July 30

July 30 was my last day in China.

The morning was kind of sad when I had to pack up my stuff. Granted I didn't actually have a lot of stuff so it went pretty quickly. The morning was fairly casual besides that. I went downstairs to ground level (Sol's room was on the fourth floor) and had a healthy breakfast of 馒头 (mantou) and 凤梨酥 (fenglisu - Taiwanese pineapple cake) to finish out my stay at her place. As a final fair well from her house, her dog pingping and I got to cuddle for a bit. That honestly just made me sad, not only because Sol's dog was so cute and fluffy, but also because I really miss my own furry friends back at home.

Since I was flying back to Taiwan later in the afternoon, our tourist stops were very few in number. The first site Sol had called it "some old dead person's home", however when we got there I quickly realized that it was a bit more than just an "Old Dead Person's Home." We were actually standing in some elaborate giant Chinese Garden. This garden reminded me a lot of the Chinese Garden in Portland that is made to represent their Chinese Sister City. The only difference was this place was HUGE. It had some crazy koi fish jumping out of water, a lotus garden, a school of fish, the garden even had a random hill/mountain in the center of it. CRAZY, I know. Be warned, there are a LOT of pictures here.

Above were all of the interesting architectural/Chinese oriented places in the garden.

This "Old Dead Old Person's Home" definitely had some gorgeous natural sights to see throughout the various corners of the garden.

Finally what would it be without some crazy pictures of Kate and Sol???

When we finished at the Garden we were off to lunch and the bus stop. :(

During the entire weekend i had the opportunity to spend time with Sol, he mom, and even her grandma. Unfortunately, Sol's mom and grandmother didn't really speak much Mandarin, so I didn't communicate that much with them. But that afternoon before I headed off to the airport I was able to experience Sol's grandma's amazing cooking skills. She prepared a full meal with corn soup, a Cantonese style chicken skin dish, stir fried beef and more. Too say the least it was quite amazing. Before we left to go to the bus stop for the airport, Sol did tell me that her grandmother told me (in Cantonese) "You are welcome to come back anytime! We loved having you visit." Sol's family was magnificently hospitable and I appreciated every moment that I was able to spend with them!

After a sad goodbye to Sol and her family I was on my way to the airport on a bus. Admittedly a part of me felt weird being on a bus to an airport, and I did feel a bit nervous about whether or not I'd get off at the right terminal. I know that there was honestly no reason for me to be nervous about missing the stop, but it happened. Not entirely sure why it did, but it did.

The Guangzhou Airport was about as normal as you could expect an airport to be. Except what really peaked my interest was how empty the terminal felt. Once I got through security (which there were female-only and male-only lines) the gates felt ridiculously empty. Yes, there were people there, but I was still in the International Terminal. I did happen to pass a man wearing a Jordanian Olympic Team Jacket. I didn't have the chance to ask him, but that was interesting to see that in Guangzhou China.

Guangzhou Terminal 2

From there the rest of the day was fairly uneventful. Because I didn't have any luggage I was able to zoom past customs and immigration. The guy at the desk that I went up too with my arrival card seemed very impressed that I was able to write my address in Chinese, and he asked if I was studying at ICLP. It was interesting to notice how well-known the program is and how so many people know about the program.

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Tomorrow, I promise there will be more pictures and more blogs. Time is clicking away.