Gotcha!

Today is the one year anniversary of when met Grace! It was just after 9pm or so, as I recall, it had been a really long day, and it didn't quite happen like we expected. Nothing did on that trip. And nothing has quite happened like we expected it to since! In fact, it's been far better than we could have hoped. God is certainly good!

In adoption circles, especially the ones we know of, this day is known as "Gotcha Day". Apparently there's some controversy over the term and the celebration (see that link if you really are interested), but we note it as a day of happiness and thankfulness. Just tonight I was telling Grace about it, how glad we are that we "got" her and that she "got" us! It's kind of like a birthday, I suppose, but as this was the day she was brought into our family, the family can celebrate twice as much--woo hoo! (we're her forever family, if you want another adoption colloquialism--but don't try to wikipedia that one). So in our family we have Chinese New Year, Sam's Birthday, Gotcha Day, Grace's Birthday, Anniversary, Kathy's Birthday, and Jon's Birthday all in about 2 1/2 months! Whew! Maybe you can begin to see why it's important to us, but we don't go all out.

In the past few weeks, as Kathy and I have retold the story to those that have asked, memories from our trip to China have become clearer once again. When we first returned from the trip I was so thankful to be home and really didn't want to return--ever--except to say so if I was being polite. But, like climbing a Colorado 14-er, after time passes, I find myself wanting to return someday. We've become more "aware" of China, more interested in her past, present, and future, and more concerned for her beautiful people that God also loves just as much as us--even though the East is so odd to the West.

Grace has been growing and developing wonderfully. She is typically a very happy kid, and is learning SO quickly! She loves music, books, and babies--dolls or real ones. Her best friend is doggie, and doggie's best friend is Grace now that she knows where the dog treats are and sneaks them to him whenever she can.

Here's G today sporting her new sunglasses Kathy bought for their upcoming trip.

One final note, I just realized that our last post (the Dead Blog post) alluded to a trip Brooks and I were taking to Europe. That trip did happen, and it was amazing. I only wish that Kathy, Sam and Grace could have come. Here is a link to a (I hope brief) blog about that trip. Not having reviewed it recently, I hope it doesn't leave you hanging in the end. :)

Well, since someone asked why we haven't kept the blog up to date, I thought I'd at least write this to let y'all know that this story has a happy beginning!

Dead Blogs! Dead Blogs!

This is June 4th, and our last post was back in March! Ooooh, bad bloggers, I suppose. Well, time for an update. After reading this update, you'll no doubt be able to FINALLY get the sleep you've been deprived whilst waiting for news--any news!

Let's start with some continuity material since the last

post: about Grace. Believe it or not, there is still more paperwork required once returning to the U.S. Grace has been added to my health insurance--more paperwork than you'd think. The adoption has been recognized by Colorado, and her "Colorado birth certificate" is on the way (both TONs of paperwork). So is her social security card (still more). And she's a bona-fide U.S. citizen, according to the immigration department. Yay!

Grace has been to the pediatrician, and on his recommendation, to a team that specializes in international adoption. Our doctor thought everything looked good, but that the team really knows what to look for, even based on which province

of which country that a child comes from. So we made the appointment and Kathy and the kids spent 5 hours with a team of a half-dozen specialists poking, prodding, x-raying, and taking blood.

Then we heard: nothing! We did get one letter from that team telling us what the bill was going to be, but we had to call 4 weeks later to learn the results. And they are: Grace is healthy. We had 3 concerns, some of which would have been quite serious, but the PA briefed me that we had nothing to be concerned about. Still, when we go for her 15 month checkup we'll speak to our doctor to confirm that interpretation. But at least we can sleep a little better now.

Speaking of sleeping, her mother commented that Grace has got to be the easiest baby she's ever met. Isn't that something that other mommies say about your children to be nice? I have to agree, however. Of all 21 babies I've ever met, she's the easiest.

You may recall that when we met her about 3 months ago, she wasn't sitting up (very long, that is). She is now standing briefly and just last week began crawling. Woo hoo, go Grace!

Life has not stopped on other fronts, either. Brooks played the caterpillar in the spring play (Alice and Wonderland--Kathy made the costume), the boys completed the school year (Sam's switching out of home school next year). Brooks finished another Upwards Basketball season. Baseball just started. Sam is now a lawn-mowing machine! We've had three birthdays (Grace, Kathy, me) and an anniversary. Mother's Day! My work feels as if it's getting geometrically busier. I sold my "baby" car that I had for 19 years. Boo hoo! Kathy has more cool diabetes technology to play with.

