What a Journey!

We left our hotel on Wednesday night, and took a two hour train ride to Hong Kong.  It was a good trip and the train ride was interesting.  We got to see some of the area around Guangzhou and Hong Kong.  Joe was impressed by the fact that there seemed to be one continuous city from Guangzhou to Hong Kong.  The train ride also kept us from taking an extra connecting flight.  Drew ate his weight in yogurt at the train station and got a little sick on the train, but other than that it was uneventful.  At the train station, they had temperature scanners.  Someone took the temperature of all the children as we entered Hong Kong.  I am not sure what happens if you have a fever.  There was a sign that said "Quarantine." I think they are very serious about stopping the spread of contagious illness.  Thank goodness Drew passed that test!  We spent the night in the Hong Kong airport hotel.  We arrived late in the evening so we did not see much of the city.  Hong Kong seemed more Western than the rest of China.  In the dark it looked modern and tropical.  It reminded us a little bit of Bangkok, the city we stayed in when we adopted Susannah in 2005.

Joe and Drew looking out of the train window.

 The Hong Kong airport was very nice.  It was huge. and all of the people working there were very kind to us.  They let us move to the front of every line and tried to play with Drew while we checked in.  Still, we arrived 3 hours early and barely got to the gate before we boarded our plane.  The plane ride was pretty uneventful.  Yay!  We had not bought a seat for Drew since he was under two, and I was worried about the lack of space.  However, Drew did great for almost the entire 15 hours!  He did not sleep more than an hour or two.  However, he did not cry either, and that was really nice.  He was very interested in the touch screen in front of our seat.  He didn't watch anything, he just pressed buttons and called the flight attendant a few times.  She was not so excited about that!  We also brought out the Ipod touch for the first time.  He really enjoyed playing with that.  Before we left I bought a $20 board book in the Hong Kong airport.   That last minute purchase was well worth the money, as it entertained him for a couple of hours!

After we landed in Detroit, we were able to call our girls.  We were tired but excited about completing our trip.  Finally we took the flight home.  I was so happy to see my family at the airport.  I really missed my girls!  A LOT!  They are such good girls and they were so happy finally to meet their little brother.

My dad drove us home, and Grandma and Paw Paw met us there with our luggage.  What a journey!  

Our first family photos!

I am so thankful for all of the friends and family that took such good care of our girls.  They missed us but had a great time with their grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins and friends.  They had a much easier time than I anticipated, largely because of the good care that everyone took of them.

When we arrived at home, some very good friends had worked on our yard, planted flowers, and decorated our porch!  Our house had been stocked with diapers, wipes, and food, and our church friends had signed up to bring us meals for the first couple of weeks.  We are so fortunate and blessed to have such wonderful family and friends!   

Saying Goodbye to New Friends

After the Pearl River cruise, we realized that we would soon be saying good-bye to some new friends who had played a big part in this trip that changed our lives.  There were 17 families in our travel group. However, only 3 other families went with us to Jiangsu Province.  All of them are from faraway states, but they sure felt like family when we were in Nanjing!  We were glad to be able to share the experience with them.

 This family adopted a 12 year old boy.

 This is a picture of Larken with her mom and sister - although they decided to change her name to Avery on the last day!

This is the family who shared their Papa John's pizza and cruise tickets with us!  This single mom had adopted a little girl from Thailand, who is 7 years old.  The girl in yellow reminded Joe and I so much of our Sue!  The other little girl was adopted on this trip, and she is 5 years old.  I enjoyed spending time with this family. . . . . they helped me not miss my sweet girls at home quite so much!

This is all 17 families on the last day.  They took the picture just before we picked up Drew's visa and began the LONG journey home!

If you see me anxiously looking around back there, I was looking for our guide Anson.  He had gone to the Consulate to pick up Drew's visa that we applied for the day before.  Once we had our passport and that brown envelope in our hands, we boarded a bus, a train to Hong Kong, and a van.  After spending a restless night at the airport hotel,  we got up early, navigated the HUGE Hong Kong airport, and got on a plane bound for the United States.

