"Being back at work has been such a let down after our wonderful travels through china, and i meant to drop you a thank you note to express our appreciation for your arrangements and the super guides we enjoyed in our travels. Please do not worry about the meal in Xian. I understand the mentality of Chinese cooks; just in the future, if a tourist makes such a request for "meiyo weijing", and the cook feels it imperative to drop in some msg, the waiter/waitress should inform the tourist which foods contain that spice. it is a very serious problem for people who are very allergic to that spice.

generally, we were very satisfied with the tour arrangements, and again, as mentioned previously, with the guides. peggy (jing lan) in xian was superb! li in guilin was also very good, as was cheng in beijing and fan fan in shanghai. we were duly impressed with their command of the english language and knowledge of the chinese culture and history. with respect to the meals, we would recommend switching the luncheon meal outside the summer palace in beijing, as it was totally unsatisfactory. the last meal in shanghai at i believe the dynasty hotel was also very poor. on the whole most of the meals were average. we were impressed with the first dinner in beijing and the first lunch in shanghai; the dumpling dinner in Xian on our first nights stay was excellent, as was our meal (on our own) in shanghai at lu bo lang in the old town which fan fan recommended. the hotel accomodations were satisfactory, with the exception of the sheraton hotel in guiling which although rated a 5-star, should have been rated more as 3-4 star. we particularly enjoyed the hyatt in xian and the jc mandarin in shanghai. as you know, there was a bit of a mixup at the sheraton in guilin upon our arrival, as the date for our arrival had not been revised by the agent in guilin, and we were informed that there were no hotel reservations for us; however, that was eventually straightened out. We were very pleased with the touring arrangements; what really impressed us the most and what we truly enjoyed were the guides that you utilized in the cities - they were excellent. we particularly enjoyed peggy and li, in their improvising and sharing with us sites off the beaten path as time permitted, and their desire to show us what we were interested in.

thank you once again for the wonderful tour of china and such wonderful memories. we plan to return to china in about 2 years, at that time with Petes daughter who is now 16. we will, again, contact you, and hopefully our paths will cross, if not then, when you come to san francisco. we will meet someday!

"xie xie, zai gen" (spelling? maybe at that point in time, i will have learned a bit of mandarin)."