Sinus Infections 3, Doelling's 1

I have been remiss in not getting another full post out since we've been home.  In all honesty we were wiped out!  Christina and I both ended up with pretty decent sinus infections that sent us to the doctor on Monday and immediately after our appointments we went to the pediatrician for Cam and he has pretty much the same!  Only Lainey has escaped the pounding head, thick green mucus and wincing coughs.  But now the medicines are starting to do their stuff.  Lainey is back to school. Time zones are re-synced.  I haven't been too camera happy since coming home because we look like death warmed over.  That flight home was just a beast.  14 hours from Hong Kong to Chicago.  Cam just couldn't get comfortable for more than maybe 20 minutes at a time.  Christina and I tried every position imaginable to sit, lay back, lay sideways, anything for quiet.  Lainey spent a lot of time next to grandpa across the aisle and had fun mastering the personal video screen in the seat back.  Movies and kids shows kept her purple and frosty "frozen" headphones busy for hours.  They usually would walk around every hour offering at least a cup of water on the plane.  With about 6 hours to go I was pretty dry and wondered what was the deal?  Just before landing we found out.  The in plane drinkable water system broke.  I guess water is a perk on United.  Hard to believe they don't have extra water in bottles for all the passengers just in case.  I would imagine that's certainly what made our infections take off. 

Now that we are home the bonding is growing.  That's the most important thing right now for the family.  Let Cam get attached to all of us.  He is playing well on the floor with Lainey.  He will crawl pretty easily from the living room to the kitchen to find us if we are away too long.  He'll appear at our feet and start to pull up on the pant legs with a big smile.  He found tinker toys last night and building blocks today.  Not wild about stuffed animals.  He puts his hand up right away waving them off.  Now I know why the ones we sent him in China look untouched.  He's gradually starting to move away from noodles and bread.  Devoured a muffin this morning and even likes poptarts!  His paperwork said he likes fruit.  Can't find any hint of interest in that.  Sometimes eggs will go down.  Also said he likes meat, haven't got that past the lips yet either.  But maybe the infections have his taste buds all fowled up so who knows,  we keep trying.   Next up is trying out the car seat and maybe a ride in the wagon around the neighborhood to meet some the great neighbors we have.  They watched our house, made us all kinds of food and even brought us gifts.  Hopefully it warms up soon and we can show off the new kid on the block!

 

 

 

Welcome to Cbus!

Well it's taken about 20 hours but we are in Columbus! We left Hong Kong at 11:30 am on the 23rd We landed in Chicago at 11:30 on the 13rd. Go figure. I was brutal at times Those who have done this trip know what it's like. But we are all fine and I can not keep my opens any more!

All Oathacized!

Yeah, yeah, oathacized? Its our blog, we reserve the right to make up words! But what that officially means is we have taken the oath that we have provided all the truthful information about ourselves and our child in this process and the U.S. Immigration Visa is hereby granted!  On Wednesday we piled on a bus with 7 other of our families and traveled into the heart of the skyscrapers of Guangzhou and visited the U.S. consulate.  So very different than 5 years ago.  The consulate then was in a large skyscraper and we had floors and halls to walk and security for endless stretches it seems to memory.  The waiting room there was huge, no bags allowed in and the wait was hours.  This time there is a brand new U,S, consulate in a relatively small maybe 4 story building with some smaller surrounding security buildings.  Very modern, some curves to the edges of the silver and wooden trimmed building.  There is a small garden plaza in front but no U.S. soldiers guarding the gates like you would see in the movies!  I'm trying to give a good description because cameras are not allowed there or any electronics so I don't have pictures to show!  We had one friend of one of the traveling families that stayed outside with her camera to get some photos for us but I won't have access to those until we are home!  We were in the first appointment segment of the morning so there was rush hour bustle and many stares from business people looking at these white skinned faces carrying Chinese kids.  The x-ray machine in security broke just as we came in so we had to have our bags handchecked.  But considering last time we couldn't bring but a small bag for diapers and wipes that was fine!  We could bring snacks and kids toys.  I remember a huge white room before with rows and rows of chairs for everyone seeking a visa to the U.S. Probably 20 glass window booths like at a sporting stadium where you scream through security glass and small speaker to communicate.  This time its a private room just for adoptions.  About 20 chairs and even play areas for the kids!  The windows were still security glass but we have 3 sided enclosures to separate us from others and speakers all around giving almost surround sound! Less than an hour all families took the oath and paperwork will be ready with the visa in the children's passports on Thursday afternoon!  Just think, a years worth of paperwork comes down to a maybe 3 minute span where we talked with the immigration agent and the only question we had to answer was, "This is Cameron in you are holding correct?"  Correct.  Guess we did all the paperwork right! 