I think we can actually say that we're well on our way to settling in as a family of five and a dog. Speaking of dog, he's feeling a little neglected. If you're looking to lease a dog at reasonable rates, please let us know how we can help.

Oh, the other item that may be of interest to you pertains to my grandfather's 1946 B-17 crash in Italy and France (on the border). It seems that a group of dedicated Europeans is planning to honor the family members of the men who died in that wreck. This is really cool for me especially as I've kind of fallen into the role of (amateur) "family historian", and because of my Air Force connection with him. My sister's family of four, Brooks and I are planning on attending the dedication of a memorial, Lord willing. More on that later.

Coming Home

Warning, this is a long one. But as our day was nearly 36 hours long, we figured, I’ll only hit the highlights.

Our day started at 4:45am with alarm clocks and wake up calls. We were told that we needed to be down by 5:30am so the bus could leave at 5:45am sharp to make it to the Guangzhou airport in time for our flights. The bus did leave at 5:45-ish. Everyone was in great spirits, but the loopiness was just beginning. You wouldn’t believe the jokes we were making on the way, everyone was happy to be going home after all this time.

Guangzhou has an elevated, ringed freeway system that encircles the city, and goes through buildings with surface streets beneath. There are periodic exits down to the surface.

We’d been traveling for about 20-30 minutes when the driver drifted over to the narrow shoulder. Our guide had just been briefing us all on how we needed to hustle when we got to the airport, but that there should be plenty of time. So why was the driver pulling over? Then we heard the engine repeatedly turning over, and catching, and then dying. Over and over. He made a call on the phone, and then we started rolling backwards! What was going on? We soon realized that, yes, the bus was broken, and the driver was going backwards to get the big tour bus out of the traffic (remember the narrow shoulder?) About 100 meters back was a two-lane off ramp. We coasted back to the off ramp, but then the bus was blocking both lanes of the ramp. Luckily traffic wasn’t that heavy yet.

The driver made some more calls, and I think our guide made some calls too. Another bus was on it’s way and it would be there in 20 minutes or so, and the plan was to transfer the baggage, and get to the airport (in plenty of time, of course). One funny part is that after all our wise cracking, and the bus breaking down, the driver asked for two guys to help push the tour bus out of the road so the lanes weren’t blocked. (It was funny that he thought two guys could move it!) Four of us hopped up and gave it the ol’ Guangzhou try and did manage to get it to the side. The picture is a little blurry, but hopefully will corroborate this crazy story. I’m sure you can only imagine where this is headed.

So the relief bus screamed up, parked in front of us, and we did a transfer of the baggage. Then the driver sped us to the airport at what seemed like 50-75% more speed than the other cars. It was like the Beijing traffic dance in fast motion!

When we arrived, we said good bye to the one family that had a different routing—instead of flying Guangzhou to Shanghai, they were first headed to Beijing. They were bummed about the longer route, but they were glad to be going home, too.

Getting to the airport, we really hustled with our guide over to a check in counter while our guide then raced over to a supervisor’s desk where she worked some magic. The check in agent where our group had been parked was frustrated that we didn’t have our passports (the guide and the supervisor had them), and we had 3 families to check in, all in about 4 minutes (before the flight closed, at 45 minutes before departure). I ran over to where the guide was and she was checking us all in there. You know how long it takes to get checked in for a flight sometimes. Checking 6 adults and 4 kids onto a flight in 4 or 5 minutes is literally amazing.

After we checked in, the other agents checked our bags, and it was off to the races again, this time to get through security and then go all the way to our gate. At security we got to go through the “I’m late for my flight gate”, and they whizzed us through. David commented that in the U.S. they’d say “sorry Charlie” and tell you to take the next flight. A good thing they didn’t in this case.

We made it to the gate, and were able to get on the flight to Shanghai. Grace was able to get a nap in on the flight, and things were so far going peachy. I think there must have been a lot of prayer cover, as we’d already had some close calls and some incredible allowances made to keep us on the tight schedule we ended up on. Much of the day, in retrospect, seemed to be providentially guided.

In Shanghai, which by the way is a crazy-big airport, I was tempted to go for a ride on the mag-lev train (advertised to go 30km in 8 minutes, not bad for a passenger train), but we stuck to our schedule. We had a few hours, but needed to get set on our international flight.

