Ok so iam swrestling with the internet trying to answer you guys. Today was tienmen square, the forbidden city and the tombof Mao Tse Dung. Lots of very young very serious red  guards marching around...tried to get them to smile . Some of them were sweet and shy and some of them scared the sh.. out of me. The people were amazing, soo friendly and nice. The school age kids loved  practicing their Engrish on me.. Two women my age practicing a dance with fans in the park. Told them they were beautiful (Mei li) then they said no no I was and we argued in a happy way about it for a while, then decided we were all Mei li and had a good laugh. Tee shirts and signs are a riot. Easy Joy gas station, "Create their own to create better  clotting (pretty sure they meant to say "clothing")" on the front of a tee shirt. But my favorite shirt said "Blinking Smile". Saw several of those.
Mao looked pretty good for a dead guy. Weird to think I was looking at the actual man. Sort of like when Roy Rogers stuffed Trigger. There are pictures of George Clooney everywhere. He  looks constipated but I guess he is supposed to be looking hot. NOT. Hopefully I can get this sent. Love you guys. Yes I know it is actually a keyboard, but calling it a piano gives a better mental picture!

Hello from Bejing. It is huge HUGE and largely unintelligible. Imade two friends who speak little or no English. One sat next to me, a high school English teacher who was visiting his daughter in medical school in Wisconsin. He was very fluent and very proud of his English abilities. I didn't have the heart to tell him I couldn't figure out most of what he was saying, so I nodded and smiled a lot. He probably thought I was senile.

He did tell me where to go(no, not like that) while here in Bejing. Tomorrow I will head to Tienamin Square. (It might be in bad taste to do my man in front of the tank imitation, ya think?)

There were some of the terra cotta soldiers and horses in the airport. I was thinking about taking my picture on the horse, decided against it

My other friend is the cab driver who didn't even pretend to speak English. I told him some stuff out of my handy dandy Instant Chinese guide book, but he made me quit talking because whatever I was saying made him run off the road.Tomorrow I'll try to get the blog going, but this works for now. Thank God for the internet(never thought I would ever say that!) Agirl could get a little lonesome out here by herself.

My piano has made it great so far. They lost it for a while in the Bejing airport but there was a very irate Mexican base guitar player who lost her guitar and fur was flying. I just nodded and smiled and followed her at a safe distance. When they found her guitar, low and behold, my piano! She stormed off in a huff and Ithink they said something about "help the senile round-eye with her piano". Could not get on facebook. The instructions were in Chinese and Ive been flying since yesterday at 9:00 am. It's now after midnight. G'nite for now.