July 8th

Just another day in paradise. Indigo ate a super breakfast and today added plain yogurt to the other standard fare. Melanie's parents called and while on the phone heard Indigo giggling. We have had a busy day today. This morning we went to the Cheng Family Academy. The buildings were built in 1888 through 1894 during the Qing Dynasty. The artistic architectural complex consists of 19 buildings with imposing halls, spacious courtyards done in the traditional classical southern Chinese style.

The beautiful and intricate wood carvings were just mind boggling. Although no longer used as a school, it now serves as the home of the Guangdong Folk Handicrafts Gallery. Indigo fell asleep but did not nap long. We had many Chinese come up to us and we showed them a card explaining that we have adopted her.

One young boy came up and spoke to us in very good English.

For lunch we ventured out of the hotel to a place called Lucy's for some American style food, although Melanie opted for chicken curry, while I had a cheese burger and fries. Indigo ate a whole bowl of chicken congee.

After Indigo's nap, we went down to the pool which also has a kiddie pool. Indigo enjoyed her first time in a pool as long as mommy or daddy held her tight (Kim, notice she is wearing a bathing suit you gave her and she looked really cute in it).

We had to rush from swimming to meet our group to go to a Cantonese restaurant across from the hotel.

For those with a weak stomach, you may want to skip the rest of this paragraph. When you walk into the restaurant there are bins of live critters, mostly fish, amphibians, bugs, and reptiles. These include silk worms, sand worms, water beetles, snakes, frogs and eels. It was like an episode out of Fear Factor. Also, as a side note, that bin of sand worms was way fuller when we first arrived compared to this picture taken when we left. Apparently Cantonese are very well known for pretty much eating anything. Our guide very kindly ordered us much more run of the mill items, which were all delicious. As usual Indigo ate very well. In addition to congee, steamed eggs, steamed bun, rice, she also enjoyed some pumpkin, green beans and some small pieces of chicken.

After dinner, Melanie hit one of the local shops and we could barely get out of the store without buying every item in sight (Melanie's edit - David vastly exaggerates!). We will definitely need to purchase another suitcase. We also picked up our laundry from another local shop and returned to the hotel. We had the worst poop event ever tonight, which involved clothes needing to go into the tub. She was extremely cheery, babbly and silly in her crib and it took awhile for her to fall asleep. It's been another great day with her and despite the snotty nose, she is so much fun!