One funny thing that happened when went to go check in. We went up to the United desk to start the process. I told the man that we had two adults and a baby with a ticket to check in. The man said he only had middle seats left in the airplane, and no two together! I said “she’s 11 months old, what can you do”. He said “there’s nothing I can do”, but you can check with the folks at the gate. Something didn’t feel quite right. We were still like 4-5 hours away from our flight. That’s when Kathy had the smarts to ask “is this the flight to Chicago?” He said “No this is to San Francisco!” We had a good laugh over that one. It turns out that you go to a specific gate at a specific time to check into a specific flight. We were told to come back in an hour or so.

So after checking in and saying good bye to another family traveling on another airline, we went through security. Rounding the corner we saw a big long line snaking through the retractable belt pole thingies. Then a man approached and asked to see our tickets and passports (always makes me a little nervous, I don’t know why), and then ushered us all through the “VIP” line for passport control, and the VIP line for security screening. It really had a red carpet, too! Then after a short* wait (*-An hour? Two hours? That’s short in this day), we got some more VIP treatment by being escorted to the new gate after a gate change, and we got to pre-board before everyone else!

You’d think there wouldn’t be much to report on a 12 hour flight over the Pacific. Actually, we didn’t ever cross the Pacific. From Shanghai to Chicago, the normal route takes you over Japan and the Pacific, but due to the captain’s concern over a warning of a radiation cloud over Japan at our altitude, he thought it wise to spend an hour getting a new clearance to fly around the cloud. We did get that clearance, finally, and then, against a 70 km/h headwind we flew to Beijing! (So Howard and Beth, you guys lucked out getting to skip Shanghai! J) Being so far east and north of where we started, our new route took us over Siberia, the pole, and down over Hudson Bay, approaching Chicago from the North. The rerouting approval and the longer flight time made the total flight about 14 hours. Even though they explained a few times over the PA system and apologized for the delay, we didn’t hear anyone complaining about not getting to fly through the radiation. After the first couple of hours, Grace settled down enough to sleep. Kathy and Grace got some Z’s in; I got a in movie and a book.

The most exciting part (for us) about the Chicago connection was: Grace became a citizen! Also, it was another tight connection.

Touching down in Denver at 9:45 pm MT, and exiting the plane about 10pm (no one to drive the jet-way over to the plane), Brooks, Sam and Gramma were waiting for us at the top of the escalators. It was so good for us all to see each other again, and for the boys and Gramma to finally meet Grace. I noticed the on-lookers also enjoying our reunion. That felt kind of good.

It is nice to be home. Finally. Our hearts have been in China with Grace for far too long. It’s good to have them all back under one roof again. I rocked with her in the glider chair in her room last night. With great relief, it was the first time that I cried about this. As the jet-lag wears off who knows what will happen. Thank you, Lord. You’re the one who led us and saw us through this big adventure. Or should I say the first part of this big adventure.

Status

We made it to Colorado!  More crazy details later.  Jon's been up >36 hours, and we're all beat, so we'll make another post tomorrow.  For the other families that travelled with us, we had a wonderful time getting to know you all and your new additions.  We'll be in touch and share our pictures.

One More Day in China

The day before we left, Wednesday in China-time, we mostly chilled out. We came to breakfast later than usual, and really had no commitments. Having received Grace’s immigration papers and Chinese passport, now with the US Immigrant Visa inserted, the night before, we had pretty much no commitments except to be sure to check out of the hotel the night before and to get our bags packed for the bell boy to pick up before 8pm. It was strange to check out the night before (yes, we still slept in our rooms), and also strange to think about a packing strategy that allows you to sleep and get ready for a long day of travel.

The day was filled with shopping. One should note that when I use phrases like “the day was filled with”, there is an implied tax of baby naps, changing, and meals levied on every day, so the amount left for “shopping” is whittled down to about 2 hours. Here’s one last picture of us all at Starbucks. Again, you’d think that all we did was crave things that were familiar or American. Well, even though we started out more adventurous, I have to admit that it’s true. Looking forward to being back home is what allowed us to power through this day and definitely the next.

Lastly, we had dinner with a few other families at a local restaurant, and said our good-byes to the ones we wouldn’t see the next day.

Comfort Zone

Kathy, Grace, and I spent yesterday on an unscheduled and unplanned adventure! After her morning nap, we strapped her into the stroller and set out in search of gifts for our boys--we'd heard there was a market just north of us, off Shamian island. I like to think of Shamian island as the opposite of the "China town" you find in many large US cities. It's "Western-town" (no shutter-doored saloons, nor wooden sidewalks, of course).

