Kai has been asking about Buddha since before we left home. "See Buddha?" he says. I think he's asked about seeing Buddha every single day here. We were hoping to visit temples in both Baoding and Xi'an, but didn't manage to do it. Today we finally returned to the Six Banyan Temple here in Guangzhou, and Kai was very happy!


In the main hall of the temple are 3 giant bronze statues of Buddha each weighing 10 tons and cast over 300 years ago, they are the Buddhas of past, present, and future.


The hands of each one is positioned differently...


We visited the temple with the a group of families all adopting through our agency that are here at the same time. Our guide asked the monks if we could receive a blessing for the children, but was told it wasn't possible as they were preparing for a big ceremony. Then suddenly one of the monks changed his mind and said if we hurried they would do it right then, so we all quickly gathered and received the blessing.


Kai was fascinated by the monks, and enjoyed lighting the joss sticks at the different shrines.


A nun stopped to admire Shen.

It was a beautiful visit, and we really enjoyed the time we spent there. Afterwards we went to the Chen Family Temple, which is a museum of folk art and craft work. It's an amazing site, but we weren't really able to see much of it with the boys. The temple visit was easier to experience as it was more about the atmosphere and mood of the place, as opposed to looking at things. Between pushing a stroller up and down lots of little flights of stairs and multiple potty breaks, we didn't get much out of it. I enjoyed the architecture though, and it was fun to see something new to us.

Afterwards we went back to the hotel and fed the boys lunch in the room - cup-o-noodles and milk.


I took them swimming while Tina sorted laundry, then we went out for a walk. We had dinner at Lucy's


And then Kai really wanted to go to the park in the middle of the island with all the play and exercise equipment. It was busy with lots of local Chinese families using the equipment. Kai loves this space. I think he used every device they have there. It's funny watching how comfortable he is here. I shot a lot of video of him playing and running around. Shen likes to sit in the stroller and watch, but he finally decided to climb out a play a bit too.