We are back from our second day of Olympics and today was a .5 on the 1-10 scale. Our event today was tennis....and....it poured rain and the tennis venue was total chaos. More on that later...

We are back in our apartment after a long day in the rain and crowds....we are hoping to watch the USA vs China basketball game on the television. We went to a restaurant this evening to watch the game....but the weather (major rain and lightening) was making the reception really bad

Two days ago.... Shanghai....
On the way to the airport we stopped for lunch at a new (or at least new to us) Mexican restaurant. The food was good and I think we will eat there again...

Restaurant alley in HongQiao

Security at the HongQiao airport was Extreme!!! There were several queuing areas, x-rays, and check points. Everyone was escorted through the security maze one person at a time. As soon as we entered the airport we were wanded and put in a "holding area" until....well ....I am not sure what the qualifying mark was for when they let the "holding area" people go. I was happy we got there a little early even though the process went pretty smooth.

On the plane to Beijing....

Tucker was playing with his camera..,

We arrived in Beijing to....well....lets just say the sky was not exactly blue. We were amazed at how many private jets we saw while we were taxiing to the airport. We think we even saw Air Force One.

Welcome to Beijing...

CCTV building....

We decided to rent an apartment for the four days we are in Beijing. Tim found this place on the internet and it looked like a good option....It has been a good place to hang out but we have had a few "issues" with the place.

This is our apartment building...
The apartment grounds ...this picture actually looks much better than it does in real life...
front door......we are on the 18th floor.

This is Tucker and Abi's room...these beds do not have mattress.....they have one comforter like blanket on top of a wooden board.....no kidding!!!

This is our living room....
This is Tim and my bedroom

One of the bathrooms.... This bathroom has a tub/shower combo but not means to keep the water in the tub area while taking a shower....hmmmm?

We waited for our apartment contact person for over an hour. When she arrived we had to wait for a while longer to get a key. The air conditioning was turned off so the apartment was REALLY hot and muggy. We were a bit grumpy by this time. We left our house at 11:00 and it was 6:00 when we finally got the key to the apartment and went off to find dinner. We made arrangements for the "contact person" to come the next morning and take us to the police station to register our arrival. This is a new requirement in China any time you check into a hotel or stay someplace in China that is not your "primary" residence. They are imposing very high fines for hotels and others that do not comply with this law.

We walked to a Papa Johns Pizza for a quick pizza so we could watch the opening ceremony on television at 8:00. The pizza was not quick....they ran out of cheese....I am not kidding! And the first three things that I order...they said Mai you....which means.....we don't have. The good thing.....we met some nice people in the restaurant...three young boys that were with their teacher and her husband. The boys were anxious to practice their English. We all shared our frustration with the service and it somehow seemed more fun.....

We watched part of the opening ceremony....I was falling asleep and Tim and I went to bed before we saw the US team come into the stadium.

Stay tuned for more of our Olympic fun and disasters!