The Last Day

Today was a pretty relaxed day as we spent the morning shopping and filling the extra suitcase we bought. Eli took a two hour nap this afternoon, Kim a one hour, and Dad decided three hours was needed. I guess we all are saving up for the long odyssey home tomorrow that begins with a 4 am wake up call to get to the bus at 5 our flight leaves after 8 to Tokyo.
Eli was able to get his first taste of the pool this afternoon. He really enjoyed it and likes to float. This evening we had our final dinner with three other families at Lucy's. We've met some great people on this trip and the four of our families being from the midwest gave us lots to talk about.
Some final observations on China: Coke is definitely the soda here and you'll find Coke zero way more than Diet Coke. Pepsi is trying to make an imprint here, but not really making a dent. Mountain Dew is unheard of. We've avoided drinking milk the time we've been here since some of the problems going on. In thel big cities, KFC, Mc Donald's and Pizza Hut are easy to find. You can find some american products around such as Kellogg's, Pringles and an occasional Coors light. Snickers, and wrigley's gum is around. When making a purchase most places will require you to pay for a plastic bag. I still have not seen a stop sign. The parks are huge with people in them all the time. We did see kids in school on Saturday and Sunday. Only about 100 million people in China practice a religion of the 1.3 billion. One-third of those that do are buddhist, others do Tao, and christianity has some followers. Bottled water is the only way to go here and of course just about everybody drinks tea. Television we do get CNN and BBC and HBO and Showtime. It is funny though that the most recent movie I"ve seen on Showtime is Arnold Schwarzeneger in The Running Man from 20 years ago. At least HBO gives us the recent ones.
That's about it. Time to get some quick shut eye before the long journey back. Lastly, we want to say Happy 1st Birthday to Elise. We'll be home a day late to celebrate, but it has been our mind too much. We'll put in our final blog Wednesday night. Take Care all.

Otherwise, that is about it for now