Today is our last full day in Guangzhou. We went to the Chen Family Temple as well as to a park with a statue of five goats. I don't remember the name. Here is a photo from the Temple of the two Beijing daddies walking the kids. We constantly joke that these two are going to have an arranged marriage. No doubt the dads are discussing the dowry right now. The kids are happily sharing a bag of pumpkin crackers.
Jodi apparently tells him he is covered in crumbs because he looks at his shirt and starts wiping them all off while she supervises. They looked like an old married couple at that point.

At the five goats statue. The kids were running around happily until Julianna fell into a ditch.


If you see this one on a Christmas Card, act surprised.
We bought the shirts just for the photo and will probably not wear them again until our next trip to China.

Yesterday was the physical exam. Keith did not do well on the vision exam (big shock there). As best we can tell, he was unable to see the image at the top of the chart. There was some difficulty with following directions, so it was not terribly accurate. He can see fingers held in front of him. They did not test each eye individually. He also had to get two shots, part of the new Hague requirements. He told the nurse he would not cry. They did not seem to phase him at all. I gave him some motrin before hand.

We purchased his traditional outfit yesterday. Unfortunately, I did not take him with me, so it is two size too big. Julianna got three new ones. She wanted white. Every time I would ask a shop keeper for white, they would say, no, red for Chinese new year. Sorry, she wants white. In the end, we got white, red and blue.

We are winding down here in Guangzhou. We still plan to be home on Thursday at 4 pm, northwest from Nashville.

The yogurt is for the kids. We also need eggs.

To answer the question about the flight, Keith did well. He got very fussy on landing because he did not want to wear the seat belt, but other than that, no issues. The long flight leaves at night, so I'm hoping he will sleep a good portion of it.

Being here in Guangzhou is strange. There are so many memories from the first adoption. Our first trip was miserable. Very miserable. I was sleep deprived and lacking confidence in my parenting skills. As we visit all the same places, it dredges up those feelings. It has been a very painful trip for me. I am very ready to leave here and get home to my comfortable surroundings, although not doing my own laundry has been very nice.

BTW, if the people responsible for buying home coming supplies could invest in some drinkable yogurt, any flavor, we would be grateful.

We have made it to the famed White Swan hotel and have ventured out in the pouring rain for dinner at Lucy's. The hamburger is everything I remember it to be. I almost ordered Julianna scrambled eggs just so our meal would be what we had two years ago. Tomorrow is a shopping day and we do the physical exams on Monday.

It is finally our last day in Beijing. We had a free day, so we have gone back to the Pearl Market, ostensibly to buy Julianna the Wonder Woman Barbie she has been talking about since our first trip, but in reality to buy mommy a Legolas Barbie (or would that be a Ken). We also did some shopping for souvenirs, all of which means repacking. I am a bit ashamed of my packing for this trip. Not at all efficient. If I had a week or three, I could probably get it all down to less space. It would also help if people would quit asking for packed items. Around here, out of sight means 'I need that more than air right now'.

Today was the last of the scheduled activities in Beijing. We went to a public park that has a kiddie amusement park in it. The kids had a blast and the parents doled out cash. This afternoon Grandma and PawPaw entertained the kids and I engaged in my favorite past-time--packing. Tomorrow we get the new passports and on Saturday we fly to Guangzhou.
We are so ready to be in a new hotel room and to be back on Shaimen Island. I never thought I would say that, but at least it is familiar territory, having spent a long two weeks there. It is, by the way, almost two years since we boarded a plane to adopt Julianna. We will arrive home from this adoption on her Gotcha Day.


This is Keith's little buddy from his orphanage. She is nearly five. We have decided that we will pursue an arranged marriage between the two. Her parents will head to North Carolina when they leave here, which is also where Julianna's orphanage buddy lives. I foresee a road trip to the Carolinas in our future.

Julianna ran straight to the engineers seat when it was time to board the train. She loves the driver's seat.

Addendum:

We went to dinner tonight and on the way home I stopped into a bread store for cookies. The price was 10.60, so I gave them a twenty. To be quite honest, the change stuff here just confuses me. Some of it is little paper money and some of it is coins and I can never figure out how much any of it is worth. Well, they didn't have enough in the kitty to give me .40 change and wanted me to give them .10 so they could give me .5. Well, I couldn't figure out the change, so a nice Westerner tried to help, but my German isn't better than my Chinese.

