It was a beautiful Sabbath morning, and we all thought of our mothers from our 1/2 day head-start. We had a very good Church meeting on our own since we were unable to meet with the local branch. Then we drove to a nearby restaurant for lunch. We headed out again soon to go to the Xi'an Museum of Art to see some of their art and then learn the art of calligraphy. This is one of those skills that looks SO easy when one watches, but is very difficult to recreate. A few of our group were naturals, and produced some reasonable characters. And others of the group just ARE characters.
It had been cool and raining lightly all afternoon, so our visit to see the stone tablets was cut short for the health and well-being of our Singers. No one wants to be ill the last week of the tour. But what we saw was very interesting.We had a very good dinner at the hotel, then split in many different directions for the evening. It sounded as if many were going in search of ice cream or other goodies since fruit doesn't satisfy their need for sweet. We are all supposed to be packing tonight in anticipation of having our suitcases picked up tomorrow night just after we return from our long day in Xi'an; that will allow a group check-in for our early morning flight on Tuesday. We are all considering the logistics of getting ready Tuesday morning with none of our own liquids since they cannot go in carry-on luggage. Somehow we will figure it out and start the day clean!Also--I forgot to mention last night that we heard from some of our audience that they had already heard the concert before they came--apparently some of those phone and tablet recordings are making their way onto Chinese social media! I guess it's good publicity...