Heading over a pedestrian over pass in some chilly wind, we finally found a 5-story escalatored market. Strangely, it wasn't what we non-readers were thinking. Every floor featured an array of herbal items and natural items. I'm talking hooved shin bones, antlers, dried sea horses, eels and other aquatic things. Many other things out of our comfort zone. But we pressed on deeper into town, looking for "gifts". Kathy wanted to turn back, but I was convinced that the elusive toy store was just around the corner. About 8 blocks north of where we started, we found an outdoor market area, with shoes, watches and underwear. We commented that we must be in the "food court, lingerie, Hello Kitty" part of the mall. :) Not many toys, though.

We did finally make it back to the island, and found some things here. We picked up Grace's visa to get her back to the US, and we spent a quiet evening in our hotel room with a Papa John's pizza.
That's about the day in a nutshell. Grace is still doing better and better with us. She still is a nap-champion, and is talking more and eating even more. Hopefully all that contentedness will get us through the long flights tomorrow.


If this video doesn't work now, try this link--things are kind of sketchy when posting from here:
http://vimeo.com/21098196

The Red Couch

There are 10 families in our group. This photo is of our Grace, Lyle, another Grace, and Mun, all from the same province. The red couch isn't like what I had pictured in my head. I knew there was some couch at the White Swan, and I had pictured a ratty old red couch with sagging, worn out pillows and faded fabric due to years and years of adoption photos. Actually, there are several couches, and as this is a nice place, they keep things up! Silly me.

we now have an American girl

We're still alive and well - sorry I haven't gotten around to blogging for a few days. It is now Monday lunchtime in China - G is just waking up from a nap (always wakes up happy!) and we are fixin' to have a cup o' noodle lunch. Shopping at the 7-eleven grocery department is so limiting. Pretty much noodles, noodles, noodles, candy bars, and shrink-wrapped meat-like things I don't recognize.

If you have followed anyone else's blog about adopting from China, you will know about the White Swan hotel. If not, let me tell you we have again landed in a pretty great spot. The room is nothing to write home about (and yet, I am) but the other amenities are great. There is a two-story waterfall in the main atrium, an inside pond filled with monster-size goldfish, a huge birdcage with little bright songbirds Grace likes to watch, lots of shops, and a terrific breakfast buffet. Still, we are both looking forward to getting home. What we miss the most are our boys.  Also the washer/dryer, kitchen, our bed, having more than one room to share, cool dry Colorado air . . . Yesterday we were missing the fellowship of our church and worshipping with our Christian family.

Sunday here was pretty quiet.  Jon went on a tour of a folk art museum, but Grace and I opted to stay "home" to watch the fish and birds then nap. Grace is a serious sleeper - two longish naps and ten or eleven hours at night.  I hope we can maintain this when we turn her body clock around in a few days. Last night we joined several other families and our guide for traditional Chinese food at a nearby restaurant.  "Not very fancy, but cheap," as our guide apologized.  Just like home, I told her. It was great and I am inspired to do new things with potatoes I had never imagined.

This morning was our all-important consulate appointment, which our guide told us about a dozen times to NOT MISS and to NOT BE LATE. We were trundled off to the American consulate where we off-loaded another heap of money, stood in various rooms and waited with other families, raised our right hands and swore to various things on behalf of our daughter, and signed some more papers. Grace is not quite a US citizen, but almost, and will be when she reaches US soil.  Or rather, the floor of O'Hare airport, our port of entry.

We have, so far, been impressed with how well this little girl travels.  Buses, planes, stroller - all good.  I am hoping this extends to the minivan. Generally, Jon and I are also good travelers. If we were here just to explore a new country, we would be loving these experiences. As it is, we are growing weary of trying to parent in hotels/restaurants/museums and are looking forward to being home. Just a few more days, and those consist mostly of free time. And there is a Starbucks here.

While I have been typing, Jon has been feeding Grace noodles.  She has eaten everything we have offered, but noodles are the biggest hit.  Jon drops them in like a mother bird dropping in worms, and she sucks them in like you wouldn't believe. She can't pick up Cheerios and get them to her mouth, but she can slurp up ramen noodles like a pro.

