SUNDAY - Shopping and Mum and Dad's week in Hangzhou

Today was so much fun!... okay for all the girls reading this... you want to do some amazing shopping... Beijing Silk Street is the place to go!

Imagine... 6 levels of hundreds and hundreds of stores... A level dedicated to handbags, another dedicated to pearls, watches, sunglasses and jewellery and another to clothes. I was in HEAVEN!!!!!

I walked out with 8 new shirts, 2 leather handbags, a watch, real pearl earrings and pendant necklace! all for about $230 Australian bucks!

It was absolutely amazing and hopefully I'll get to do a little more shopping again before I leave.

As for the rest of the week, we flew home on Sunday night and I had to head back to classes on Monday morning at 8am. I REALLY wanted to sleep through my classes! ... I think the teacher could tell I was a little tired, even coffee didn't give me my usual morning perk!

TUESDAY - Today I skipped class and headed back up to Shanghai with Mum and Dad to visit 2 factories. They were both very impressive! Though I must say what impressed me most was that they both fed us! :) The first one took us out for a traditional Chinese lunch in a beautiful garden created back in the Ming Dynasty... we had over 7 dishes for 4 people... I almost died from happiness! The next one fed us coffee, oreos and other chocolate nibblies! VERY VERY HAPPY! :)

WEDNESDAY - I had to head back to class again, but Kelsey, Mum, Dad and I headed out to the Hangzhou Silk Markets that afternoon! It was beautiful, bought a few presents and a silk dress and skirt for myself. Mum bought some lovely scarves for herself, and Kelsey got a skirt and some silk pjs and dressing gown for her Mum. It was really good and fun to just hangout with Kels and my parents.

THURSDAY - Today was a kind of lazy day and I had classes till 2:30 in the arvo so we couldn't really do too much gallivanting! ... but Mum, Dad and I did head out to a western restaurant for dinner and eat 2 yummmmmmmyyyyy pizzas! ah... so GOOD! ... and then headed back to Mum and Dad's hotel to watch Wolverine the new movie with Hugh Jackman. This was kinda funny because someone had pirated it when it hadn't been finished yet, so you could still see some of the wires attached to the actors as they flew through the air, and raw computer graphics! but you got the jist on the movie :)

FRIDAY - This was my final day with Mum and Dad. I finished classes at 9:30 in the morning, so I headed across to their hotel shortly after that, we had our own person Good Friday service and then headed out to explore Xi Hu (West Lake) It was really beautiful and there's heaps of photos to see, but for some reason my computer is having pink kittens trying to upload photos at the moment so you might have to wait awhile to see them all. We visited the local art gallery (which surprisingly had very political art pieces in it. and some a little raunchy too. Next we headed to the museum. I loved it here, Australia has such a short history, but this humble little museum in Hanghzou had pieces dating back 7000 years!!
We then caught a boat across the lake to the island with the famous lakes mirroring the moon. This was really beautiful too, apart from the fact half the island you couldn't go to cause it was under construction! lol... but there was these amazingly HUGE goldfish (carp) ... but they sure did look like goldfish. I'm not even exaggerating when I say some were as long as my table I'm typing on write now... they were MAMMOTH!
After all this we hopped back on the boat and travelled to the other side of the lake where he headed down to the famous Lei Feng Pagoda. This was pretty cool, but I wasn't willing to pay money to stand on top of a pagoda and look out at the smog so I only saw it from the ground. Funny story though, we though we were heading to the pagoda, when we went down a road with two officers at the end, when we approached one turn abruptly, clicked his heels together and put up his hand saying STOP! ... we must have wondered down into some rich person's driveway at the base of the pagoda! ... As we were walking back a black car with totally tinted windows drove down past us, as it pasted the guards they both in COMPLETE unison turned, clicked their heels together and saluted! We were very impressed... timed to perfection!

Anyway we spent the rest of the afternoon wondering up the edge of the lack, they have they most beautiful gardens absolutely everywhere, and being the 'ritzy' side of the lake, the other side of the street was all high end retailers, coffee shops and car dealerships including Maserati, Ferrari, BMW, Merc... etc. oh and a mini as well :)

We finished off the day heading to the Hangzhou wine centre like we do every Friday night. Enjoy the free buffet, a good glass of Aussie red and then went back to the hotel room to watch a movie.

I have to say it's harder saying goodbye the second time around knowing Mum and Dad were going home to Grandma and Poppa, Marshal and Larissa and all good things Aussie. But I do love it over here and I have a fresh stock of chocolate to keep me company over the Easter weekend (thanks Mum and Dad!) ;)

But in summary, I had such a fantastic time while Mum and Dad were here. I learnt a lot about business, ticked off all the 'must sees' in China, got to introduce Mum and Dad to all of my family over here in China and I got to see Dad trying to use chopsticks :) It was great!

Thanks Mum and Dad for coming over I absolutely loved it and I was spoilt rotten with the ritzy hotel rooms and showers with water shooting out in straight lines! Thanks! :) and Grandma and Untie Lynden, thanks heaps for the letters I've received both of them. I hope you both had a wonderful time down in Victoria and Grandma and Poppa, you both have a lovely time up at the unit in Caloundra! Also, happy b-day Poppa for today :) I hoped you liked your Chinese birthday song!

Love you all and will let you know how all my mid-semester exams go this week.

Zai Jian xx