1999 Flashback

Some fun OLD photos we found of our trip to China back in 1999:
Rob @ Tienanmen
Rachel in Xi'an
Group Photo with Buddha
Pictures borrowed from our sponsoring program, CCCU's CSP.

These photos go way back to the pre-millennial days when Rachel and I were just considering ourselves a couple. Very exciting and frightening at the same time. At the end of the semester, we figured if we could survive a relationship in China, we could survive a relationship anywhere. And that theory was strangely accurate: making a relationship work in the USA was so much easier! During the trip to China (Fall 1999), we spent most of our time in Xi'an, Hong Kong, Beijing, and Shanghai. We visited many other cities along the way.

Our favorite moments in China (in no particular order):
1) Top of the Jin Mao Tower in Shanghai
2) Trekking around Xi'an on the famurs "City Wall" (you're not suppose to go around the whole thing , but we did).
3) 37-hour train ride from Guangzhou to Xi'an
4) Horseback riding in Gansu Province
5) Tai Chi lessons (cloudy hands!)
6) Street food vendors (hepatitis on a stick)
7) Beijing: Great Wall and Rachel's 21st birthday bash (same day)
8) Beijing (Continued): Forbidden City, Summer Palace, Temple of Heaven, Ming Tombs, Silk Alley (which is now lame. No more "authentic" North Face copies. Now they're flagrantly "Noryth Face.")
9) Xi'an's Old District / Muslim Quarters / Terra Cotta Soldiers
10) Starbucks in Beijing. You wouldn't understand unless you lived in a developing country with little familiar around you, then one day seeing the blessed Green Mermaid in a window across the street after being away from home for 4 months.