The Aquarium in Zhengzhou

After a couple of days of paperwork, the group of us were ready for a little adventure to see some of the city.  Zhengzhou is a city of  about 9 million people and while it does has pretty great public transportation moving around the city isn't very easy.  I had all these great plans of seeing different things here in the city before I came, but when you have a baby who has lived her whole life in an orphanage and maybe gone on 5 car rides her whole life it is a whole different story.  They don't use car seats which I find crazy given the amount of traffic.  Also, you may be able to get a taxi ride to your location, but getting back is not as easy and since they don't use meters here the drivers can pretty much make up any price they want. Unfortunately, not everyone in our travel group was able to attend.  We have a couple of children who are sick and another family went to visit the orphanage from where their daughter stayed before going into foster care.  Some children here in China if they are lucky go into foster care which is great for them because they live a life in a family. Sadly, not many families in China are able to keep the children they foster due to the cost of raising that child and the fees that go along with them adopting them.  While China has relaxed the one child policy, many families still may choose to only have one child because of the cost, both parents working, and because they care for their ageing parents.  The aquarium isn't very large, but they do have a fun show for the children where a couple of divers go in the tank.  The story line that goes along with the show involves a bad guy, a prince, and a mermaid.  After we went to the aquarium a few of us went out to lunch at a restaurant down the street.  It was a pretty funny experience because none of us spoke Chinese and none of the staff spoke English and they did not have a picture menu. It was like watching a game of charades and involved a few misunderstandings and lots of laughing.  In the evening we went out as a group with our guide and this time the meal was delicious.  Avery really loved the garlic chicken wings, beef ribs, fried rice, and the garlic green beans.  Today she said two new words, the first one in Chinese which is Ni Ni or something to that effect which means either grandma or bottle.  We are assuming she was referring to her bottle.  The second word was in English-bye bye.  She can wave bye bye and also blow kisses.  It is amazing how much she is blooming.  She loves to smile for me and is really a happy content baby.  Frank and Winston sadly didn't make it home all the way today.  I guess their were really bad weather conditions in Detroit, so the flight out of Beijing was delayed by two hours.  They missed their flight and have to spend the night in Detroit.  Today we are just going to hang out at the hotel as I need to pack my suitcase because we leave for Guangzhou on Saturday morning.