Growing a Treat!

Hi, this is Cayanna.  Everybody likes treats, but I'll bet lots of you don't know that you can grow a treat.  Sugar cane is one plant we get sugar from.  Sugar cane can be eaten or juiced.  When you take a piece of sugar cane, you don't exactly eat the whole thing.  You chew it until all the sweetness is gone and then spit out the pulp.  It looks sort of like bamboo.

  You can see in these pictures what it looks like.

If you don't want to eat it, you can drink it.  One day we thought we would buy some pieces to chew on, but they had a machine that juiced the pieces.  They put the canes through a tube in a machine, and it smashed it so the juice came out one side and the dry pulp came out the other side.







Here is the dried, smashed pulp.  The drink looked sort of like lemonade but not as dark in color.  It tasted sweet and divine.













When you want to buy sugar cane to chew on it, the person who's selling it peels off the outer part of it.  Then he wraps one end of it in plastic because it's sticky like most sugar.

It's delicious!





















Hi, Classmates!  We are having a great time in China.  No, Asa didn't get sick from eating all the candy, but he WAS pretty wild for awhile!  When we saw Asa's pictures, he looked really sad, but he is the opposite of sad.  He is all hyper and happy.  Thanks for the comments.  They make me feel like I'm both at home and in China! 

Zai Jian!

Things on Roofs

Hi, this is Annika.  I am glad you like our blog.  We are having a good time, and we like sharing it with you.  Our family has a wonderful view of things on roofs out our hotel window.  Here's a view of the city.  The city is very crammed, and the rooftops look dull.  Mostly we don't get on our roofs in Escalante and Boulder unless we're fixing leaks or something.  In China, people get on their roofs every morning and exercise.  They do Tai Chi.  There is a man in yellow pants that has a garden on his roof.  The garden is really the thing that keeps the world from being too dull.  It is beautiful.

Every morning the man exercises in his garden.  Today when I saw the man in the yellow pants, he was coming out to exercise.  When he started to exercise, I did what he did.  It was like he was my teacher, but he didn't know he was teaching me to exercise.  This picture is the view of his garden.  The flat place right in the middle of the picture is where he exercises, and you can kind of see plants (the green things) that make up his garden on the roof. 

Here is another view of the city from our window.   You can see the air is not clear like it is at home.  It is smoggy.

  Another thing that people do on their roofs is hang clothes out.  Some of you might have clothes lines, but maybe they're not on your roof.  Can you see the lady in blue hanging out quilts to dry?  People also hang their clothes out their windows to dry.  They must be very talented, because what if it was a windy day?  They would have to make sure their clothes didn't blow away!

Can you see the clothes in the window in the middle of this picture? 

Now I will answer some of your questions about our trip.  Yes, we both used the squatty potty.  Mom wanted us to do it just to have an experience.  I was good with it, and Cayanna thought it was a nightmare.  But our brother, Asa, wants to use the squatty potty every time he goes to the bathroom!  He freaks out about the other kind.  Keep sending us emails!  We love to hear from you!

Annika   

A New Beginning

Cayanna and I were so excited on the day we got Asa that we could barely wait, but we had to.  We waited until 3:30 and then it was finally time to go to the Civil Affairs office.  I was excited when we entered the door. Cayanna  and I knew right off which one was Asa, because  he had a familiar  backpack, and it was the backpack our mom sent him.  Asa was calm except shy at the first, but he got used to us very quickly.  He knew how to use a magnetic drawing board.

My mom asked a girl what his favorite food is, and she said candy, and I believe that because he got into my sack of treats at the hotel room and didn't want to let go.  We got him a flashlight with candy in it, and he already ate half of it at the Civil Affairs office.  Also at the hotel, he saw some chocolate eggs and we tried to get them back from them.  He said, "I want some chocolate!" in Chinese.

Today we finished the adoption papers and he is a member of our family.

I like all the notes that you guys sent us.  I'll answer more of your questions when we come back.  We're going shopping on Shamian Island right now. 

