Our bags are packed and ready for the 6:15 a.m. bellboy pick up. We bought extra luggage today for the extra stuff we have acquired, and we will bring home a cute little Chinese boy as a permanent souvenir.
The van will be here at 6:45 to take us and the other two families to the airport. That will be 2:45pm Christmas Eve for those of you on the West Coast. 22 hours later, we should be in San Francisco International Airport. And it will still be Christmas Day.
Our last day here was spent adventuring off the Island. We took the subway to a Guangzhou eight-story shopping mall. Up to this point, in spite of bazillions of people living in China, we have not seen that much crowding. Today was different. The crowds were absolutely crazy. Tens of thousands of shoppers, elbow to elbow. When we found the toy section and saw parents grab for toys, it suddenly all made sense. We were in a large mall on Christmas Eve! We had forgotten it was Christmas Eve. You could not pay us to go to a mall on Christmas Eve in the States. And this is China! We now know what it feels like to be an ant trying to scurry out of a flooding ant hill.
This evening, after a “hot pot” dinner, we took one last stroll through Shamian Island and discovered crowds here too. Christmas crowds. Our suspicion is that Shamian Island attracts tons of Chinese people on Christmas Eve due to the Western/European nature of the place. Christmas is a Western holiday, and not traditionally celebrated in China. Yet Shamian has one of the oldest functioning Christian churches in Guangzhou, and it was packed out this evening. The crowd overflowed into the courtyard in front of the church, and we could see and hear the choir dressed in robes singing. The rest of the island was crawling with folks strolling around wearing santa hats and blinking antlers. Others sported glowing red horns or bunny ears, for reasons we could not understand. In spite of Christmas décor all over China, no where this week have we seen a manger scene. Remember, the holiday is called the “Santa Festival.” Good thing we are headed back to the States where none of that ever happens! (wink, wink, nod, nod)
We want to thank each of you for sending us emails while we blogged away. Our blogging helped us to process what we were experiencing and to record our memories, but it also helped us to connect with our friends and family back home and made us feel supported in our adventure. A big thank you goes out to Leah Dutton for getting the posts and pictures up and sending out emails to let everyone know. We will try to add at least one final blog entry (with more pictures!) once we are back in Bellingham, reunited with Lidia.
Merry Christmas from Victor, Carina, Lidia and Sam Sam Kozaczuk!
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