More pics from the Summer Palace

Hey y'all. Daddy here. Yes, there is a riverboat at the Summer Palace in Beijing, China. Seems the female emperor (Referred to as the Dragon Lady by our guide) was interested in American technology back during the Industrial Revolution. And the item that caught her imagination most was the side-wheeler riverboat that plied cotton and gamblers up and down the rivers of the Antebellum south. So what does she do to satisfy her longing to own one on her man-made lake? Buy one and have it shipped? Why of course not! she has one built. From marble.

This next pic is our guide, Michelle, with the two adoptees. This charming picture would not have been possible had our son not protested vehemently when I tried to put him back in his stroller after a potty break. He insisted on pushing. Which is fine and all except he can't see to push it straight and has to stop and check every change in the feel or color of the pavement. It was taking forever. So Michelle told them both of the "big boat" and took their hands. On the one hand I was relieved—on the other I hate that he instantly obeys nearly everyone who speaks Chinese, even construction workers we meet on the street.

Today we went to the Summer Palace, a structure also build by the Chin dynasty, and to be honest, after you've seen one Chin Dynasty structure, you've seen them all. The beauty of the Summer Palace is in the landscaping, which is amazing. The lake is man-made and the longevity mountain is the dirt they took out to make the lake. Not the mountain below, the mountain the longevity structure is on. Every point you stop at has a beautiful view of the lake. It is simple indescribable.




No visitors except on party business. Dear old friends are excepted.

This morning we visited the Lama Temple, which is a Buddhist temple that boasts the largest Buddha at 18 meters high. It was built by the same family who built the Forbidden City and the architecture is very similar, so I won't bore you with more pictures of roofs and doors. As we were walking around, the supplicants were offering incense and I was reminded of a verse in Psalms "He will not let your foot slip--He who watches over you does not sleep; indeed he who watches over Israel will neither slumber nor sleep" (Ps 121:3-4). It just struck me how all these people were offering prayers and petitions to wood and gold, when the Ruler of the earth is always ready to hear them.

On the way out I spotted the birds and then the cat and the rocks and I thought about Luke 19:40 "if they keep quiet even the stones will cry out". I thought, here, even in a place that gives no thought to God, that deliberately seeks to worship wood and not the One who made the wood, even here are creatures singing songs to the Creator and stones ready to break into praise.

After our trip to the temple, Grandma, Julianna and I made a trip to the Philip Hayden Foundation to take soy formula and size six diapers. We got a short tour of the facilities and met some of the children, who are super cute. It is very modern and nice looking and the children all look well loved and cared for.

Today we went to the Forbidden City and Tienanmen Square. It is really huge. I was most fascinated by the concept of giving eight adults cameras and seeing what they photograph. These are some of my favorites. Phillip will have to post his favorites later and we'll check out the blogs of the other families for what they found most photo-worthy.





















Keith seems much different today. He has been sweet and nice and seeking to interact with us. He has not hit his sister. He was a loud creature when his buddy showed up and he still eats in a super messy fashion, but things are better today.

My Field Trip

Hey all, Daddy here. Pawpaw and I took a couple hours the afternoon of the pearl market trip (which, as Sherry said, was a joke) and took a cab down to the CCTV tower.

The CCTV tower is not a joke. It's a single building composed of two tower "legs" roughly the same size and vposition as the two towers of the World Trade Center in New York. Except that these two towers lean toward each other, on both the x and y axis, and at the top (at about half the height of the WTC I'm guessing) each one makes a right turn and cantelevers out over the open courtyard below, until they meet at the corner. And, I'm assuming, the president's office.








In this image you can just see several window-washer platforms. There is so much glass downtown in Beijing that I bet there is a small army of these guys. And it must take forever for them to finish a building like the CCTV tower.

I have not idea what the circular holes are under the "president's office" But they're each about twenty feet across. maybe some kind of ventilation fans?





Also of note, and right next to the tower, is the old CCTV building, which burned to the ground (so to speak) in February when someone decided to use it for a fireworks platform during the Spring Festival. Without a permit of course. The building was a comlete loss. it's also the reason there are no photos of the base of the CCTV tower, as they've erected their own little Great Wall around the site, about ten stories tall.

Today we went to the Pearl Market, which is poorly named. I think there was one pearl store and the rest was just a bunch of little booths selling all kinds of stuff. We got a Barbie and a helicopter on the toy level, as well as a stroller. Phillip took a field trip with PawPaw that I will let him tell you about.

