They only change the guard at certain times of the day. We were lucky enough, standing in the hot sun for about twenty minutes, to get a front row view. Every single move was precise. You can hear the soliders coming about thirty feet away with gun in tow. It was amazing. Once we are able to upload video we have the entire five minutes on the blog.





They guard the tomb of the unknown solider.





D: "Hey ya'll! I'm from Texas!"





D: We came, we saw, we conquered Lenin's Tomb.

B: It's really cold and quiet down there.

BnD: HE IS REAL!!!! HE IS NOT MADE OF WAX!!!

Three more days till we're on our way out of Russia. Now what?


Stalin and a bunch of other Soviet leaders and heros are buried along the Kremlin wall behind Lenin's tomb.





D: I remember the story told to me was that Ivan the Terrible wanted a cathedral so grand that he would get it at any cost. Once St. Basil's was built it was the most beauiful ever created. To ensure that the creator could not ever build anything so grand ever again, Ivan had his eyes spooned out.


Climbing inside the church.

















You still see a lot of Lenin in Russia today.


D: This place...hmmmmmm. What can I say? I might have gotten food poisoning here? But damn was it good!!!!!!!! Russians do buffets a little bit different. Instead of paying for all you can eat, you pay by the plate full. So whatever you can get on your plate in one trip is all you get. So Bill went for a test rounds. It was not bad. So I get about five pounds, no kidding, of these beef tips and about three pounds of this coleslaw. Best coleslaw ever, even coming from the south. I left Bill in the dust eating everything on mine and his plate. It was not until about two days later I felt the rath of the "all-you-can-load-on-your-plate" buffet. Dang though, I think we would eat it right now.

B: It's true everybody. D has a great bod, but she can really put it away when she wants to.


Moscow was a blur.





B: This picture was taken after another round of sushi. We had it our first and last night in town.

D: Maybe this is were I got the Delhi Belly. Hey, free dinner is worth a belly ache sometimes. Ask us about that later too.

Novgorod...our home away from home

B: We didn't have a guidebook for Russia, other than our one for the Trans-Siberian, and it only covered St. Petersburg and Moscow. That meant that we had three weeks to spend in Russia and the only places we had any advanced information on were the two most expensive cities. We found out about Novgorod from a pamplet in St. Pete and decided to check it out. It was a couple hours south of the city. It's a smaller city, and the oldest in Russia, founded in 859. It's an alright place, but we found a decent hotel with reasonably friendly staff. We also found a cheap internet place where we did quite a bit of blogging and wore out our welcome.

D: We learned there is a reason why you don't put a bottle of hot champagne next to a computer in an un-air conditioned room. Anyone? Anyone? We really fell in love with this place...at first. A few of you know we left Novgorod-y to head to a holiday spot called Valday. Lets just say if you want water you have to walk a mile down a dirt road and pump it yourself. So we decide to head back to Novgorod for a second round and found it less romantic than before. Needless to say, us two little piggies still loved the food. Here are some shots of Novgorod through our eyes.


There are beautiful old churches all over the place. They're not very well maintained for the most part though. We did some reading and a lot of the old frescos were destroyed during World War II, or the Great Patriotic War, as the Russians call it, when the front line came very close to the area.


Just a moment while I wipe up my drool. We ate here three or four times. This place ROCKED!!! We would eat there right now. In this one of many pictures of me and food, I am having pork SMOTHERED in cheese, mushrooms, pickles, and tomatoes. I know what a lot of you are thinking...gag. Wait till you have had it though. Not to mention the mushrooms baked in cheese and the fried cheese we had for "zakuski"...appetizer.


This should speak for itself. No packaging or refrigeration of any kind in the grocery store without A/C. Keep in mind, Bill and I ate sausages nearly every morning for breakfast...until we saw this.


We also stopped eating pork cutlet as well...no we did not...but maybe we should have.


Outside of town is an old monastery. The main chapel is really really old but visited frequently by religious pilgrims like these ladies in the background. Deni and I lit a few candles ourselves and said a special prayer for her grandpa's brother.








D: A beautiful flower for a beautiful flower.


Near the monastery they've built an old-time wooden town like they used to have in Russia.


B: Hurry D, we have to get all the free pictures we can before the babuskas catch us! (We didn't pay the fee to take pictures.)


D: I have a weird obsession with bell towers and the amazing music that some of them play. We were walking through and heard this music that sounded like a ten piece bell choir coming from an old wooden bell tower. This one gentleman is playing about fifteen to twenty bells by himself. He looks like an old time one-man band with the kazoo in his mouth and cymbals between his legs while he bangs the drum. He played beautifully and with amazing prescision. He played at least two or three with his feet using a peddle, pulled about six to seven with his hands, and only the Lord knows what else he used to play the rest.





We waved at him from the ground and he invited us up to see his office.


D: We gave him a Texas pin and out of his backpack he pulls out his little bell. It seemed to have sentimental value to him. It was nothing shiny or new. Just something he carried with him everyday to work to do his amazing job. This dude was awesome!


What Bill is known best for and won several awards for. Beautiful and amazing scenery pictures. Looks just like we are in Okie-homa.


D: I cannot swear to it, but I do not think there was one "no smoking" sign in this place. I was worried and waiting for this place to go up in flames at any moment. The place was really nice though.









B: Traveling the world is not all fun, games and picture taking. In addition to our blog, we write a whole lot of postcards to our friends and family back home.

D: We sat here and licked about 200 stamps. Does anyone remember that Seinfeld episode? Licking envelopes amd kicking the bucket? We were worried for a while afterwards.

B:Typically, we'll sit down with a stack of them, our address list and a bottle of something and three hours later we'll be done.

D: Usually with a slight buzz jamming out to George Strait. By the way, did you know that Russians do not like him? Ask us another time and we will tell you. They may throw water on you if you try to sing anything George!


B: "Please please please Russian postal system, don't eat our postcards!"


D: Anyone for a nice gooey dip in the river? EVERYONE was out in the sludge swimming in it or drinking it. NO JOKE!


Our last supper in Novgorod.

D: We tried three times to get into this restaurant and on our fourth we were victorious. This was one of the best and felt like a good way to go out. Well, besides the waitress not giving us back our 500 rubles in change thinking that we left her a $20 tip. She insisted that she could not make any change for our 1000 rubles, so she got a $2 tip instead.


A toast to hopping on a train out of Russia in less than a week. Later that evening we boarded a night train to Moscow.





Again, Bill insisting on "hanging out" till we got to Moscow.

Well, this is a dent in the pictures we have left for Russia. I hope this settles everyone's appetite for now. We are waiting for nice Chinese lady to come with our change for our time on the internet. We have not seen her in about two hours. Hint?