Catching Up...

C here, just playing catch-up with some stuff we should have posted but could not - due to the long time it takes to upload photos.  We're using a personal VPN application to allow us to post directly to Google and otherwise reach all of the sites we could from the States.

These nuggets may be out of order but we'll do the best we can...

Meals...

Breakfast is included with our luxurious accomodations here at the Best Western Premier Mayflowers Hotel here in Wuhan.  The selections are broad and cater to both Asian and western tastes.  The typical western breakfast fare is similar in look and taste to what are used to back home. Everyone has been able to find at least a little something.  Dylan likes the mini apples (the size of golfballs) and usually pounds 3-4 every day, while Kyle typically eats 5-6 pieces of ham along with his hard boiled egg(s).  Coffee is exceedingly average and usually only warm, not hot.  Ashley's still feeling her way - and seemed to test a little bit of everything this morning.  On our first morning, we had a laugh because the server quickly and efficiently filled our coffee cups seconds after we were seated - ALL of our cups - even Kyle & Dylan's.  They both immediately piped up that they didn't order coffee!!

Lunches have been mostly fast food - McD's, Pizza Hut, and KFC.  Unfortunately today, the rain started coming down heavy just as I was leaving to go to Pizza Hut - my shoes are still a little wet!

Dinners.
We had dinner last night at a place called the Greenery Cafe, a 10 minute walk from our hotel.  The menu was wide ranging, but mostly Chinese with a sprinkling of western dishes. Unfortunately the young ladies who were assigned to our table did not speak English very well at all. So they quickly rounded up another staff member to assist. As it turns out, she knew only a small amount more! Grant, our guide, had written for us in Chinese a very detailed description of a dish that Ashley had had before and liked very much (a combination of rice, pork and vegetables - ground to a porridge-like consistency).  We showed it to "the english-speaker" (TES) who promptly read it and called some of her friends over to look at the note.  Apparently, Mr. Grant must do stand-up as his second job, because the group of young ladies erupted in Giggles upon reading his words.

We were finally able to order by pointing to the menu and repeating, repeating and repeating.  After about 15 minutes, and some furious note-taking, TES was able to carefully read back all of our selections, pointing to the person who ordered said dish.  We felt pretty good about things until the boys spaghetti arrived loaded with Sauce (a big no-no if you know the Lockhead brothers). Thanks to AR we were able to avoid an approaching Armageddon-like meltdown.  She salvaged anough spaghetti from around the edges of the plate to make two reasonably-sized plates of somewhat naked spaghetti.  After all of the effort, Ashley didn't even eat very much of her concoction.

Somehow we made it through - it's a shame that things went so badly, the place looked nice and there was a good crowd of diners already seated as we headed out (with Mr. Grant's note tucked firmly in my pants pocket). Perhaps another time...?  Naahhhh. Not this trip.

On the way home, Kyle insisted on pushing Ashley's stroller by himslef and with Lisa's gentle guidance on the tricky sections, he did very well.  The street was alive with the chaos that is life in Wuhan - lots of traffic, on foot and in the streets, jammed buses, and cars weaving what seemed like everywhere.  We passed a number of storefronts and mobile street vendors hustling meals of all sorts.  The environment was tolerable until we passed a fellow behind a mobile cart who was hawking something looking like 2-inch square crab cakes.  Based on the whiff I got of them - "crabcakes they wasn't"!!!

(Aside: When I post items like this, I try to do my best to describe the scene in terms of as many senses as I can.  After a quick readthorugh and a minor tweak or two, I feel like I can usually communicate what I want to get across.)

However, last night, I met my Waterloo with the odor of these "not-crabcakes".  It hit us all about 20 feet away.  If there are words to describe what we smelled, I am unaware of them.  I have though about this all day - how to capture this??? As we got the first whiff, AR shot me a puzzled but alarmed look -  something like "You've been here before TWICE, is that normal?" At that instant, a spike of fear took over MY body.  I thought I was going to lose it - right then and there.  In point of fact she was correct - we had been to China twice before - however, I NEVER experienced anything like this before.  And I hope I never do again.  it never even occurred to us to slow down to ask "What IS that?" - we just wanted to get past it - FAST.  'nuff said - you don't want me to try to go any further.  Trust me on that.

Soon enough, we were out of the fog and back on track.  That was close, i'm down to my last clean shirt!

Finally, before we got to the hotel, Lisa saw a school-age young girl carrying two little live chicks in a platic baggie? Pets or Pots? To be raised or braised?  Not sure.  And not sure we want to know either.  Welcome to Wuhan.

Much more to come..stay tuned.
Thanks.
C