                                                                   shampoo time

                                                          on again off again with the hat

                                                                    slurpin' in noodles

More process, but Starbucks makes it worth it

I've received some comments that some of y'all really enjoy the pictures, so I'll take a hint that my writing isn't up to blog standards, and try to keep the writing short(er).

Today was passport photos (for Grace's US passport, which we'll get later in the week), followed by a trip to the clinic. Every adoptive family in Guangzhou was at the clinic today, so there was a lot of standing in line.

This clinic visit was to confirm that G is healthy and can go back to the US with us. We did have a little bit of a concern, but as far was we can tell we aren't being held back. On

the walk back to the hotel,

we found a Starbucks, where K was able to get her fix in--it's been a while! The brewed coffee was great, but K noted the whipped cream on her frappacino tasted a little diffe

rent than she's used to. La

ter today we'll meet with our agency guide and work through the US side of the paperwork in preparation for more meetings in the coming days. After that it's dinner at Lucy's with some from the group. We're looking forward to it. Here's some photos from today for you to enjoy.

Not shown in the pictures, we noted that there were no less than 6 different "photo shoots" going on with people taking pictures of models in fancy clothes, even wedding gowns, probably for a catalog or something, we guessed. Here's Grace obliging for someone for her own picture.

These last two shots I took for Sam, our violinist. Sam, note that even bronze statues suffer from broken bows occasionally.

Now in Guangzhou!

Today was about traveling to the next and final (official) city, Guangzhou. After breakfast, we received a copy of Grace's "finding" advertisement (newspaper ad) as a keepsake, checked out of our hotel, and headed to the airport for a 2:30pm flight to here.

The original flight was cancelled a week ago, so we were taking an earlier flight. That flight then was delayed after we got to the airport. When we heard that there was an hour and a half until boarding, two families went up a floor to find lunch. Not ten minutes later, they announced something in Chinese, and all the waiting people literally scrambled over to the bus-boarding area! We got the hint that the flight had just been "un-delayed", and then the announcement came in English. The families upstairs had just ordered, but luckily got their money back as the order hadn't yet been put in. Thank goodness they made it onto the flight.
Grace slept through the entire flight with the help of a bottle and her mommy's tender arms. If she does that on the long flight I just might put this girl through college! :)
We've heard many things about the famous-in-China-adoption-circles "White Swan" hotel. It is indeed very nice. All three hotels we've stayed in are pretty swanky. I can only imagine what we Americans (not just westerners) are thought of by our hosts. We stay in 5-star hotels, apparently are pushy and demanding (a funny idea to me, based on what I've experienced here), make interesting observations about the way people drive (I should tjavascript:void(0)ell you sometime), and the first "american food" restaurants that come recommended are Mickey-D's and KFC. But I digress.
As K and G are both asleep, I'll just cut it short. Actually, that's about all there is to report today.
More appointments tomorrow, and several throughout the week.
More later! Hope you're all doing well.

another day in the life...

I think today is Wednesday.  Activity-wise, things have slowed down quite a bit and we are enjoying some rest and some quiet time with Grace. Jon and I are pretty much over any effects of jet lag, we're healthy and sleeping well, and we're getting the hang of taking care of Grace. 

Right now she is sitting on our hotel bed and crying - a mix of ready-to-go-to-bed and the fact that Jon stepped out of her line of sight. She is getting more comfortable with Mommy but when she's tired, she just needs Daddy. It's a bit tough on me, but not like it would have been if I had not read and heard about this happening often.  I have no doubt she will come around.

The three of us visited the hotel coffee shop this afternoon - ordered a mocha and a caramel machiato and played cards.  Grace is not good at cards, but very interested in holding them.  The Chinese apparently have a vastly different concept of mochas and caramel machiatos than Starbucks has. Still, it was fun and nice to chalk up as one more experience here.

Also today, we visited another pavillion - the TengWang, I think.  It had lovely paintings created by one of the emporers and featured a famous poem by one of the ancient poets. It made me think of the Longfellow park near my brother's home. From the balcony, we could also see a good view of an enormous digging project, which turns out to be the construction of a city subway system. Maybe the most interesting aspect of these Chinese citiesto me  is the juxtaposition of modern and ancient. I had an interesting chat with our guide about ancient vs. modern religious beliefs, and apparently this juxtaposition extends beyond just the architecture. (Say that five times fast.)

Four families in our group in Nanchang

Teng Wang Pavillion, 9 stories tall, built in 653 AD, rebuilt in 1980's.