The Pearl River

Our last night in Guangzhou, our group went on a river cruise down the Pearl River.  The plan was to eat Papa John's pizza on a dragon boat.  When we arrived, it turned out that I was supposed to call our guide Joyce the day before to let her know that we were attending the outing, and to tell her which kind of pizza we wanted.   After we rode the bus 30 minutes to the boat, Joyce told us that we did not have any pizza or tickets for the cruise.  I was really bummed!  However, one of the other moms had a sick child, and had to cancel at the last minute, so her sister Christy had come to the cruise alone.  She had a large pepperoni pizza to herself, so she shared with us and we bought her tickets from her.  I was very sorry the other child was sick, but that pizza tasted really good.  It tasted just like Papa John's from college!  And we all enjoyed the river cruise.   The air was cool and the lights in Guangzhou at night are beautiful!

A view from the boat

This is me trying to stop Drew from diving into the Pearl River.

Drew was starting to let me hold him a little more. . . . 

But this was still his favorite place to be!

The Final Steps

These are a few photos from the past few days here at our hotel in Guangzhou.  This morning we had our appointment at the US Consulate to get Drew's visa for entry into the United States.  Tonight we will go on a riverboat cruise.  Our guides say the cruise food is ridiculously expensive, so we will order Papa Johns to take on the cruise.  Which seems silly to me but whatever, right?  I do love Papa Johns!  Tomorrow afternoon our guides will go pick up the visa.  Then we will board a train for Hong Kong tomorrow evening.  We will spend one night in Hong Kong, and then board a plane for the US!

A Bible verse I hopefully memorized correctly from my trip . . . . . . .

"Do not fear, for I am with you.  Do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God.  I will strengthen you.  Surely I will help you.  Surely I will uphold you with my righteous right hand."

Free Time in Guangzhou

Sorry to say that I have no current pictures to post today!  We don't have free internet in our rooms at the China Hotel in Guangzhou, so I have to go down to the pool for internet access.  By the time I got down here today I realized that I left the camera in the room.  Drew and Joe are napping in the room so I will just post a few pictures that we received from the orphanage.

Since the medical checkup, we've had lots of free time.  Joe found some Nutella at the hotel market. So we gorged ourselves on animal crackers and Nutella!  I think I am surviving mainly on the breakfast buffet and junk food on this trip.  On Sunday, we took a taxi with some friends to Shamian Island.  It was a great day!  I wish I had some pictures to post, but I forgot my camera (obviously having some issues with that!)  We bought some interesting souvenirs at Jenny's Place.  Joe and Drew waited outside and made some friends from the store next door called Sherry's Place.  He spent a couple of hours teaching English to Sherry and her sister Cindy while we shopped.  Chinese people are generally very friendly and ask lots of questions!  And Joe likes to talk to strangers apparently.  Who knew?  We also ate at Subway.  It was very similar to the US Subway except for they had Grey Poupon instead of honey mustard.  One of the ladies who went with us to Shamian Island is a single mom.  She adopted a 5 year old little girl.  She also has a 7 year old daughter who was adopted from Thailand.  It has been really fun hanging out with them because the girls remind me of my girls!  Last night we ate at a traditional Chinese restaurant.  Thankfully our Holt guides ordered for us.  It was very good. 

Today, we decided to just rest at the hotel.  Drew seems tired and like a two year old who is out of his routine - which he is!  He has had a few more tantrums in the last few days.  When he gets mad, he stands straight up, throws his head back, and then falls flat to the floor, hitting the back of his head first. This does not seem like a good survival instinct but he has done it twice now.  So we are learning to prepare for that!  He is a very indendent child, and like to do things for himself.  He has gotten mad at us for not letting him eat out of the trash, and I think he holds onto a grudge for a while!  Overall, though, with sleep and food in him, he is a very happy child.  He has enjoyed playing on the hotel playground, has figured out how to use the hotel remote control (even though I haven't), and is bonding well with both Joe and I now.  He eats well as long as we let him feed himself, and he loves taking a bath.  He enjoys being around other children as well.  Although he is missing some fingers and his toes are webbed, those things do not seem to slow him down.