Different Things

In my last blog post, I talked about scorpions.  Lots of people are wondering if I tried eating them.  I just wanted to tell you that I am NEVER eating scorpions!  There were different kinds.  There were small, tan ones and big, black fat ones.  In the barrels, they were all crawling on each other and fighting with their stingers up.  One time, I was walking and not paying attention, and I almost fell into a bucket of big black scorpions!  Here's a picture of the bucket of scorpions I almost fell in.

 Hi, classmates.  I need to tell you about a horrible experience that I had.  Did you know that in most of China, the toilets are different than the ones we have?  They are called squatty potties.  Can you guess why?  It's because you don't sit on them.  It's just a hole in the floor that you squat over.  I had to use one yesterday and it was a nightmare! I am way happier with our hotel bathrooms.

Thank you for the little notes that you guys sent us. I miss you guys. P.S. In two days it is my birthday!

Hello From China!

Hi, this is Cayanna again!  My family and I got off the plane after a long ride.  Our plane ride was exhausting and entertaining.  Each seat had its own TV and remote.

When we got to the hotel, we traded our U.S. money for yuans.  Yuans are Chinese money, but yuans are worth less than U.S. money.  About six yuans equal one dollar.

Then we walked down the streets and went shopping.  There were jade, different animals for pets like chipmunks, turtles, kittens and puppies.  There were also big barrels of live scorpions!  I don’t think they were pets.  I think they were food.  People eat them here.  There were also big spice and tea stores with little tea pots and cups.

We were on the street at the busiest time of day.  It was hard to walk without bumping in to people.  In the whole city of Guangzhou there are 13 million people!  (That’s more than the whole state of Utah.)  Lots of Chinese people were staring at us because we were with Americans and we were speaking English.  Some people talked to us in Chinese, but we didn’t know what they were saying.

I will write tomorrow about meeting my brother.   

Hi this is Annika blogging from the country of China! We left from Las Vegas at about midnight, and me and Cayanna were really tired because it was past our bedtime.  The plane ride was fun because we all had our own TV screen and a remote control!  We could also control the light so it shined on us.  When you're on the plane, they serve you big meals.  I couldn't even finish mine.  We had pizza, spaghetti with chicken meatballs, fish crackers, cracker sticks and more!  Even though I couldn't finish mine, it was pretty good.

This picture is Cayanna and me cheerfully sitting on the plane.

This is Cayanna playing with her remote control and her screen on the plane.

When we got to China, we saw that things are already getting green here.  Also, we saw a van on fire on the side of the road.  No one was in it and smoke was billowing from the van.

When we got to the hotel and to our room, Cayanna and I pulled out our money and went with our grandma to the front desk and traded our dollars for Chinese yuan.  I only had $50, but they gave me 311 yuan!

Chinese money is different from our money because Chinese money is all different colors.  It is also different sizes.  All of it has the same guy on the front and different pictures on the back.

After Cayanna and I got our money, we all went for a walk outside our hotel in a place called Up and Down Number Nine Street.  Shops were everywhere!  They sold everything from bracelets and jewelry to sugar cane.  We bought some sugar cane drink. 

By the time you read this we will have a new little brother.  I hope you have a nice day!  'll write more later. 

Were leaving for China!

Hi, I am Cayanna. For those who are reading this I want them to know that they picked a good site. I can not wait to go to China. Me and my family are so excited to get our little brother. I think that he will be shy when he comes home but soon he will act like all boys,wild and noisy. My family has many animals and I wonder if he will will be scared of them for a while. When I was adopted and I got home I was terrified by cats and dogs. I would not touch them, but now I love all animals. My family and I are very eager to get to China. China will be like I am in a whole different world.  Everything will be so surprising and new. We are meeting some friends of ours at China. Their are already at China because they're adopting two girls. It seems like these next two weeks are going to be a fun, crazy and exciting. Again I want to thank all who are reading this.

 Check out my China bags.

Hi classmates, (and teachers and aides) I can not wait till we go to China. I am imagining China full of people and busy. By the time you read this we will be in China. Right now we are packing.  I can not wait to tell you guys and gals about our days in China. See you all soon!