I would write more, but we are loaning this computer to another family for the evening so they can talk to their relatives. The families (three of us have been together since day one) really meld into one big family, looking out for each other and swapping/giving things supplies we need. This family borrowing our computer gave us a package of laundry soap earlier. More blogging later...

Late Breaking Video

This just in, live video of Happy-Sad Girl caught in a rare happy moment, just before swing back to sad. This was shot just before bedtime last night.

http://vimeo.com/upham/gku1

Settling In

[By now you might be able to tell when Kathy's writing and when Jon's writing, even though it always says Kathy. I just added myself as an author to her blog, so now you can tell for sure!]

Yesterday was a day of settling in. It was a morning just as packed and odd to the western mind as the others, and it was followed by--break time. The first real break since before we left, to be sure. And we and our group just about fell over when we were told that we wouldn't need to do anything until an OPTIONAL walk the next day (today now) at 1630, and if not that, until 0930 the NEXT morning. Just hearing those words was like the feeling you get when being served a wonderful dessert--you haven't had a bite, but you just know it's going to be good!

After a tasty hotel restaurant breakfast, we piled into a small toyota bus (large van) and drove to the local government office where the main Chinese portion of the adoption proceedings would be done. After loading up kids and strollers (three other families with us), we moved out into some pretty heavy traffic (which our guide says was light) and immediately drove down the street and got stuck. Our creative driver (who will be tipped generously at the end of this trip!) "made it happen" by, with one hand on the wheel and another on the horn, cut onto the sidewalk, wove through some sidewalk-planted trees and people for about 30 yards, into a parking lot, back onto the street and into the next intersection where he did a U-turn! We then went back one block in the other direction. He pulled over, and we all got out--we were there. So the entire bus trip was about 3 blocks, but as the crow flies, it was about one block and across the street. We all cracked up! Probably not a bad thing the way traffic is here, especially with the new babies.

I just realized that getting to the office took a whole paragraph, so I'll try to speed it up a bit for those of you with non-vicarious lives to live.

In the office there were several other families present with our group. New York, Maryland, and even Holland were represented. Here's what got done there: a family photo was taken, many papers in Chinese were signed by us, many fees were paid (gulp!), and a finalization interview with an official was performed. The best parts were that we finalized much of the process (still more to go) and that we got to ask more questions of the orphanage director where Grace's foster home was attached to. There are a few more interesting details, but I'll not be able to share them on an open blog. It's a real experience combining the exploration-by-immersion of another culture (if staying in a western hotel doesn't nullify that entirely) with growing your family by 25%.

Next was a trip to the notary--a really quick in-and-out meeting. That was followed by a trip to Wal-Mart (which appearantly is becoming customary for adopters to Nanchang), and that was fun.

Grace has a chest cold, so, being a little concerned, we were able to visit a doctor at the clinic inside the hotel. The doctor had no serious concerns, so we plan to suck snot from her until it clears up--hopefully nothing will prevent her from entering the U.S. (There, now that didn't sound like Kathy, did it? She would have surely described the nasal aspirator bulb thingy).

Time to keep resting. She's resting now. Night sleeping has been a major blessing--about 12 hours last night for Grace with only one bottle break. We're excited to spend the next few days settling her into our family.

There is a baby at the end of this post

The Hutong tour via rickshaw

At the end of this day (Sunday) we met our new baby. But we had a very full day before that. The itinerary listed these for Sunday: check out of hotel, Hutong Tour, Forbidden City, Tienamen Square, fly to Nanchang, receive babies.

First, a rather hurried checkout - turns out it was too hurried on our part, as we found out later in the security check at the airport. Then the Hutong Tour. It was hard to imagine what this was since we had never heard of a Hutong, but we were pleasantly surprised. Hutong used to mean "well" in ancient times (more about ancient times in a second) and the Hutong area of Beijing began as a number of public and private water wells in one ancient neighborhood. (Side note: we heard "in ancient times" from our tour guide many many times today, and it seemed to mean basically in the days of the emperors, which ended in the early 1900's.) Today the Hutong area is a grid of tightly woven streets of tiny apartments. In fact, "hutong" now means any street narrower than 9 meters (from 9 to 18 meters is a "street", wider than that is an Avenue.) Anyway, we were bussed to the Hutong neighborhood, driven around it in bicycle rickshaws, and allowed into one of the homes to visit with a family. This tour was my favorite so far - an up-close look at some Chinese people and how they live. While we were chatting with the family, the teen-aged son walked in with a new haircut, apparently, and the mom had a fit. Moms are moms the world over.

