We love travel disaster Part III (let's end this)

I'd like to say a little bit about the Chinese language.
Totally incomprehensible.
That's all.

My Brother Kevin has been studying Chinese for some time (1-2 years?)
When he bikes through China in the Spring, apparently it will help him.
Well.... I'd like to take a moment to thank my brother, Kevin, for giving Ira and I some of the biggest laughs we have ever had, and right when we really needed them.

We pictured Kev, studying those wacky and impossible pronunciations with his tutor, over and over, then eventually paying him, whatever it was, $10-20 per hour, hour after hour, week after week.
Oh my Kev. Are you in for some fun. Good luck my dear brother. And thanks for providing the best laughs. We had a great time imagining you getting out your grammar notes, just before peddling across the border, happy about all those lessons that you invested in.

another giggle attack.

So let's finish up China.
How about just jumping right to Ira and how he lost his 'Bloom coolness'.
---The Day of the Great Wall hike. We went up to the Mu-tian-yu section of the wall, whisked up to the top by gondola/cable car. (By the way, I don't give all those fancy facts about where I am like my brother does on his trip around the world. I am on a really long stone wall. That's about all I know. Oh, and it's quite old too.) We decided we would all hike together the several kilometers on the Wall, and then the older kids and I would toboggan back down--(like an alpine slide/go-cart ride). Ira would walk down the trail with the baby in the backpack, and we'd meet at the bottom, to buy souveniers on the tiny street to the entrance..
Crammed with vendors, they were coming at you from every direction. "Hello lady, you need t-shirt? what size? here, try red one", and right as she is going on, another person calls you "Miss!, I have table cloth Miss!"-- "Excuse me, I have best price lady, you need hat? look I have pretty carving--best price."
You get the picture.