Today started with a trip to the Sun-yatsun Memorial Hall. If you've ever seen the movie, "The Last Emperor," Sun-Yatsun was the leader of the movement/revolution to end the last dynasty in China.

The Memorial Hall and the statue is of Sun-yatsun, described to us as modern China's "George Washington." John's biting his tongue not to say anything... but hey, at least he was educated in the U.S.

Just finished a little shopping at the pearl store and here's Jane and Nealy at the jade store. At least this store had a fan blowing. This was part of a jewelry shopping mall -- about a five-story mall of nothing but jewelry stores... and they had AC but it must have been set to "hot and humid."

On Shamian Island, where the US Consulate is located, is a pretty neat little shop with a lot of silk clothes. Here are a few of the dresses -- Nealy's red and blue dresses and a bigger one and for "big sis" Francie. We also found the squeaky shoes we've heard about since we started the adoption process. Once Nealy is mobile, we'll probably regret getting those. The owner of the shop also wrote Nealy's name in Chinese. Translated it is Ni (tender) Li (jasmine).

Still on Shamian Island, we grabbed a bite for lunch at Lucy's, an attempt at an American 50s-style restaurant. It's kind of amusing to see, and they did have good cheeseburgers and fries along with a few bottles of Zhujiang beer, a local brew.

John and Nealy outside of Lucy's. We can't believe all the banyan trees here. Most of the streets are lined with them and most have roots hanging from the branches trying to reach the ground.

Had to get a few pics of the construction outside our room. Our hotel is 21 floors and the building under construction next door must be over 40 stories. All the scaffolding is bamboo lashed together with something like hemp rope. The bottom pic is of a 5-story waterfall/mountain scene being built in the hotel's garden. Again, all the scaffolding is bamboo lashed together with rope. During breakfast this morning we watched two workers constantly hoisting concrete one gallon-sized bucket at at time by rope and pulley, never seeing anything resembling a machine or a power tool. There's a pool at the top of the structure that we saw emptied last night but was full this morning with one of the many popup-monsoons we've seen since being in Guangzhou.

Winding down for the evening, Nealy is playing with the family album Jane put together, so Nealy will have been "introduced" to most of the family before her trip home to the U.S.