Chinese Wal Mart Adventure

This is James writing this time.

Today was much less stressful and the best day yet.  Chun Wu was much more expressive and relaxed.  Yesterday she was either emotionally flat or crying.  Today we got her really giggling and having fun!

In the morning we went to the CCCA and did some more paperwork, did our final interview (we think), made the donation to the orphanage, and got our certificate of adoption.  This did not take very long.  We got to see all the other families again, and ask how everyone else is doing.  Lots of interesting stories, but everything is going pretty well.  We rode a chartered bus to and from CCCA, which Chun Wu really liked.  She seems to have no trouble in cars or buses.

We went out to lunch with a great couple from Atlanta who are also adopting.  They brought their daughter along who is Sophie's age.  With them, we ordered our first Chinese meal without a guide helping us out.  But we did well.  Everything was excellent and tasted great, and the kids got a kick out of the chicken head that was left in the chicken soup.

After lunch, we went to Wal Mart, which was an adventure.  It was very strange to see such unfamiliar food products with the standard Wal Mart advertizing.  We bought water and a bunch of assorted Oreo cookie varieties, such as green tea and birthday cake.  I was a little disappointed that there was no "duck head" flavor.

The city we are currently in, Hafei, is undergoing rapid development and is very disorganized.  There's no such thing as a city block, every street seems to be at an odd angle from every other.  Adding to the confusion, there are so many high rises that it's difficult to get oriented.  When we left Wal Mart, we had no idea which way to go.

Plus it's so hot, that decision making is difficult.  When the wind blows, it's not refreshing.  Hot air is just changing places with other hot air. After Wal Mart, we wandered around hoping for a clue as to which way to go to get back to our hotel (which was within walking distance), until Michelle flagged down a nice local man who helped us get a cab. Strangely, every time *we* tried to hail a cab, regular people would stop to pick us up!

Cabs, bus, and subway are all very cheap in China.  This is the government's way of discouraging driving to help with pollution.  A cab ride to the restaurant and back was only about 4 US dollars.  So we do not hesitate to get a cab, so long as we have some sort of written instruction about what place we want to go.  It is virtually impossible to communicate with people here.  There is no middle ground, even simple gestures barely work.

Once back in the hotel, we retreated to our room, where we took a nap and played ball in the hallway.  Chun Wu LOVES playing with a ball!  Then we played games, Michelle gave Chun Wu a bath, and ordered dinner in.  Right now, we are reading, Chun Wu is watching a movie, and Sophie is reading comic books.  We're keeping things very simple and trying to establish the room as a safe and fun place.  We are also trying to set up routines so that Chun Wu knows what to expect.  This will take time, obviously.

We try to limit ourselves to one adventure a day, and today's was "Chinese Wal Mart".

We've finally got her - meet Cora Chunwu Davis!

I am trying to type softly, as my entire family is sleeping right now.  It's 9:34pm, and they were all out at 8:15pm.   My beautiful girls are both sleeping in the king bed together - I was in the middle before I snuck out.  They are so gorgeous; I'd take their picture if I didn't think it would wake them up!

I feel like so much happened today, but yet the day flew by.  James and I both said we were not at all prepared for how this all went down.  We were cursing the adoption books we read - completely not helpful on day 1 at least.   

Sophie had a change of heart about 6 minutes after my last post.  Was crying and writhing around on the floor in protest to getting her sister.  So that frayed my nerves a bit, but we managed to snap her out of it, and got to breakfast on time, and met the group also ontime.  A pretty big feat for us, in itself.  But by the time we were on the bus to go get her, we were all excited once again, and in a good place emotionally.  For most of the 6 families, it was our first adoption, so the whole bus was a ball of nerves.

