July 15

Thursday morning, we had breakfast in our room--our coffee and milk, fruit, and bread.  Just enough and no hassle.  The day was predicted to be rainy so our outing for the day was changed from going to the prairie to staying closer to Manzhouli.  By 9:30, Charlotte’s entire family plus Mark and I (but minus the wedding couple) were assembled and on the bus.  It felt like we were going on a school field trip--arranged by Zhiyong and led by his cousin.  We were  relieved that I-i, Charlotte’s maid of honor, was able to speak English.  (About the name--Charlotte said she changed it for some reason.  We’re guessing on the spelling but it was pronounced E-e.)

First stop was the Chinese/Russian border.  The border is marked by impressive massive arches on both sides.  Most Chinese buy a single ticket and walk through the gate in the fence to get into the area near the border to view the other side as well as to see the different gauge train tracks--not the same in the two countries.  Zhiyong had arranged for our entire bus to go through so we didn’t have to go as individuals.  At one point a police car stopped the bus but Zhiyong’s cousin hopped out, showed the appropriate paper, and we were allowed entry.  Our bus trundled through and we all disembarked and started walking around the grounds.  This was the innocent beginning to our troubles.  Unbeknownst to any of us, this area is for Chinese ONLY.  After about 30 minutes of wandering around, we were following Zhiyong’s cousin to the stairway inside the massive arch that gives views to the tracks and into Russia, when suddenly we were surrounded by 8-10 Chinese uniformed police. 

I heard later that Charlotte’s mom was initially excited because she thought it was a kind of “changing of the guard”.  In fact, she instructed Charlotte’s cousin Dong Ying to take lots of pictures.  Well, no, that was not the case.  We, Mark and I, were the cause of the police!!  We were to be escorted out of this sensitive Chinese Only area!  So the entire group started nervously walking out followed closely by the police.

soldiers following us all

Apparently, the police were actually apologizing to the group but indicated that “rules are rules”.  We all ended up with stifled giggles and much hilarity on the bus as we waited for one missing couple from our group.  Since we had time, I decided to go with others to the W.C. and the soldiers followed me there and back to the bus again.  Shuzhun protectively stayed with me the entire time.  Later, Charlotte indicated that the police wanted to avoid any news of our being in the sensitive area from getting out since “U.S./China relations are strained right now”.  Yikes!

The group seemed to take it all in stride and no one indicated to us, at least, disappointment over being kicked out.  We were sad because we caused problems but also because we had been looking forward to see the mechanics of changing from one gauge to another gauge of railroad.  While sitting on the bus waiting to leave, we saw one train entering China with over 60 carloads of Russian logs.  It is a very busy port.

From the border, we bussed to Manzhouli’s big tourist site--the famous giant matrouska doll park. There are over 200 representative huge dolls here including a couple that are 90 feet tall.  Opened in 2006,  I don’t think this area has any other purpose than as a tourist stop.  It was raining fairly hard and the group wasn’t interested in lingering.  Mark and I were fascinated by the strange variety of dolls--Abe Lincoln to Chopin to Michael Jordan!  There were dolls representing different countries although we never found the one for the USA.  We also scurried over to a very Russian looking, bright blue building topped with onion domes.  Zhiyong’s cousin thought it was some kind of church.  Wrong!  It was filled with paintings of women in various states of undress…huh?

Next stop was, of course, lunch!  We ate heartily AGAIN.  One of the aunts carefully produced matching forks for us from a little pouch.  They had red plastic handles with pictures of little bears on them and were a matched set--“Tina” and “Ted”.  I was never able to ask but I think she bought them specially for us.  She produced them again at every meal.  We felt well looked after.

The afternoon was on our own--we took naps and caught up on emails a little.  We found that if we put the computer in the open window of our hotel room, we could pick up an unsecured site (called 5FCOFFEE) at different times.

Zhiyong made sure that we were planning on coming to dinner since it was to be at a favorite Mongolian restaurant.  We assured him that we would be in attendance.  At the restaurant, we were ushered into two small rooms featuring large wok-like boiling pots set into the middle of the tables.  Mark sat with me so we could talk with Charlotte.  The pot was simmering with a kind of savory soup/stew of a whole fish, potatoes, eggplant, beef, onions, and tofu. They stirred in a plate of noodles and we all dug in.  It was marvelous!  The beer and rice wine completed the dinner and all had a grand time!