The Forbidden City is terrace upon terrace and palace upon palace of protection and ceremony, which served as the home for the emperors. There are a million of (fascinating) details, but the gist of the place is to surround the emperors with wealth, privilege, good luck charms, ritual, luxury, and countless minions. I found it hugely impressing, but also terribly sad, as an enormous temple to misplaced faith.

Our tour guide didn't go into much depth about T. Square as we walked across it. If you knew nothing else, you'd find it to be a large peaceful paved city square surrounded by government halls and other important buildings. I won't write too much here of Jon's and my opinions, but I will say I was sorry I did not know more of the square and the government's recent history.

Off to the airport (via Kentucky Fried Chicken, which was terrible) and off to Nanchang. I must have fit the security guards' profile because I was pulled out of line and busted for shaving cream, face wipe cloths, a water bottle, and a can of apple juice. Jon chugged the apple juice as I expounded on the insulin pump and received a pat-down - you know, just in case.

Very cramped two-hour flight to Nanchang; good food service, but we are too nervous about getting sick to eat Chinese airline food we don't recognize. New tour guide and driver, and more updates, schedules, and info. By now, us remaining three families traveling together were getting very anxious to meet our babies as well as rather travel weary from the marathon day. The guide said the three babies were at a different hotel from ours, so when we arrived at our hotel, we would settle into our rooms while she called the nannies to bring our babies. Something didn't work as expected, and the babies and nannies were actually sitting in the lobby waiting for us as we got off the bus and hustled our bags inside.

After waiting five years for the moment, we were all caught off-guard. None of us was prepared, no one cried, we hardly asked any questions, we just were shuffled off to our rooms, stunned, and holding stunned little kids.

There is too much to say about this sudden life-change and this incredible little person to adequately put it in a blog post, but here are a few details. Grace is absolutely darling and has lots of thick hair, cut and styled into a precious little look. She is definitely a Daddy's girl - he held her the most right at first, and she is really only happy when she is with him. The 12 month clothes I brought are going last maybe this week and next, then we'll switch up to 18 month clothes (she's built just like our boys at that age.) We are in love with this little girl. She slept very well after a bath and bottle.

I am writing this on Monday evening, so more has transpired, but I am too tired to write about today's events and too tired to post pictures (hope you like them now), so I will leave it here.

Don't know what day this is

Life is a fog of jet lag and dehydration, but we press on. I am immensely grateful for our guide, Joy, who takes care of every detail. Today's adventure was mostly about the Great Wall, which, essentially, I feel like I hit every day about 3 in the afternoon.

Breakfast each morning is a bit of an adventure. If I were accustomed to eating Asian cuisine, breakfast at this hotel would be really lovely. However, with my deep aversion to sushi at breakfast (or any) time, it's tricky to eat.

After eating this morning, we met for a bus ride to a cloisonne factory. The "we" here is our group of 5 families total. One couple already received their son and decided (wisely) to stay in today. The rest of us headed for the factory. Cloisonne is a time-consuming art form used to make these lovely enamel/copper pots. You would recognize the style. I recognize the style, but have not yet figured out how to pronounce it. It was very interesting to see the artists at work and fun to browse through the truly lovely gift shop.

On to the Great Wall of China. I had been anxious about this bit because of the strenuous nature of the hike, and I found this to be a well-grounded fear. We had a lovely cable car ride to the wall, then about an hour of steep ups and downs along the wall, along with a significant portion of China's population. If seeing the Great Wall of China had been a life-long dream, today would have been a disappointment. Since I was not anticipating too much, the only disappointment for me was my own wimpiness in not being able to keep up with our group.

On to lunch - a lovely restaurant with a traditional Chinese feast - lots of tasty dishes I didn't recognize but am glad I tried. Then a two-hour bus ride to the hotel - about twice as long as expected because of traffic. Beijing is a fascinating city, even from a bus window, and our travel group is easy and fun to be with. The architecture is surreal, from the Olympic Bird's Nest to this TV network building, locally called "The Pants."

The rest of this day will be used for Jon and me to regroup, repack, and rest for tomorrow. We are one day away from the real purpose of our trip - getting Grace. I feel increasingly aware of God's hand in this process and his quiet reassurances that we are following His voice. Many people are praying for us, and if you are one of them, I would ask for specific prayer for Jon to sleep more and for my blood sugar to be a bit more manageable.