I am so thankful for how things are going.  I think that God is taking care of us on this trip.  Such a big change is hard for all of us, and I felt anxious about how Drew would adjust, about plane flights, and about being in a foreign country.  Please continue to keep us in your prayers, for our visa appointment tomorrow, and especially for our flights home! 

Love the tank top and the mohawk!

I guess he has been on a slide before!

Rest for the Weary

Well - - - quite a lot has happened since my last post!  On Friday morning (was that just yesterday?) we packed up and left Nanjing.  Drew was feeling better (Yay!), and I felt VERY ready to move on. 

Our hotel in Nanjing was nice, and of course it was a great place for us because that is where we met our Drew!  But very few people in Nanjing spoke English, even in the hotel.  We did not run into many other Americans at all, other than the other adoptive families that were with us.  We were quite a spectacle, and very much the center of attention everywhere we went.   Also, we were in the middle of a huge city, and it was hard to get around.  I was ready to be in Guangzhou, because we had heard they are more used to American travelers.  We were packed and ready to go by 10:00 Friday morning. We were scheduled to leave the hotel at 12:30 for the airport. Our plane was supposed to leave at 4:15. 

We took a few pictures of the hotel on the last day.  Despite the fact that there was no air conditioning, it really was a nice place to stay.

Drew in front of the fountain in the hotel

We took this one because Joe was so impressed with the types of cars in front of the hotel.  Drew just keep trying to throw his toy phone out the window of our room and hit one.

Joe and Drew on the staircase in the hotel

When we arrived at the Nanjing airport, we found that our gate was actually in the basement of the airport, and that we would be shuttled to our flight.  And that there was no air conditioning in there.   And there were so many people waiting that we could hardly find a place to sit down.  At the gate, there was a sign that said our flight was delayed, and rescheduled for "No Time."  Our guide had already left us because she could not cross through security into the terminal.  Apparently no one else in Nanjing speaks English.  

So we waited.  For hours.  Many other scheduled flights went through our gate, but ours continued to be delayed, rescheduled for "No Time."  When I showed my ticket to the attendant at the desk, she placed a call, and then said, "Sorry, your flight is scheduled for no time.  Please sit and rest a moment."  So we waited.  For hours.  A very nice girl in a pink jacket with very limited English explained to me that because of the trade fair in Guangzhou, the air traffic was congested, delaying flights.  Then we started to see some flights get cancelled.  Our appointment for the medical check was at 9:00 the next morning.  At least we had a few other families to share in our misery, but we were getting more than a little anxious.  I am not sure what would happen if we missed our medical check but we were pretty sure it could delay our flight home!

The Chinese people in the airport seemed to be getting very agitated.  Around 7:00, the airline brought the in-flight meal into the terminal.  So we ate.  And waited some more.  And it was hot.  Finally, a crowd of people gathered around the attendant, obviously irritated.  The attendant got on the phone with someone, and then made an announcement.  My friend in the pink jacket explained that we may leave around 9:00.  We finally got to board around 8:30.  Then we waited for an hour on the runway.  By that point all of the children, especially Drew, were extremely irritable.  He hadn't had his nap and it was past his bedtime.  He screamed on the plane.  Really loud.  For a long time.  He definitely has healthy lungs.

At about 9:40, we took off.  We arrived in Guangzhou at about 11:30.  We were so very happy to see our Holt guide, Joyce, at the airport.  We arrived at our hotel at around 1:00 this morning. There were some families that had flights scheduled from Nanjing after ours.  We saw them arriving this morning around 7:30 AM, so it certainly could have been worse.  I am so glad we did not spend the night in the Nanjing airport!  And even more thankful that we did make it in time for our medical appointment.

Our medical appointment was at 9:00 this morning.  It was quite miserable, as there were 60 families with screaming children in a very small, hot space.  It seems that most of the flights last night were delayed, so there were many tired families.  Here is a picture of Drew and Joe at the medical clinic.  His face pretty much sums up the last 48 hours. 

The good news is that the medical check is over, and as far as I know, everything went fine.  Our hotel here in Guangzhou is very nice.  Right now I am sitting in a lounge chair at the pool.  Drew is doing well, and is warming up to me a little more.  He is anxious when we are around strangers, but he is very happy in the hotel room.  We took him to a little playground here at the hotel.  I am pretty sure he has never been on a slide or a swing before.  It took him a while to understand it, but he realized it was a lot of fun!  And I am SO much happier to be one step closer to home!

