Nanning

Nanning has been wonderful!  From the minute we arrived at the hotel (a Best Western) it's been a treat.  Our rooms are great and  the hotel has a huge pool and they kept it open late for us because we didn't arrive until close to 10pm.  We had huge picture windows with great views. Thankfully we got to spend a lot of time in this great hotel here in Nanning!

On the 9th the kids had a press event at one of the local schools. The kids participated in a music class as well as a Chinese class!  (I videoed some of it so you could also hear what was going on but I separated the videos from the pics in case it's hard to download - be patient, with the videographer also!!)

Matthew's birthday was also today, he had a wonderful day, "the best birthday ever"!  Shawn, Jack and the kids managed to send flowers to the hotel! Emily managed to sneak in a gift right under Matt's nose!  Caitlin and an gave him a CD of Erhu music and some of the other cast brought him some candy, cookies, pool toys!! The party continued with pizza, fruit and soda's out on the back patio!  I had ordered 2 cakes, one chocolate and one vanilla from the local Walmart (that was the best I could do on such short notice since the Walmart was right next door) and they we're great! Then the hotel made a beautiful cake for Matt and THEN the Presenter sent over a cake with his hospitality group from the theatre!   So Matthew ended up with 4 birthday cakes!!!  It was great to have a Broadway type cast sing "Happy Birthday" to you!

The best part of the night was when Amy (our resident Trumpet player) gave Matthew his gift.  She had carried the Erhu  from Harbin, through the airport as one of her carry ons and we carried her carry on. Matt even helped her with what he thought was her trumpet several times!   He had asked for an Erhu since Chengdu, even when we were home he mentioned several times that he hoped we were going back so he could get an Erhu! He was so excited to got it!

The crazy part is that our Presenter Mr, Sheng is a VERY accomplished Erhu player and just returned from playing a concert at the National Theatre in Beijing,  He gave Matthew Erhu Lessons!!!! Mr. Sheng began Erhu at the age of 13, so he really pulling for Matthew to do well.  We went a second day, for 2 hours each day!  It was very generous of him to give us his time like that! He is the head of several National and Regional Arts agencies! After the lesson we went around downtown Nanning. Check out this Majong table!

We only had 3 shows in Nanning, it was a very old and musty theatre.  Opening night, I sat with Peggy, the 5th grader that was Matthew's translator at the school event.  She brought gifts for all of the kids and Maria and Capt.  Also one for me!  How sweet.  She gave Matt and extra special gift, a Chinese characters writing book, a special paint brush and some ink!  He was thrilled because we had seen this at the school! I'm sure Nanning will be one of Matt's favorite cities in China!