Devil Went Down To Korea Or Was That Georgia.

I ditched the husband and the kids a couple of nights ago to go and see The Charlie Daniels Band. Yes, he is alive and still touring and who would have thought he would wind up in Korea. I dragged a friend with me that night. No, she did not go kicking and screaming but with a little convincing with being without kids and husbands for a couple of hours she was on board.

Charlie getting down.

Charlie is over 70 now and was still able to put on a great show. My favorite part was when he would take the fiddle stick and swing it around in sync with him trying to dance. He brought down the house with “Devil Went Down to Georgia”. He truly is a wonderful legend and I felt honored to be able to attend his show. Afterwards he, along with his wonderful band, stuck around to give out autographs, shake hands and even let you take pictures. The only thing missing was my cowboy hat.

Drummer and the bass player

Getting Charlie Daniels autograph

What’s going on in Korea?

Everyone has harvested their red peppers and are drying them wherever they can. This is our crop on the roof. Just kidding, it’s the neighbor beside us. Her roof top is eye level with our windows, so we can see her walking around and occasionally she will wave to the kids. It seems like a long process to dry the red peppers. They have been on the roof for several weeks and usually every evening she comes out and she turns them over one by one. I am not 100 percent she actually needs to turn them over, maybe she just really likes to hear us talk, yell and sing in the house. Anyway, her crop looks good and it appears she will have lots of dried peppers. I can’t wait to see if she will start on making kimchi next. I might have to invest in some 007 type spy gear.

Beijing

The kids and I in front of the Water Cube.

After two days in Xian, we boarded a plane for Beijing. We arrived, got the kids and bags and headed out from the airport to the Olympic Park to see the Water Cube (the venue for all the swimming events), and the Bird’s Nest (track and field events). We walked around while the kids posed with random people. Sometimes I feel that the people are more impressed with the kids then the sites. We were stopped too many times to count. We have started to take pictures of the people taking pictures of the kids. I was even approached by an older Chinese woman wanting to pose beside me. So of course I did what any other person would do: I pushed the kids out of the way for my 5 minutes of fame.

The Great Wall

Next, let me do some bragging about my children. Either they were was too excited about being on the Great Wall or maybe it was all the rice they had been eating but they would not stop climbing. When the steps started to get taller about halfway up, I was ready to quit…but not them. They raced and climbed like there was a surprise waiting for them at the top. While we all were resting at the highest lookout tower, we were approached by several families that wanted a picture of the cute American children. No one wanted James and I, just the little ones. After thehike back down (which was even scarier) we made it back to the bottom, grabbed some ice coldwater and sat in the air conditioned van commenting on how we really need to get back into shape. We had lunch at a wonderful Chinese restaurant where, for once, the kids ate more than just the rice.

As I am trying to write about a trip that is now weeks in the past, I am totally forgetting the order in which we did everything. I do know that during our visit, when the kids and I went to the Beijing Zoo to see the Panda bears the kids were really mobbed by curious strangers. I could not look at hardly any of the exhibits because the people would surround them taking photos and I could not find them. We also saw the Temple of Heaven, the Forbidden City (this place was horrible with crowds; every time we would walk away from one “photo shoot” we walked right into another one), Tiananmen Square, and we took a rickshaw ride through an old neighborhood. We learned how everyone there would share one outside bathroom and oftentimes even their house. We were able to go inside one the houses and drink tea with the owner while gazing at a huge jar on the table with alcohol and a dead snake inside. In addition, we saw an acrobat show (which I think the kids enjoyed more than anything else that we did), and the last thing was something that James picked out: the Military Museum. It actually was not that bad. I guess a school field trip was going on and someone forgot to tell me that we were in charge of a small group of kids, because every time we moved to a different room these kids in green shirts would follow us. I do believe at some point we had 5 shadows wearing green shirts that were working up the courage to ask us for our picture. We did stop and pose several times (with other kids, not the shy green shirters). I even got another 5 minutes of fame and made some school girls very happy.

The kids doing Boom Boom Fire Power

Our week in China was wonderful; we saw everything we wanted to see plus lots more. We made a lot of Chinese people happy by taking the time to say “hello” and even shake some hands (I kind felt like I was running for political office). Most people did not speak English so it was very entertaining for us. We sometimes had to do charades to ask questions. We began to have a lot of fun with it and laughed when we did not get what we ordered. I guess only a “plain cheeseburger” does not mean the same thing, as Benjamin found himself without cheese as well. The people were extremely nice and friendly. I hope my kids remember all the memories we made happen for them and fully appreciate it. It was truly a wonderful, exciting trip and I would highly recommend it to anyone.

Ben resting after the hike up.