Tired Touring

We debated signing up for the "package" through our adoption agency which offers a couple of extra days up front of touring. We finally settled on doing the tour package as we've come this far, paid this much money, we should try to learn as much as we can about the country Grace was born in. Today I've come to realize that it's a good thing in another way: walking around and visiting places is a good way to help get your body clock turned around. Today another couple and we opted to go out on our own and see the "Temple of Heaven". It was quite fascinating, and I won't repeat the history here (since you're already on the internet you can find it yourself, and besides I'd get it wrong). One of the most interesting things about the trip was the taxi ride getting there. It was like a high-speed vehicle chase-slash-ballet through a crowded pedestrian mall with trucks, cars, motorcycles, tri-cycles, people, dogs. Many times we were mere inches away from high-speed catastrophe (or so it seemed), but we made it back alive. I had the video camera with me, and was sitting in the front seat, but was concerned that it would be rude to film the driver's skill. I kinda wish I had.
We got to the temple and rented a translator device and began touring. It was very good to see relatively-modern history of a country that is literally millenia old. All four of us were impressed.
On the way home we got a taxi, and as we were famished, tried to find somewhere to eat. We ended up opting for the hotel restaurant this time.
In the evening we went to a planned tour: an acrobat show. It was amazing. Unfortunately, they expressly requested that we don't film or photograph their amazing acts. Our boys would have loved to see their skills. Lots of flying through the air, lots of coordination (like stacking 6 women on a single moving bike, spring-boarding a guy 25 feet into a chair, etc.) and lots of flexibility and muscles.
Tonight Kathy decided to stay in while I went out with some new friends. Yes, we went to a Chinese restaurant. I stayed away from the ox-tripe, and we had a good meal and a great discussion.
I've saved the best part of our day for last: this morning our in-country agency worker told us that due to scheduling nuances, we will meet our daughter on Sunday night, not Monday morning as originally planned. This was to save fees and make it more convenient for the folks in her province as they have a long way to drive from where she is. We can hardly wait to meet you, lovely Grace.

Friday March 4th, morning

Friday March 4th, morning:
Not sure if it's proper blog ettiquette, or "blog-iquette", but I thought I'd give you an update. I'm not nearly as good a writer as Kathy, but with as much sleep as I've had over the past 3 days, I like to think that I am.
Needless to say, we were able to get 3-4 hours of shut-eye on the flight. The only reason I was able to was due to my lovely bride switching with me. (Before you go off and label me as someone who'd put my wife in HACK's way, you should know that her seat controls were busted, so she couldn't watch TV, listen to music, or even use the reading lamp. If you know Kathy, you know that would be torture for 12+ hours.
Once we arrived, we made it through customs and got our bags. Then we met Joy, the Bethany worker in Beijing. It was good to have a friend. Then we took a short ride with a man who spoke no english to our hotel. It seemed like the ride really took 45-60 minutes. What was impressed upon us most were two things: what a huge-beyond-our-expectations city Beijing is, and what a great driver that man was!
Arriving at the hotel, we crashed for about 20 minutes, and then we met three other families with Joy in the lobby for a trip to the local grocery store, where Kathy and I bought a package of cookies, two oranges, and a dozen bottles of water. Then back to the hotel. Our body clocks were so messed up, I can't tell you how nice the bed was to crash onto!
It's Friday morning, and Kathy says she slept great. I think I got 4 hours of good sleep. Time for breakfast!

Travel Day One

Travel day one: up at 2:30 (Jon up all night, I think), picked up by Terry at 3:30, no problems checking in at the airport. Problems came when we were on the jetway about to board and were informed that too many people brought little roller suitcases and all in-cabin storage was full. Apparently we could choose between calling Terry back and heading home or allowing the airline (United, by the way) to check our carefully arranged carry-ons all the way to Beijing. After a little philosophical debate with a rushed and harried (by us) flight attendant, we are now travelling fairly foot-loose and fancy free across the world. Just me, my backpack, and my man - and this teeny computer. We are praying we will not be quite so free and unburdened when we get to the baggage claim in China.
Meanwhile, we are sitting having frappes and croissants in the (foggy) city by the bay, watching several families pushing strollers, and getting very excited. Finally on our way!

Happy Birthday Sam!

Sam picked TGIFriday's for his early birthday dinner tonight. This post is mostly to see if we can figure out how to upload pictures (not very hard) and we thought this picture is a winner.