Hello from Shijiazhuang, China

Hi Everybody,
It is a bit difficult to get access to a computer here in China. The hotel that we are staying at has about 20 floors and only one computer for our use. It costs 5 Yuan for 15 minutes . Six yuan are worth about $1.00 Canadian.
We have been a bit taken aback by the treatment we are receiving here in Shijiazhuang. They treat us like we are very important people. Even the people in the street all stop and stare at us, especially if all eleven of us are together. Apparently they do not see many 'foreigners" and are just fascinated by us.
We have gone to the local college every day this week and met with a class of about 50 students. Each of us has a small group of six students that sit with us and we help them understand what is being said in English during the lecture. The English names of some of my group are quite interesting. I guess that they were allowed to pick the names themselves. I have a Blue and a Spring and there is a Zero in the class. Too funny.
They are the sweetest kids you could ever meet. Keep running to get us Canadians another cup of tea or trying to sit right beside us. They are very curious about Canada. They were fascinated when I showed them Canadian loonie, toonie and a five dollar bill.
None of them have ever been on a plane or outside China. It has been very hot and sunny here everyday but we have not had much of a chance to go outside so no chance of getting burnt. We leave for Beijing on Saturday . We go by bus and it will take us five hours to get to our hotel. We are going to see things such as the Forbidden City, Winter Palace, Tianemen? Square, and the Great Wall and of course do some shopping. Trish, the mascots for the Olympics are all over the place and they are the cutest little things.
One week from today I will be safe and sound in N.S. again. We are thinking that we should get t-shirts printed up for us and call ourselves the "Dodging Disaster Tour of 2008". China is still in its three days of official mourning for the earthquake victims. All flags are 1/2 mast and on the t.v. in our room we can only pick up CNN> The other channels originating from the U.S. have been taken off the air during this time of mourning. No entertainment channels are showing during these three days. Every channel has only news of recovery efforts or other news of the day. Little strange but that is how it is when your Government controls all of your media.
Gotta go, we have rare time off this afternoon until 4:00 p.m. so think I will take the opportunity and go to the hotel pool. Talk to you all at least once more before I leave for home I'm sure.

Doris