Special welcome in Changde

When we landed in Changde yesterday afternoon, Judy Yang, our Chinese worker from Atlanta who works with the burn patients and cleft palate children, met us. A female doctor and another hospital worker was with her and presented me with a large bouquet of flowers to welcome us to their city. A photographer was taking pictures of our arrival. A driver took us to the hotel and after getting refreshed from the trip, we went with them to dinner at a nearby hotel. Some other officials from the hospital joined us for dinner.

Changde is a very pretty city - not large like most, but very nice and clean. The streets are beautifully landscaped with colorful clipped shrubs, hanging baskets of petunias and pots of other flowers arranged in designs along the walkways. You see quaint restaurants and shops occupying street after street as you travel along dodging taxicabs, three-wheeled cars, buses, bikes and pedestrians. Don't ever plan to drive if you come to China. You have to be out of your mind to drive here. You will be a nervous wreck just riding with an experienced driver!

After dinner last night, we toured the hotel that will be used for the team arriving for the cleft palate medical mission in August. It officially opened today, so we transferred from the other hotel to spend one night here to see how it checks out. It is very beautiful with large comfortable rooms. This is only the standard room where we are staying, but there are deluxe rooms the doctors can use if they really want first-class accommodations. Those rooms are particularly fancy and look out over the river with a spectacular view of city lights at night.

I asked Ron what hotel he would compare it with in the U.S. He said it's only considered a four-star hotel in China, but it's almost as nice as a Hilton. I know it's much nicer than most hotels we stay in as we travel in the U.S. It's been years since we were in a Hilton hotel.

So, how much does a hotel like this cost for a standard room which includes a breakfast buffet? We will be given these rooms for 200 RMB or about $28 per night. It's a real bargain, I can assure you!

We had breakfast at the other hotel this morning. Ron was not thrilled with the buffet, but I enjoyed it because I've gotten used to having a Chinese style breakfast. I will not be able to remember all of the dishes available but from the cold buffet table, there were plates of vegetables such as sauted zuchinni, snow peas, green beans, and spicy Japanese style noodles. I didn't try the platter of sea horses, however. On the hot table, there was bacon, fried rice, noodles, dumplings, steamed breads, soups (rice congee for one), soft tofu (similar to yogurt) and watermelon. We also requested a fried egg from the kitchen. There was tea and coffee as well as juices and milk (which is not safe to drink in China).

Today's lunch was at the hospital in a private dining room. The standard buffet dining room looked really nice and will work out well for our medical mission team. They can enjoy all of their meals there, if they wish. I can assure you, it will not be like hospital food in the U.S. There will be some weird things, but, for the most part, 90% of the food will be very delicious. Our lunch was extra-ordinarily good today.

Many times, when I tell someone we are returning to China, I will be asked "What will you do about the food?" I always say, "I eat the food because it's very delicious." It's not like the Chinese food we get in the U.S. restaurants. It's much better! We were seated at a large round table with a glass lazy susan in the center. Food is brought from the kitchen and surrounds the glass lazy susan. As it turns, you can try different dishes as you choose.

Today, we had a vegetable I'm not familiar with - similar to zuchinni squash but somewhat different. There was a pot of beans similar to lima beans cooked with chunks of pork (probably high in fat content but oh, so tasty). My favorite vegetable I discovered in Beijing last year was there. It is the tops of the garlic plant that resembles small green beans cut in 1-l/2" pieces and cooked with small pieces of pork. It has only a slight garlic flavor. We also had steamed eggs that is almost like a custard with a topping of some kind, as well as baked eggs with chives, which was also delicious. A steamed whole fish was very tasty with a flavorful topping. There were pressed duck cakes (just fair), sweet potato balls (fried and delicious), a platter of greens, rice and pickled white radish chunks.

Now, which of those dishes would you not want to try? Ron and I ate some of everything and loved it! I told them early this morning that I would stay in the room and work today. I planned to skip lunch because I had a large breakfast. I planned to eat a granola bar if I got hungry. I should have known they would not let me do that. The doctor from the hospital came to my room to get me at 11:30 a.m. After enjoying the lunch, I was glad she did!

All morning, the hospital officials met with Ron and Judy to finalize plans for the cleft palate medical mission. Ron said Judy handled the meeting very efficiently and received full coopertion from the hospital. Tomorrow, there will be an official contract signing with the top hospital officials. This is usually a very special event as it signifies a special joint commitment between our foundation and the hospital. I will try to get pictures and post to this blog later tomorrow.

Saturday night, Ron and I will take an all-night train somewhere. I can't pronouce or spell the name of the city where we are going next. Maybe a post over the weekend will give details of that particular segment of our work.

Judy has completed all of the many things she planned to accomplish while in China to get her long-term VISA to work in the U.S. She will return to Atlanta next week but she's enjoyed a short visit with her sister in Shanghai and her parents in another city. She spent some time with David and Ya Ning in Beijing while we awaiting the approval of her VISA.