After that it was time to enjoy the sun and do some shopping on Shamian Island.  Shamian Island is where we stayed 5 years ago at the White Swan Hotel.  The U.S. consulate used to be on that island and at a peak time when 5 thousand kids I believe were being adopted from China by U.S. families a year a whole economy arose on that little 4 block island centering around adopting families.  There was a medical facility and photography office.  Several shops selling silk dresses, and all the souvenirs you can imagine that families clamor to take home at 1/6th of the cost of what we would pay at home.  Those silk dresses we see for girls at the Asian Festival for 20, 30 bucks, 4 or 5 dollars here. There is a long park with bronze statues everywhere depicting every day life moments.  Even a restaurant called Lucy's that features mainly western food.  Sadly,  much of that has changed.  The U.S. consulate moved off the island years ago.  After that the many stores and the White Swan still remained a constant.  The White Swan was the only place in the world to get a special Barbie holding a baby.  It was the site for the literally thousands of red couch photos of new adoptees.  But 3 and a half years ago the White Swan closed for renovation.  The families had to make new plans and those were off the island.  So the dozens of little shops also were forced to close with no cliental.  Lucy's is still there.  Maybe 3 stores with a much smaller amount of inventory.  The shop keepers made us quite aware business is bad, please buy something, we make deal.  They say the hotel will open this May, but it looked like a lot to go to me.  New windows and some paint outside but I could see lots of pipes and wiring hanging from ceilings inside.  May 2016 maybe.  We had lunch at Lucy's with two other adoptive couples.  Several others sat around us.  So people do make it here and to enjoy the people playing hackey sack in the park, dance lessons, dodge around at least 20 professional wedding photo shoots in the streets! Simply the charm.  I hope the photos capture the feeling.

Back to the China Hotel from there.  Photo day.  No red couch but some nice marble steps and some purple couches!  Family photos were somewhat doable.  Figure these kids have only known us for 10 days.  We've carted them over half the country in things most have never seen before.  We sound funny to them. Smell funny. Want to squeeze and kiss them and expect them to pose with a perfect smile.  So yes a picture with the person that's been holding them for a few days in a row may work.  But try to put 11 mostly 2 and 3 year olds together with 20 parents on the other side all flashing cameras and yelling something they've never tasted?!  Not happening. We got pretty close with 11 in the frame I think, but not together in any fashion!

And we'll wrap up with some breaking news! Our visas returned from consulate Thursday afternoon and we are all set!  For us we got the passport and travel documents, said good bye to all the great guides and new friends, shed some tears, and jumped in van for a 3 hour drive to Hong Kong!  That's where we are now.  The flights from here were cheaper and the van to Hong Kong idea came from our guides to save more money and prevent getting here at midnight and only getting a few hours sleep.  So they are all sleeping soundly behind me and I'm about to join them.  In 12 hours we'll be boarding a United 777 bound for Chicago with our newest citizen!  

 

 



 

Formalities, the Pearl River and more Pearls!

First off, let me say thank you to all who are reading our blog!  Through modern analytics the site tells me we have had over 3500 pages views in the short time we've had it up!  That just blows us away!  Ideally it will help others travel on a adoption journey of their own if it fits we hope. 

