We’re heading south to Guangzhou today and Sophie just finished her first plane ride. She took it the way she takes most change – she watched quietly and kept glancing around to make sure baba or mama was nearby.
We’re back in Beijing for a little while while we transfer planes. Looking forward to warmer climes in the south.
Today we went shopping at the craft factory, joined our guide at his parent’s house for lunch and went to the city square to see people getting ready for the lantern festival. If you’ve ever been to one of those stores that has the fantasy swords for sale, we visited the factory where they are made. No, boys, we are not bringing any home.
As I type this, the noise outside sounds more like the background of a news report from Baghdad or Beirut than a small city in China. That’s because lantern festival is like fourth of July on steroids. It’s the last day of Spring Festival, which begins with Chinese New Year, and it’s one of the most important holidays on the Chinese calendar. As we went around the city today, there were various independent celebrations ranging from a few dancers to a line of hundreds. It was very colorful to say the least. It was great to get a glimpse of this central piece of Chinese tradition up close.
Even more exciting for us was that we got back the official adoption certificate and Sophie’s passport this afternoon. That means that the Chinese government part of our trip is over. Tomorrow morning local time (about 6:30 PM Eastern time) we’ll be on a plane and headed south. Next stop Guangzhou and the US government part of the process of bringing our little girl home.
Today we got to visit Sophie’s orphanage. It was about a two hour ride over the highway that had the famous 9-day long traffic jam further south. We got to see the beautiful statues and gateways surrounding a city that is striving to be the most inviting in China. We also got to see stunning poverty. We finally got to Baotou SWI around 11 AM.
The orphanage visit itself was relatively short, since Chicken Pox are running their course inside. We got to look around outside and take pictures. Sophie clung tight to her mama the whole visit. Sophie’s teachers and other workers from the orphanage came running out to see her and said sometimes tearful good byes.
The orphanage looked very clean inside, but it’s obvious that there is not much money for upkeep or facilities maintenance. It’s also obvious that they do the best they can with what they have and that the staff there cares about their charges. In addition to children, the complex houses the elderly (with no family) and the disabled. While we were there, we could not help but feel for the people who are institutionalized with no family or loved ones to care for them.
On the way back to the hotel, Sophie was obviously relieved and got the giggles. After a brief nap during the drive, we got back to the hotel and the girls had a great time playing in the lobby before lunch. With the stress of the day past, and the family bonding continuing, things are looking up.
The only thing constant in this adoption process is change. We had planned to go do some shopping, but that got rescheduled until day after tomorrow. Instead, we went to the museum – still a pretty low stress day. At least that was until mommy took a walk with Sarah and told Sophie to stay with daddy.
At this point, Sophie decided that daddy had sent mommy away and so she started crying and yelling at daddy in Chinese. Kind of humorous looking back on it, but at the time it was pretty frustrating. The rest of the day, Sophie was happy to be with anyone else other than Daddy. After dinner, daddy decided to put a stop to the attitude by carrying Sophie back upstairs. She cried and screamed almost the whole way while mommy and Sarah walked right next to them. Sophie put up a good fight but by the time we all got back to the room, she had started to calm down and then realized that she needed help to get onto the potty to go. In the end, she grudgingly accepted daddy’s help and gave up on the perfectly good temper that she had worked up all day.
In the middle of the day, we visited the Inner Mongolia Museum where we learned about Genghis Khan, Kubla Khan (his grandson), and the history of the area. Inner Mongolia is also the home of the launch pads and recovery areas for the Chinese space program. Our guide told us how three Chinese men had landed on the moon – he even showed us their publicity photos. I didn’t get to see any actual moon landing pictures or get the names of the astronauts, but it was interesting all the same. I also learned that Inner Mongolia was the place where human civilization began. I was amazed at how much I had wrong.
Click here for a photo gallery from the museum trip.
Tomorrow, we’re off to visit the orphanage. While we won’t go in (lots of children have chicken pox) we will be able to walk around and take pictures. It should be interesting and will likely be stressful. We’ll post again when we return.
There comes a point in this sort of trip where you just need a day to recuperate from the stress, when the adrenaline has worn off and you just need to relax. Today is that day … hopefully. The only thing on the agenda for today is a visit to a local handicraft center where they make traditional Mongolian items and clothing. It will be nice to just spend an hour or two walking around, getting out of the hotel, but nothing too strenuous.
