Merry Christmas!

We arrived in Guangzhou on Christmas Eve and finally met up with the rest of our travel group. It was great to see all of the families from our agency along with their new babies! We were pretty much by ourselves in Beijing up until now, so Brandon was excited to have other friends to play with.

Guangzhou is a completely different world than Beijing. Or at least it seems that way during the holidays. Our tour bus from the airport had difficulty getting to the White Swan Hotel, because everyone (and I mean EVERYONE) was trying to get on Shamian Island to celebrate. As it turns out, Chistmas is HUGE here in Guangzhou. Arriving at our hotel was like being in Las Vegas on New Year's Eve. There were swarms of people EVERYWHERE. The spirt of Christmas is definitely alive here, with beautiful lights, people greeting each other, and revelers partying in the streets.

Last night, Rick, Brandon, and I walked around the river area around the hotel and participated in the festivites. Here we are in the lobby at the White Swan:

And oh yeah, and the weather is much warmer here. We've shed all the bulky winter gear and are now wearing comfy mild-weather outfits. Thank goodness...heh. Can you tell I'm from California?