The Conerly Family: The Pearl Market & The Chen Family Temple

Tuesday, June 25th (Day 10 in China)

Today was another day we had planned for touring the city. We decided to tour the Chen Family Temple. Ancestral Temple of the Chen Family is also called Chen Clan Academy or Chen's Lineage Hall which was a place both for offering up sacrifices to ancestors and for study. Now it serves as Guangdong Museum of Folk Arts and Crafts to show the most characteristic Guangdong architecture.

Our driver, Yuan, and Lily

This was how they slept. No mattresses, and porcelain pillows. It doesn't look very comfortable!

Amazing embroidery.
These can take 1 1/2 years to complete.

The Chen family seal.

You had to look through a magnifying glass to see the beautiful paintings. Amazing how they can do this! Lily said this is a lost art. Most of the young people are so focused on their education, and don't have the time to learn these techniques.

They place their ancestors names up on

this wall once a year to worship.

Watching the fish.

It was so hot, yet Caroline fell fast asleep.

Thank goodness there were fans throughout the temple to cool us off.

I love the beautiful lanterns.

Thankfully we had an umbrella to block the sun.
Did I mention that it was very hot!

Caroline was all tuckered out and ready for a good nap.

I love to watch her sleep!

Play time with her toys and of course, the Starbucks bag.

Another destination on our tour was the Pearl Market. This was a six story building filled with stores that sold jewelry, mainly pearls. I've never seen anything like this before. We walked in and immediately wondered where in the world to begin. Every store seemed to look exactly like the next. Lily took us to one of the stores after I told her what I was searching for. What I really wanted to buy today were matching earrings for Caroline and Savy to wear on each other's wedding days.

Sisters have a bond like no other, and they will be so blessed to have each other. Even though I'm much older than my two sisters, I love them with all my heart. It will be so special to tell others the story behind the earrings on their wedding days. I also wanted to purchase a pearl bracelet for me to wear. This has been the most amazing trip, and I wanted to purchase something symbolic....with a lot of meaning behind it. Daddy (Ba-Ba) says they're never getting married, and that they'll live with us forever!