Day of waiting

We were supposed to be looking at more houses today, but the timing didn’t work out, so Michael and I ended up with most of the day to ourselves. 

We started out with our world themed breakfast.  This morning I had the noodle soup, followed by toast and bacon and Michael went with toast and a sweet roll.

We went for a short stroll around the park and enjoyed seeing the groups of people doing various forms of exercise.  I have taken some videos of these and will try to post them soon.

We had been told that there was a “flower and bird” market not far from the hotel so we asked the concierge where it was and how to get there.  He suggested taking a taxi and then proceeded to pull out a little card that had all of the hotel information (including a map)  on one side, and a place on the back to write the names of where we wanted to go.  He wrote the name in Chinese characters and then sent us out. 

The market was a series of stalls that had everything imaginable, including animals and flowers.  The bird stalls were really interesting and had lots of other animals as well.  I desperately tried to talk Michael into letting me buy a small pink cage with a little bunny in it!!  I especially liked the cages of parrots with all of them sitting in a row on a piece of wood.  All of the colors of the bird seed was also fascinating.   They also had plastic bins full of little mice.  There was also a bin of meal worms and scarab beetles!!!

We spent about an hour just walking around the stalls and observing life there.  There was one food vendor that had all of his ingredients in a glass case with tiny “ceiling fans” blowing on each level to keep the flies off.

We are not sure exactly what this food was…..

In one area we could hear a singing class…..one woman would sing a phrase and a group of other women would repeat the phrase. 

I was interested to watch a group of men as they loaded a baby grand piano onto a truck.  There were no dollies or other mechanical devices, but just 5 men and a truck.  They had harnesses around their shoulders that were attached to the piano.

 

I remain enamored with the tea shops here.  You can buy tea in two different forms….either loose or in a disc.  Many of the shops also have various herbs that can be made into teas as well.  The shops are always colorful and exciting…..

 

As we walked out of the market area we ended up in an area that Cecilia and I had visited on our last trip.  It was fun to see an area that I had been to before and I was able to point out different things to Michael as we walked.

I loved this statue and especially the close ups of their faces…..

 

We have enjoyed seeing the way that much of the liquid “take-out” food (such as noodle soups) is served.  The owner puts a plastic bag inside a bowl and then prepares the noodle soup inside the bag.  When everything is finished, she removes the bag from the bowl and hands the bag to the customer.   We even saw one man drinking Chai tea from a little bag, using a straw inserted in the bag.

We returned to the hotel for a short period of time and then went walking to the Buddhist temple that I visited in March. We got completely lost and then realized that we had been on the right street but had turned off and headed another direction.  Anyway, we finally found it and enjoyed walking thru.  There was a lot of construction work when I was there previously, but it was going at an even faster pace this time.    We did see several new things from the last visit……

In the area where the incense was being burned there was a huge blob of a red substance.  Michael figured out that it was melted wax.  Candles are used to light the incense and obviously they had just cleaned out the candle pit.

 

Praying before entering the temple….

Also, there was a room to one side that was filled with people praying.  As they were coming out of the room, they were all carrying mats and pillows that had been used for the kneeling and bowing.

We got a call while we were there saying that we had a meeting at 5:00 so we hurried back to the hotel and were picked up by Jialin and taken to the Kunming Institute of Zoology.

For the quilters…..I love this design that was over a drain…..

I have so many photos of my toes!!!!!

More to come……