Today, we’re hoping that the most strenuous exercise we get is a good round of drawing and coloring, which both of girls love to do.
We ventured out today because Sophie had nothing to wear – literally. We brought 2T and 3T clothing for her, figuring that one size would fit and that we’d donate the other to the orphanage. Our Sophie is smaller than 2T though – by quite a bit. So off we went to the local newborn shop. The ladies in the shop thought she was a lovely one-year-old … until she started talking to them like a bright four-year-old. Her voice sounds like a baby, but she’s every bit the precocious four-year-old exploring her world. She really shocked the ladies in the store.
The problem we’re having is that baby clothes look like clothes for a baby, while 2T and 3T start to look like “child” clothes. When she goes out in her new baby clothes it’s tough to get people to accept that she’s not a little baby. We’ll have to do something about that, but that probably means making her clothes or having 3T clothes tailored pretty extensively.
It’s an interesting problem to have. We’re convinced that she’ll have a big impact in life, but it will just be in a tiny body.
By the way, she’s into everything tech – as you can see below…
Our adoption is done. Our guide will pick up the paperwork for us this afternoon. Our little Valentine’s Day gift is ours.
Now for the rest of the work. You see, the rest of the trip is dedicated to getting our new daughter home. We need her Chinese passport and then a US Visa. All of that involves waiting for governments which are not known for their speed of processing.
We’re having mixed results with the internet here, so here’s a quick family photo. We’ll post more when we get a chance to go to a location with a better connection later today.
We’re doing the adoption in an hour or so. Should be an eventful morning.
So after this morning’s surprise announcement, we got settled into the hotel and got a coffee. Then came the toughest part – the last hour of the wait. Sure, we had been waiting for a year and more but now we were so close … and yet not done. The last two adoptions we did, we went somewhere to pick up the children. This time, they were coming to us. Just not yet.
Sarah and Lynn went for a walk around the hotel to find the swimming pool and see what else was around. They came back – and still Sophie was not there. Finally, we spotted them coming through the front doors and Lynn said “my daughter is here”. With that began an hour of paperwork and discussions. We went over Sophie’s daily routine. We signed papers that said that we would take care of her. We looked at her vaccination record. We reviewed the records that were kept of her life over the last few years. Through it all, Sophie played quietly with Lynn and Sarah or sat on Russ’ lap. Not a tear. Her first word to Lynn was “mama” and to Russ was “baba” (the Chinese translation is pretty obvious). The orphanage director asked what she thought of her new dad and she replied “ho” (good).
When it came time for the orphanage officials to leave, Sophie gladly waved bye-bye to them. We went off to lunch as a family as if we had always been together.
After lunch, it was nap time. About 15 minutes after we laid her down for her nap, Sophie finally had her first “moment” – she missed her “home” and wanted to go back. A little cuddling and playtime (and no nap) later, we were all smiles and giggles. An “official” photographer came by to take some pictures for the provincial paperwork and Sophie giggled and showed off the whole time. He had to take about 30 pictures to get one that he could use. As I’m writing this (about 4:15 PM local time), Sophie is coloring diligently in her coloring book – staying very neatly inside the lines – and she is quiet happy and has been most of the afternoon. Sarah is even adjusting well and she and Sophie teamed up to tackle and tickle daddy earlier.
She is very tiny. Sophie is 4 years old, but the 2T clothes we brought her hang off of her like a tent. She is very thin and weighs almost nothing. We’re planning to go shopping later today to find some 12 month old clothes to see if they fit better. Mentally, she is very bright. She has a large vocabulary and can converse in Mandarin intelligently with adults. She looks like she’s a one-year-old, but mentally she’s where she should be.
So we have a new daughter and a bigger family. And it seems very much like Sophie has been in our family forever. The orphanage people said that they thought “we had a fate” with Sophie since she seemed to so naturally go to us. We know that there will be challenges in the future, but for the moment we’re a nice happy family.
We were up at 2 AM this morning to catch the first flight to Hohhot. When we got here at 8:30, our guide Rocky told us that we would be getting Sophie today. She’ll be here at about 11:30 AM (10:30 PM back home). We’ll finalize the adoption tomorrow on Valentine’s Day.
She was a premature baby and it looks like the trend is continuing. Can’t wait to meet her.
