The Dragon Lady Wasn't All Bad

What a beautiful day!  We started out the day at the Summer Palace.  Our Tour guide keeps telling us about the wicked Dragon Lady who controlled the Chinese political scene around the turn of the twentieth century.  I bet she was just as conniving as her male counterparts - bad woman.  But she did a great job at making improvements to the Summer Palace.  As we entered the Summer Palace we heard music and saw a dance going on.  By dance I mean a boy ask girl ballroom event.  Deanna and I know a little bit from watching Dancing with the Stars so we participated.  What a way to start the day.  We walked around and enjoyed some of the most beautiful scenery and architecture that we have seen so far.  We saw a peaceful lake with gorgeous boats.  It is a wonderful national park.  As we were walking around we heard more music so we went up a hill to a pagoda to investigate and found about 250 retired people singing folk songs and dancing to a band.  Retirement age here is fifty so the people were not too old but they were having a great time.  The music was simple and the tunes predictable so Deanna and I found ourselves singing along.  One woman could tell we were struggling with the words, so she shared her song book.  To help us along, she pointed to the Chinese characters we should be singing.  I must have done pretty well because a few minutes later Deanna and I were invited to join the ten ladies in the middle who were holding hands and dancing while singing in front of the band.  Our dancing must have been equally as impressive because another woman came up and put garland around my neck and Deanna's neck!

Our guide told us that every day the retired people come to the Summer Palace to sing and to dance.  I love this tradition!  On our way out we stopped at a street vendor's cart and bought a Mongolian princess hat to match the garland.  Does this scream tourist?

Our next stop was a government owned pearl store - it was pretty pricey.  But I did get some face cream infused with pearl powder.  It will make me look even more young and beautiful than I am now.  Wow.  It's going to be unbelievable.

We went to a school to watch a student performance.  The middle school students took turns singing and dancing and doing Kung Fu.  Then I got the idea that we should do something for them.  We decided to sing America the Beautiful.  I was able to convince Darcy, a physics teacher from American Fork high, to lead the music.  Several in the group were able to sing the alto part, so it sounded like we had been practicing for weeks.  We met some really cute second and third grade students who had been practicing saying hello my name is _____.  I love how they were unembarrassed to practice.  Many of the high school age boys are too embarrassed to speak the language they are required to study.