Wednesday 10 June 2009

Visiting the Xiamen
Science and Technology Museum
Children Future.

What to do on the weekend with two kids...

Brett had found the "Children Future" place in the Xiamen Science and Technology Museum one rainy weekend whilst Mummy and Sebastien had been in Australia. So in early May we decided to check out this with Sebastien to see how he'd enjoy it. The bus trip is almost an adventure in itself - Alex likes to go right to the back of the bus and isn't worried about being on her own whilst Sebastien likes to hold onto his own hanging strap these days.As usual, the motion of the bus lulled Sebastien to sleep. Alex and Mummy followed closely behind through the landscaped grounds.And then, we were there.

It is roughly divided into four sections - the first is all about the human body and includes displays about parts of the body and delightful and informative signs such as this one.The next is all about insects
and has a great slide that everyone enjoyed. The third is all about water and has lots of different stainless steel contraptions to demonstrate the power of water. Here Alex is getting into a rowboat.
Now she's trying to lift this lever to generate some electricity. And the one she loves best of all is shooting the paddle wheel with the fish.The last section is the play area and we spent a large amount of our time here. Alex headed straight up to the top of the play structure. Sebastien is still a little small to let loose up there - mainly because parents aren't allowed off the ground level - as we found out after Brett went to retrieve him from the top of a slide - so if he gets stuck or heads for something too advanced (like a sliding pole) we can't get to him. Thus Sebastien mainly stuck to the ball pit.Not that he saw a problem with that.It's the headless child!They had a swing (not common in Xiamen) and a trampoline that Sebastien loved running around on and Alex loved bouncing on.
Then it was time to head home. Sebastien was learning that he had to walk by himself and not be carried everwhere - a difficult lesson for him - so Alex and Mummy went ahead and stopped to wait for Daddy and Sebastien to catch up. Mummy allowed Alex to use the camera with these (culled) results.That was Mummy demonstrating the traditional chinese pose for a photo - usually one-handed but sometimes two.

From there we went to KFC - for the first time in I don't know how long and the first time in Xiamen - for dinner followed by a blizzard at Dairy Queen (the only one in Xiamen and fairly new). Life is good.

1 comment:

Heather said...

Em runs to the back of the bus instantly too! Funny. Love the picture of S sleeping on Brett's shoulder. Precious.

Xiamen University, China

Xiamen University, China
Our home away from Australia