Tian'an Men Square

About to go into Forbidden City. It's hot here...
Sent on my Sprint BlackBerry

We are in China...

Finally made it here after 30 hours of total travel time.  Just past midnight in Beijing.  Somehow with this one full night of sleep since Wednesday night, we'll wake up on Saturday morning (figure that one out...)!

In Japan & Family traveling with us

We are in Tokyo for a 3.5 hour layover. Nice public airport lounge. Everything is quiet here! Shhh...

Neither of us slept much on the flight, so we're trying to stay awake now until we get to Beijing in 7 hours before getting a solid night's rest.

We did knock out some movies: Paul - Hurt Locker (interesting), Blind Side (great), Sherlock Holmes (ok); Becky - Tooth Fairy (cute), Leap Year (bad), Avatar (good).

Here are our good friends, the Spitlers, from Charlotte that we will travel with in China: http://bringisaachome.blogspot.com

By the way, my Sprint BlackBerry is working awesome here in Japan. Very easy to update the blog.

Sent on my Sprint BlackBerry

Flying out - good news!

First flight picture is here. A small jet from Charlotte to New York JFK. We were worried for the next leg, a 14 hour flight from JFK to Tokyo, because the last minute flight was pretty full and we didn't have seats next to each other. Well, we just checked with the agent, and we now have Bulkhead seats next to each other. Very nice! We'll be signing off for a while now. Updates coming on Saturday when we tour Beijing to see Tiananmen Square, Forbidden City, and Summer Palace.
Sent on my Sprint BlackBerry

What time is it in China?

Our kids quickly figured this one out and reflected in their prayers.  At night time they will say, "Please help Lyla have a good morning." At breakfast they will say, "Please help Lyla sleep well tonight."

China time (the whole country) is on the same time zone of GMT+8.  That translates into exactly 12 hours ahead of the US Eastern time zone during Daylight Saving Time.  So, while we are in China, if it is 1PM in Charlotte, it's 1AM the next day in China.

Contact info

• By phone: We'll have my Sprint Worldwide BlackBerry while travelling.  You can reach us at 704-965-3522 for emergencies.
• By email: I will be getting email to my BlackBerry at "paulbeckywuerslin at gmail dot com"
• By voice: We will be using Skype id "pwuerslin" while on the road.

Welcome to our Blog!

We are going to use this Blog to share a little about ourselves.  The first big event will be our trip to pickup Lyla (born February 2009) from her current home at the Social Welfare Institute (a.k.a. state-run orphanage) in Nanjing, Jiangsu, China.  We leave on April 29th, and we will meet her on Tuesday, May 4th.  We hope to post pictures, thoughts, and other events of our trip to this blog.  Visit regularly or sign-up to get updates.  Use the photo link at the top of the page to see a stream of the most recent photos, or click the "2010-04 - Trip to China" link at the right to get all of our China Trip photos.

Next update: Contact Info