Good Things and Bad Things

 At our house, every night over supper, we talk about good things and bad things that happened that day.  It is basically our way of getting our kids to tell us about their day.  Well - our good thing today was that we visited Xuanwu Park just outside of the city wall of Nanjing.  It was interesting to see the city wall.  It was even nicer to see a little bit of nature.  Nanjing is such a big and busy city, we didn't even know how much we needed a little peace and quiet and sunshine.  

This is one of the few times Drew let me hold him today!  He is really attached to his Daddy!

Thanks to some good and helpful travel companions, we probably have more pictures of Joe and I together from this trip than from any other time in our marriage!

Super cool!

Our guide told us that standing in this gate will make you a "top student."

This is Denise, our guide here in Nanjing.  She has been very helpful for us on this trip.

Denise told us that families and couples come to the park and hang ribbons on the trees with messages for good luck.

Notice the American man beside the flag.  He is the dad of one of the moms in our group.  He has been telling us that everyone is staring at him because he is bald with white hair.  Today at the park this group of college students asked him if they could take a picture with him.  They gathered all of their friends and their college flag, and then around 15 people took pictures of them all together.  It was quite a fiasco!

Our bad thing for the day is that Drew does not seem to be feeling well.  He is still coughing and it is keeping him up at night.  Our medical check is coming up on Saturday, and we really hope that he is feeling better by that point.

Tomorrow we fly to Guangzhou.  That is pretty much the final leg of our trip.  I am looking forward to taking the next steps, getting Drew's visa, and then heading home.      

Just another day in Nanjing

Well, we don't have too much to report today, except that we did realize that we are living with a real live two year old. I think the traditional Chinese medicine is like a cough suppressant, because Drew did not cough at all last night.  He slept until we woke him at 7:30 this morning, but then he coughed all the way through breakfast.  It was significantly worse than before.  We decided to not give him the medicine any more since we really don't know what it is anyway.  We turned off the fan in the room and closed the window - so now it is ridiculously hot in the room again, but he seems to be coughing less.

Other than the cough, Drew continues to do pretty well.  As long as Joe is here in the room with him, he is generally happy and playful.  He seems a little suspicious of me, but is attaching well to Joe!  He does not really like strangers, and is happier in the hotel than when we are out and about.  However, we went shopping today for several hours at the Nanjing Confucius temple, and he did not protest at all.  He did have a couple of two year old tantrums when I tried to dress him or feed him - he wants his daddy to do it!  Although I want him to like me, it actually made me feel a little better to see the tantrums - - - somehow that seems more like typical toddler behavior than just compliance with everything we ask him to do.  He likes to throw things and sword fight with water bottles.  He enjoys bath time, and managed to push all of our clean towels into the bathtub so that Joe had to go ask for new towels in sign language at the desk (because apparently few people in Nanjing speak English.)  He is also smaller than we thought he would be.  The 24 month clothing we brought is too big.  So I think I get to get out the camouflage overalls again when we get home!  Thanks cousin Cole!

There is another little girl in our group who could use your prayers.  Her name is Larkin, and she went to the doctor today for a cough and fever.  I think the whole experience was very stressful for her mom, Amy, who seems very homesick.  Larkin is crying a lot and I think they could definitely use some prayers.  

It's Official!

Today we had another good day!  Praise God!  Although we woke up a little early (well a lot early) for my taste at 5:00, we at least got some sleep since we all went to bed around 8:00 last night.  Drew did cough some in the night, and I hope that clears up soon.  Our guide took us to get some traditional Chinese cough medicine.  I have NO idea what is in it, but it seems to have helped some.  Today we went to the Civil Affairs Office to register our adoption.  We met with the director and a nanny from Drew's orphanage.  He has been in foster care with 4 other children for the last 6 months, which I believe is a good thing.  The orphanage is a "Half the Sky" orphanage, and they had prepared a scrapbook for him to take home.  We also received a CD with lots of pictures.  We decided not to go visit the orphanage, on the advice of our escort and of the orphanage director.  Although I would like to go, it is a 4 hour drive one way. Drew does not seem to enjoy getting on the bus and going places, and we have a lot more traveling to do.  We are happy to have the scrapbook and CD of pictures.