After waiting about 20 mins, they started bringing the kids in.  Cora is absolutely beautiful, that was my first thought.  And looked absolutely terrified, was my 2nd.  She came to us, being pushed by the nanny, but really wanted nothing to do with us.  We tried to hold back from swooping in on her, and really did contain ourselves pretty well.  It was chaos, as there were so many people in that small room.  We hung out on the floor with her, gave her a sucker (which she liked), tried to play with some of the stuff we brought.  She watched cautiously, but was not going to engage with us, or even let a little smile squeak out.  She really was taking it ALL in.  Watching the other families and kids, seeing what stuff they had, but being completely silent.  It was stressful, cause we kept saying, should we try harder, or just let it ride?  Of course, comparing ourselves to all the other families, and how all their children were reacting.  Bad idea, of course.  But there was a huge spectrum of reactions from the kids, so that made us feel better.

We had to do some paperwork, take a few official photos, and then were able to leave after about an hour.  Chunwu was holding sophie and my hand, still looking like a scared deer in headlights.  I thought we were going to talk with the orphanage director, who was there, or at least some of the nannies to get some questions answered.  But nope, none of that.  We all just loaded up on the bus, and headed back on the 20 min ride to the hotel.

Once back at the hotel, we all disbursed quickly, and headed to our rooms.  Cora was being so brave, but as soon as she got to the room, and saw it was empty, and was just the 3 of us, the tears started.  Oh my gosh, my heart just broke, and I was trying SO hard to keep it together.  It almost worked.  Sophie kept saying, "mom, if she she's you cry, she's going to be scared!".  She's five, but she is such a little peanut, and she just looked so scared.  We got her to calm down after about 20 mins.  Pulled out some games, tried singing songs, i think tried more candy.  You just feel so helpless that you can't communicate with her!  Oh, but then room service came, and brought rice and steamed egg.  And she said 2 words, that I made me think maybe she had to go potty, and she did.  So I think that helped too.  She let me feed her the rice and egg, and ate quite a bit.  And by that time it was almost 1pm, so we decided it was naptime.  

James really gave her space today.  When she was upset, she really wanted nothing to do with any of us, but would tolerate me. She's not scared of him per se, but likes to watch him from a distance.   We thought since she was having a hard time, we would let her focus on getting to know me, and then hopefully she will warm up to him more in the next few days.

After the nap, we hung out a bit, then decided to go check out the pool.  Sophie and james swam, and cora and I watched from the side.  I could tell she had not been around water much - she was afraid to even put her feet in.  It was loud and kind of overwhelming, so probably not the best move.  But we were feel like we just didn't know what to do with ourselves in our room. We ran into another family on our way back.  Little Emily was in Cora's orphange, and they clearly know each other.  Emily didn't really react, but poor Cora just started sobbing again when they walked away.  We unfortunately were in the lobby of the hotel, and caused QUITE a scene.  The manager of the hotel even came over and asked if we needed help.  I said yes - can you please help us speak to our daughter!   But then I was getting upset, so we just bee lined it back to our room, and decided we needed to stay put for the rest of the day/night.

Oh wait - somewhere in the afternoon we grabbed a bite to eat in the hotel restaurant.  Cora had some fries, and few bites of pizza, seemed to really like it.  I don't think eating is going to be a problem for us!

Once we were back in our room for the evening, things really started to to improve.  Cora discovered angry birds, which started the "little smiles".  She got a kick out of that, and sophie was good about helping her with it.  Then we started playing with all sorts of other toys.  She was having fun, and the smiles started coming a little more freely.  She whispered 2 words to me - i think one she was saying "butterfly", and the other was talking about shoes for the dolly we were playing with.  Oh, she is really the sweetest thing, and I can not wait to hear her talk more.  She's got spunk in her eyes for sure - I can't wait to see it come out.

James feels a little put out, and wants to interact with her more, but he's really afraid of scaring her.  I won't let him hang back too long, though - I gotta have a break sometime, too!  But he just looks at her with his eyes welled up, and I know they will be pals soon.

I gave her a bath, which was definitely a new thing for her.  And teeth brushing also seemed a first!  But she was a trooper for all of it.  And hand washing is her favorite thing so far :)  And then it was off to bed in her most adorable jammies, with her big sister and mom.  She fell asleep within 10 mins.  I'm praying, but not expecting, that she sleeps through the night!

