CHINA! Before you Go!

My husband had the opportunity to go to China and I took the opportunity to go with and bring my baby!  I was so excited!  Some tips before you go

1. You will need a Visa, we got ours through a company specializing in visas, it took 4 days to acquire a visa.  You can not enter their country without one!
2. Pack light!  I mean pack like you are only packing for 1/2 the time you will be there.  If worse comes to worse you can buy more clothes there and call them souvenirs.  If you are traveling alone, you will probably be okay, but as a family their taxis are tiny, and the trunk space is really small.  
3. Be careful of getting scammed.  Tours, hotels, and travel inside the country should not cost you as much as you think it would.  The airplane ride should be the most expensive part of your trip.
4. There are hotels there that are more like apartments, I would suggest to find one of these if you are going as a family.
5. Have all of your destinations written in Chinese, so you can show the address to your taxi drivers most of whom do not speak English, or to people on the street if you get lost and need directions.
6. Make arrangements for any children you leave at home.  We have a legal document that we have notarized that gives temporary guardianship to whoever we leave our children with while we are out of the country.  We do this so that in a medical emergency, or any other unforeseeable emergency we can know that our children will be taken care of.  
7. Skype works in China, so if you have children you are leaving at home set up a Skype to Skype situation so you can call your kids for free.  
8. Find a good translator app that works offline for your smart phone or Ipod