I'm combining our third and fourth days into sea of pictures for your enjoyment!  It started with a final formality before we visit the US Consulate on Wednesday morning.  The dreaded medical appointment! 5 years ago it was a cry fest for us.  Lainey needed 8 vaccinations to be allowed into the United States. Two in each limb.  Gladly they have changed the rules since then and we had to sign a form stating we will take care of the inoculations that are needed within 30 days of getting home.  But we had to start the day with another picture!  I guess the systems don't talk to each other in this country and we needed another visa photo.  Ridiculous.  After several tries our guide was finally able to convince the photographer to give him the camera and he took the photo!  Cam just doesn't like to sit long!  Then it was off to 3 separate stations,  ENT, height and weight, and general conditions.  That all went pretty smoothly.  The funniest part of the whole morning?  The wine vending machine on the way out of the medical building!  You could buy full bottles from a machine!
I guess they figured its a ripe market for booze after the medical stop!

While Christina was at the medical with Cam I took Lainey to the kids playground here at the hotel.  Some little swings and slides around a waterfall made for a fun setting to blow off some energy.

 



In the evening it was dinner on the Pearl River!  We went on a replica old sailing boat. The river at night comes alive with lights and other boats sailing for dinner cruises.  We could bring our own food so the guides took our orders from Papa John's!  Its a pretty neat trip. Just about two hours but lots to look at.  The Guandong Tower lights up in all sorts of colors and is 2000 feet tall. There are three other financial buildings making the top 20 tallest in the world in the world here too!  All lit up and pretty spectacular to see at night. 

 

 

 

They had a very detailed tea ceremony that the girls were pretty fascinated to watch.  I was surprised Lainey and a couple others sat there intently for 10 minutes watching every sculpted traditional move. 

 





 Do you know some of the many ways to test pearls to see if they are real?  Well our intrepid guides shed some light on the methods today as we ventured to the Pearl Market.  Some sales people will take scissors and show how some of the pearl will scratch off when real.  If its rough when you rub it against your tooth and not smooth its real, and they might even run the pearls through the flame of a lighter to show it doesn't crack like glass would.  Saw that example today.  We ventured to the same jewelry mall and same shop we visited last time. Hua Mei Pearls.  Still hard to fathom for me a mall six stories high with all kinds of back corridors leading away to other stores and all they sell is beads.  EVERY store. This store has all blue beads, only blue.  The next has just shades of yellow.  The next is all costume jewelry.  There are just bags of beads laying in the halls, ripe for just picking one up and throwing over your shoulder and walking away like Santa with a bag of toys!  The stores are usually just wholesale but there are a couple that work with our guides and understand they have a new group of families coming in from the U.S. weekly that will jump at the chance to buy pearls for 1/4 the price we would pay at home.  They know some people might be shopping for a while too so they have couches to sit on in the halls and toys for the kids!  Its an interesting sight as women shop, dads and kids are in the hall trying to pass the time. One couch had certainly seen better days.  Reminded me of a porch couch from a college frat house.  Seems when someone throws stuff away here they just put it somewhere that another person will say hey I can use that and take it!  I thought we were to get a bracelet for a gift long down the road for Cam's future wife!  Didn't make it out so lucky!

 

I guess if you are a buyer for Macy's you come here and order all the jewelry your stores will sell for the entire year.  That's the only way to fathom how this place works.  Just outside of the jewelry center is a shopping strip. Think Times Square with only foot traffic.  Large flashing signs and digital bill boards galore.  People even more numerous.  And stares at the Americans taking pictures from the center and trying to decide to eat at the McDonalds on the right or left side of the square!

The panorama came out pretty slick. I love the guys looking at us like who in the world are these people?  That was a 180 degree view of the shopping square.  I wish I had the guts to see what it looked like at night there all lit up!  But our guides were very cautious about us watching our belongings just in the day so a night visit isn't going to happen.  I'll leave with two pictures and a story.  When we got back to the hotel today, Christina's dad had a present waiting in his room.  A birthday cake and card from the hotel manager!  Pretty neat!  Except his birthday is Feb 20 not Jan 20! We guess they took it from the passport you need at check in and just got the date wrong.  But it was a pretty yummy mango cheesecake we believe.  A nice after dinner desert.  The perks of 5 star hotels I guess!  The last picture of Cameron needs no explanation!