A Day at the Beach and the Playground!
Getting ready!!!
Today was another fun day! This morning, Chris, Neot and Maya actually awoke before we did and went outside for a early morning stroll and to see the monkeys (which usually congregate in the wee dawn hours!). Sure enough, they were there, cavorting in the hammocks and the trees just outside our villa! Maya loved that!
Then, after breakfast, we walked down the hill, through the tunnel and down the road that takes us to the ferry boat, where we hopped aboard for a short (one-minute or so) ride to Cijiin Island.
Cijiin is known for its expanse of beach! As we headed towards the beach, we stopped along the way to appreciate an intricately ornamenta
l Chinese temple. One section had a neat huge fish tank, and Maya liked watching the gold fish swim.
Once at the beach, we all played with Maya, who happily spent a good two hours getting wet and dirty at the beach's shore. No swimming is supposedly allowed yet,,due to the strong currents. But though we did not venture far into the water, a couple of surf 
boarders did and were fun to watch; they caught some waves! Also, we watched one lone young man who was WAY OUT in the ocean, who swam back in, a process that took quite a bi
t of time and A LOT of strength! He was definitely physically fit! As Ted said, WE would not have even made it back; but if we had, we would have flopped like a beached whale on the sand. He, on the other hand, poppe
d up and strode easily to leave the sands to wherever he was going! We also are impressed with how clean everything we see is: the university grounds, the subways, the beaches. You can see why, as you see the people employed whose job it is to clean up litter!!We next went to the colorful and fun small playground. While Chris stayed there with Maya for a few m
inutes, Neot, Ted and I searched for a place from which to buy something we could have as a picnic lunch for the four adults (We brought, per usual, macaroni and cheese and a hot dog for our severely allergic granddaughter). We found a stall and did some pointing, a process which ended up with our getting, in a take-out box, some steamed pork dumplings with soy sauce and rice vinegar . We brought the boxes back to the playg
round and had a fun picnic, except for the bee that persisted in staying with and around us as we ate with our chopsticks! Neot almost freaked out when the critter kept flying near here!!! But we managed to avoid getting stung; all was well!Then we walked further to the beautiful Lotus Lake Amusement Park, which has gorgeous, colorful and intric
ately carved Chinese architecture in temples along the roadside and amusement park Chinese dragons and tigers and Budd
has into which kids can run, sit on different toys to rock, and in general, enjoy bopping all over and listening also 
to the live karaoke singe
rs at the different little spots for 
playing!Leegend has it that, at this park, if you go into the dragon's mouth and exit, after following a "tunnel" inside the dragon's body and the connecting tiger's body, the tiger's mouth, that you have left you "bad luck" behind in the dragon and come out with "good luck!" of course, we did just that!
Earlier in the day, we also had been invited to dine with Dr I-Heng Chen for dinner; he remembered Chris from his (I-Heng's) NYU days and wanted to see him. So we decided to head home and let everyone have a good nap We all went home by 3pm and took long naps. Unfortunately, Maya woke up only temporarily at about 5:30 coughing badly and fell back asleep. So I am babysitting now while Chris, Neot and Ted join the Chens for dinner. I just hope Maya is not getting sick; she has been so fun to be with; she truly is a trooper, for she just LOVES doing everything. She is curious about all she sees and a very good sport!
So I have an epipen nearby, just in case. But I surely don't want to have to use it!! Hopefully, she will remain asleep!
Assuming Maya is okay by tomorrow (fingers crossed), today was great fun! (PS: she was fine the next day!)
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