I woke up this morning really wishing I could go to church at my own church with my own church family. I really wanted to be in our sanctuary for the prayer time. There is something powerful about all those people seeking the Lord together. It is my favorite part and I am so glad our pastor incorporates it into every service.

It continues to be very difficult with Keith. We keep hoping each day will get a little easier, but so far they remain hard. He can be a little clown sometimes and he can be a little terror sometimes, too.

Today we went to Olympic Park to see the Birds Nest and the Water Cube. I'm not real sure what this building is, but it was pretty cool. It was one of those occasions when we were the attraction. A whole passel of people stopped and took our photograph. It was a little strange at first, but after awhile, we just smiled for them. What else can you do?
The bird's nest looks just like it does on TV. I did have to wonder how they got all that beautiful blue sky background during the games. Even the light posts are made to look like Bird's Nests. I almost hate to say it, but it was very inventive architecture, especially as you look at the whole park and how all the shapes they chose for the surrounding buildings imply flight and movement. This is a real bird's nest. We asked our guide what kind of bird makes this and she said a Magpie, but we think maybe something was lost in the translation. Anyway, they are all over the place and you can see how they were the inspiration for the stadium.
The water cube really looks out of place with everything around it. It is such an architectural departure from the flight and movement theme of the rest of the park. It is apparently very pretty at night, but during the day it basically looks like a giant big box.

As far as the adoption goes, we are waiting for the passport and will be in Beijing for another week. We are so ready to not be here and move on, but again, what can you do?

Today is another free day in our schedule and we are planning to go to the Bird's Nest and Water Cube. I realized that I have not said anything about his arm issues. He does have full function at his hand and appears to have full movement of his elbow. His shoulder is limited, but it is hard to judge how much. It does hang limp when he walks and he does use the other hand to help lift it some. He also clearly has more muscle mass on the right vs. left. It will be easier to assess when he learns English and we can ask him to move it.

Today was a 'free day' in our schedule so we went to a place called FunDazzle with another family in our group. It is basically a huge indoor playground. Julianna had a blast. She climbed and slid and jumped so much she actually fell asleep in my arms on the walk home. I'm not real sure about Keith. He has a very hard time with the climbing and did not really seem to like the slides. He did crawl out into the ball pit, but his primary goal was to bean Julianna with balls. Poor vision interfered with his plans and he usually overshot. I tried playing with him, but he really did not like that very much. He would laugh and giggle for a brief while, then do his complaining grunt and start hitting. It is such a frustratingly slow process getting him to acknowledge and interact with us.

I thought I would post about the vision issues. We really do not know how bad it is and it may not be as bad as we think right now. It is an ever present issue, though, so we tend to think the worst, I suppose. Imagine, for instance, walking down the street, and think about all the thousands of minor corrections you make without conscious thought. When you come to a curb, you step down without pause and up the other side, again, without pause. Now imagine you cannot gauge the step or how close you are to it. You have to slow down, use one foot to test the pavement, find the step, readjust your distance to the step, find it again with your foot, then step down. Now, since you don't know if it is one or two steps, you repeat the process to establish that the pavement is in fact level. When you get to the curb up, it starts all over again. Also imagine that you can perceive different colors of flooring, say a black border on white tile, but you cannot perceive that there is no difference in height, so you stop and use your foot to test the floor. Now imagine inclines, and the hardest of all escalators. We actually have to pick him up for these. Crosswalks are killers, too, black, white, black, white, etc. with traffic coming.

We brought him matchbox cars, which he does not like, but does like the bigger cars we bought here. I don't think he can see the small ones well enough to play with them. I don't know if he saw anything at the zoo.

Today we went to the Beijing Zoo. I am actually torn between which zoo was worse, Beijing or Guangzhou. We did see the pandas, but I can't say they were really that exciting. I only took about five photographs today. I did find the exotic animal called "raccoon" very fascinating, unfortunately, that picture did not turn out well because it was behind glass.
I did find this advertisement interesting. There were a series of them, one about color, one about the elderly, one I cannot remember and this one. There is a big push in China to change the attitude of people regarding the desirability of male vs. female children. I don't know how much it is changing their attitudes, but I found it interesting. I guess it is like a lot of cultural attitudes, they can take decades to change, but at least the government recognizes the problem and is trying to change.