China Day 12: Banyun Temple & Boat Cruise

I'm posting this a day late, but yesterday was mostly a better day.  I couldn't believe it, but Liuxia let me put pigtails in her hair, which she hasn't let me do in a week!  In the morning we went to visit a temple called Six Banyan Temple.  It was a Buddhist temple that was built 1400 years ago.  I think the current temple was rebuilt 600 years ago.  There were several different Buddha statues, and people were burning incense and praying at the different statues and buildings.  There is a beautiful pagoda there as well.  It was definitely a very unique experience to see the religion that is practiced by so many Chinese.  While we were there, an older Chinese lady offered Liuxia some of her food.  In the US, first of all this would never happen, and if it did, we wouldn't let our child eat someone else's food.  But here in China, it's like everyone is one big family.  So Liuxia took a bite of some of her food, and then the lady ended up giving Hannah the whole plate of food to take with her!  She kept giving us a thumbs up!

We went on a dinner cruise last night, which was a wonderful experience.  Believe it or not, we had Papa John's pizza for dinner!  Our agency had it delivered to the boat for us.  It actually tasted pretty similar to Papa John's at home.  So Hannah had her first pizza, and she seemed to like it.  It probably took her an hour to eat one piece, but she did eventually eat it.  I have never met such a slow eater in my life!  She carried it around with her on the boat and nibbled away.  She did great on the boat cruise and seemed to really enjoy it.  She was starting to interact with the other kids, which was cute.

Photo Captions
Pagoda at 6 Banyan Temple
In front of pagoda
Temple
Hanging out with Mommy
Lady who gave Hannah her food
Flowers on the island
Serious but adorable face
Happy face!
Papa John's delivery!
Boat we rode on
First bite of pizza
Fuzzy picture, but shows the lights of the city-just beautiful!
Notice the pizza in Hannah's hand still!
On the boat (still eating!)
Really neat looking bridge we passed under