The nanny and the orphanage director seemed very proud of Lian Bo Shi.  They said he is very well behaved and smart.  I believe he has had good care.  He seems healthy and developmentally on target for his age.  I am pretty sure he thinks of himself as funny.  I am very thankful for the care he has received.

 This is us waiting for the registration process to begin.  Many thanks to my friend Jennifer for suggesting the stacking balls.  Drew loves them and the other children here have enjoyed playing with them as well!

We signed lots of papers, and put our thumbprint on them.  All of the papers were in Chinese, so we just signed!

Drew is getting along very well with his Daddy!  They have enjoyed getting to know each other, and share a sense of humor!  

I finally caught a picture of a smile!!!

Gotcha Day!

Today has been a great day!  I will just do a quick post, but today we got to meet Drew - - - -Lian Bo Shi (We found out that Bo Shi means "professor" or "doctor," not warrior like we thought!) He was the first child brought in to a room full of waiting parents.  He cried some at first, I think mostly because of all of the pressure of being walked into a room full of strangers. He stopped crying fairly quickly, posed for a few photographs and then nearly fell asleep. 

This is the orphanage director and one of his nannies.

Here in the hotel, he warmed up quickly and has been very happy so far!  He has enjoyed playing with toys and has done lots of laughing.  He has played peek-a-boo and "Where's Mama?" He also ate noodles and a banana.  He seems to understand a lot of Chinese when we talk to him through Google translate.  And he seems to be somewhat potty trained.  We are so thankful to have a good first day!  Thanks for your thoughts and prayers.

World Travelers!

When Joe and I got married, I did not even want to go on a "real" honeymoon.  If we could not get there in the car in a couple of hours, I did not want to go!  For our honeymoon we drove about 45 minutes and stayed in an inn for a few nights, and then I was ready to go home. . . . . . . .

Guess we didn't know then what world travelers we would be!

Today we had the most exciting parts our our trip so far - probably not as exciting as tomorrow, but pretty interesting, nonetheless.

We woke up this morning and had our all-you-can-eat breakfast buffet - which just puts Joe in a wonderful mood!  No matter how much we paid for the hotel, he believes he can eat enough to actually make money.  We also got to know some other families that would be traveling to Nanjing with us.  That has definitely been a nice part of this trip so far.  Next we said good-bye to our sweet and helpful guide in Beijing named Nancy, and boarded a plane for Nanjing.  

           

This is Nancy leading us around the Fobidden City with her panda bear flag.

Nanjing is very different than Beijing.  The only other Americans we have seen here are the ones that are in our travel group.  There are many universities in this city, so there are lots of college students.  We went to a convenience store and bought some interesting snacks, such as cucumber potato chips and who knows what else!  Then we ventured down the street to the subway station, which doubles as a food court/shopping area.  We ate supper at a Chinese McDonalds, and then came back to our hotel room. 

Our guide told us this is a statue of a son of the dragon.  It reminded me of The Mountain Meets the Moon, a book Katherine and I read recently for school!

This is the underground subway station that also turns into a giant mall.

A picture of the streets in Nanjing

We had to take a picture of our hotel room before we turn it into a playroom tomorrow!

The hotel is extremely nice, but there is no air conditioning so we are a little hot.  In hopes it would cool down as the night went on, we decided to go back to the subway station and explore a little!  We somehow ended up in this never-ending maze of a very crowded shopping mall with no visible end or exits.  I have never seen anything like it!  We bought a toy police car for Drew that makes noise.  No one we talked to could speak even broken English, so we wandered around until we found our way back to the subway station.  Now the hotel room is a little cooler, the jet lag seems to have worn off, and we are ready to meet Drew Boshi tomorrow!  We were excited to receive some final pictures of him today. It looks like that boy does have some teeth!  Please say some prayers for him and for us tomorrow.   

We were really happy to see him smiling!

 I am glad he is outside!