Dear Lily,
We (Rober and Aileen) want to offer our condolences and aid over the deadly earthquake in China.  We'are moved by your deep suffering from the devastating earthquake.  I wish I could go to the disaster-hit areas to help, but what we can do now is just to donate some money, and we wish it can offer little help for the reconstruction.

I also write to let you know that we had a very good trip to China. As you know, you organized a tour for us from April 1 to April 9 -- Beijing, Xian, Shanghai. We asked to try the overnight train tranfer from Beijing to Xian, Xian to Shanghai.  We accepted your suggestions of staying one place for more time, visit less places, it was definitely a good idea. 

The idea of  taking overnight train  was also quite nice, thank you, my friend, we are retired senior citizen, compare to young people, we had more free time, and train cost were less expensive than flights, also, it saved us two nights of accommodation in hotels!  We like the experience talking with different faces of ordinary Chinese people.  What a chance!  You know, travelling in China, it was the first time when we did not need to catch up the time schedule.  And it was the first time that we felt like ourselves were ordinary people, not 'Laowai' ( it is the nickname for foreign travelers in Chinese, am I right?).

On the train Xian to Shanghai, Aileen asked me to go to see the hard-seat cabin at night, she said you told her in one of your emails, that you went to your university in Shanghai, took 36 hours train 4 times a year, in summer holiday and winter holiday, to see your parents, and you only had the money for a hard seat ticket.  So we went to the hard-seat cabin, at night, Chinese people were amazing to see two 'Laowai', we saw young students, farmers, workers, babies, and we felt that we were really spoiled to have so comfortable soft sleeper cabin.  At that moment, I remembered the words you told me before:  In China do as Chinese do.   Sorry, we could not.

Also I need to thank you for your advice to ask us to prepare clean tissues for the train, the bathroom on the train it was just like you described.  When we arrived in the next morning, the arrangement for taking us to the hotel to fresh up and have a western style breakfast is attentive, we could understand the hotel was fully booked, no clean room available at 8 am, so we used the bathroom in the lobby. 

All of our guides were very good. John in Beijing was excellent. He was good about the important cultural sites in Beijing and always very helpful. We appreciated the evening night market shopping invitation from our guide Joyce in Xian. She suggested a foot massage at the end of a long hot day. It was a wonderful experience and not on the schedule. We know that you had to scramble to find guides for us-- they were all great. Holly in Shanghai was very nice. The food was good with one exception. China was a terrific experience. Thank you for your assistance.

The tour package we took
9 days Beijing, Xian, Shanghai train tour