Day 15 – Guangzhou
Even though today was our consulate appointment, it was really a free day for us as our facilitator, Shiyan, did all the work. We’d given her all of our paperwork and supporting documentation on Saturday so she took everything to the consulate and dropped off our visa paperwork. We were so grateful for this as the consulate is all the way across the city and it’s about an hour long bus ride to get there. We’ve spent enough time in buses, thank you very much, and were happy to avoid another one.
We took advantage of the free time to link up with Josh and Kathy and head off to visit the Six Banyan Temple. This is a Buddhist temple located in Guangzhou and is well known for the eight story, octagonal pagoda in the center of the temple complex. The temple was originally built in 537, but has been rebuilt several times over the years. The name was given by Su Dongpo, a poet from the Song Dynasty (960 – 1279). It is said that he visited the temple and was moved and inspired by six banyan trees there that he found particularly beautiful. It was later renamed the Temple of the Six Banyan Trees. Unfortunately, the trees are no longer there.
As you can tell from all the lanterns, they were preparing for the Lunar New Year celebrations.
The centerpiece and the most visited structure is the Six Banyan or Flowery Pagoda (it’s called both names). We were able to purchase tickets to climb to the top so J strapped Ava in a little tighter in the Ergo and we started the hike onwards and upwards. The pagoda is very tall and skinny so the steps get increasingly steeper and narrower as you reach the upper levels.
J is also a bit afraid of heights so it started to bother him around the 5th floor, but he soldiered on and we went all the way to the top. The depth of the outdoor walkway is maybe 2 feet wide and there’s only a waist high wooden rail separating you from a plunge to the ground below so we were glad Ava was strapped in and unable to move.
The views were incredible and you could see almost the whole city from the top.
I have to note that our facilitator (keep in mind we used a Christian faith based adoption agency) never could really understand why we wanted to visit a Buddhist temple and did not assist us with arranging our excursion. We caught a cab from the hotel and muddled our way through buying entry tickets, but we did see a number of guided American adoptive families there. We walked the rest of the complex, stopping to watch a service (from a respectful distance) of some sort by the monks. It was pretty cool hearing the chanting and watching some of the ceremony even though we didn’t understand a bit of it. Ava wasn’t impressed and kept blowing raspberries at one of the monks in the front row. He gave her a wave so I guess he didn’t mind too much. Josh has gotten pretty good at flagging down cabs here so he did this in short order as we were being approached by a number of beggars on the street.
Made it back to the hotel in time for Ava’s lunch and a good long nap in preparation for our trip to the Pearl Market. That was on my list of things to do so I’d asked our facilitator for directions the day prior. Once she realized there were a number of people who wanted to do this, she organized a bus to take us all there and she went to offer some guidance (not much, though). J decided to stay back at the hotel with Ava since she was napping and now he wasn’t feeling well. We got there and Shiyan took most of the folks to a mid-quality shop but that wasn’t what I was looking for (you get what you pay for) so I went off to another higher quality shop.
After everyone finished shopping Shiyan was going to escort everyone across the street to catch taxis back to the hotel. Josh and Kathy (along with their daughter, Lin-Lin) and I decided we were adult enough to cross the street on our own and walked around the pearl market a bit more. This complex sold all sorts of (mostly wholesale) gemstones and pearls and it was fascinating to walk around and see huge bags of pearls and semi-precious gemstones just laying around on the floors. We weren’t really their type of customer (think big jewelry makers instead) so it was pleasant to not have vendors trying to convince us to come into their stores.
We walked around a bit outside and came across an old guildhall tucked in a tiny spot between these massive modern malls. I have no idea what it was for (something about the Silk Road or Silk Route, I think) but it was gorgeous. Sadly, no pictures because even though J told me to take the camera I didn’t because who’d have thought I would have needed it since we were only going to the Pearl Market? Duh on me for that one. Josh again got us a cab posthaste when the temperature began to drop and we managed to make it back to the hotel once again.
We (the four 6 troublemakers – can you tell we hung out with Josh, Kathy, and Lin-Lin a lot?) did an early dinner at the hotel and planned to do a night-time Pearl River cruise, but this time J was feeling poorly so they went off without us and had a great time. We hung out in the room where Ava had a massive meltdown over bedtime. I finally had to take a walk as I was so frustrated and upset that J took over and I wandered over to Starbucks (again) and down to browse through a tiny shop that was a little off the beaten path. It’s called Susan’s Place and I had a great conversation with the shopkeeper while I browsed around. It’s a shame her place is so far down because the quality of her merchandise was outstanding and had some different items from the rest of the shops (some the same, of course). I browsed and chatted while drinking my hot chocolate until I calmed down and headed back. We fought an epic sleep battle ALL night and none of us got any sleep.
Pictures added 9 Feb.