Tomorrow is some paperwork in the morning, and then a free day.  And then I think Wed we will go to orphanage, though we are a little nervous about her reaction to that, considering her sadness when she sees her one friend here.  

So overall, a total roller coaster of a day.  And it was hard on all 4 of us. But there were some fun moments, and some smiles from everyone, so I call it a win.   I know each day she will become a little more comfortable, as will we with her.  When I looked over and saw her sleeping next to me tonight, all I could do was smile and kiss her. I know He has put her in the right place.

Gotcha Day - getting ready to go!

We leave at 8:30am this morning to go get Cora!  There are 6 families that are having Gotcha Day together, and they are all staying at the Holiday Inn with us.  2 other children are coming from Cora's orphanage in Bengbu, so that will be pretty cool!!  I think we'll all ride in a bus together, and it takes maybe 30 mins to get over there?

I slept until about 5am this morning, and then just tossed and turned, thinking through so many things.  Why didn't we learn any Mandarin? What toys should we bring with us?  What in the world is she going to think?  What should I wear?  Should I wear mascara?  (haha)  Then decided to just get up and go check out the hotel.  The pool and fitness room were closed, otherwise I would have worked out.  But when and investigated it all, then came back to the room.

James and Sophie are up now, and we better start getting organized.  I am so nervous my hands are almost shaking typing.  Not bad nervous, but just butterflies.   Deep breaths, and prayers for calmness. Sophie is super super excited and has completely changed her tune.  Showing me all the crafts out of her highlights magazine that she wants to do with Cora when we get home, so i'm loving that.

We will write more tonight, and hopefully get some pictures going again!  Ben, our helper with the blog, is home now, and should be able to get pics up soon.

Love to you all!!

Day 3, Great Wall, and then fly to Hefei!

Early start to the morning, had to get the room packed up, and be ready to go at 7:30am to drive to Great Wall.  We were pretty much on schedule, and made a stop on the way at the Olympic Village area, from the 2008 summer games.  Just snapped a few pictures of the stadiums and such from the outside.   The sun was blazing through our window at 6:30am, so by the time we got to the olympic area at 8:30 it was HOT!!  All we kept saying was how glad we were it had been cloudy the last few days!

The drive to the section of the Wall we went to was about 1.5 hrs.  Alice was with us once again, pointing out the sights on the way.  It was nice to see the "suburbs" of Beijing, which really felt more like farmland and villages to me.  Very pretty though.

We took a chair lift up to the wall.  You could walk, but why walk when you can ride, and have a 9 yr old with you!  It was about 97 and full sun, so we knew we had limited time energy up there.  The section we were on was built around 600 years ago, and has been renovated many times.  It was 2K long, with several guard houses along the way.  Pretty amazing to be up on something like that, and beautiful views, as we were in the lush hills.

We hiked around for about an hour up there - it's very steep, though, up and down.  So yes, you can imagine there was some complaining from Sophie.  Poor thing, her face was as red as a tomato!  But she hung in there, and we walked quite a bit of it.

Got to ride down a toboggan/luge thing, back to the bottom, so that was a cool ending!

Off to lunch (chinese, again delish!), and then about 1 hr ride to the airport for our 4:30 flight.   Our bags were a bit too heavy for the domestic flight (50lbs allowed for intl, but only 45 or so for domestic).  But the man was nice and let us through without paying extra.  The flight was delayed about an hour, so we didn't arrive at our Holiday Inn in Hefei till about 8:30, and we were bushed!

Jane is the new guide - she picked us up at airport, and will be organizing all our adoption "stuff".  It's so exciting to be done with the touristy part, and get the best part of this trip!  She seems sweet, and is all business.  There are 6 families that will be at Gotcha Day with us tomorrow.  2 others adopting kids from Bengbu, who she thinks are Cora's age!!  And they are all staying at the Holiday Inn!  So that will be nice to have some familiar faces around.

We had some last minute paperwork things to do, and then it was off to bed.  We leave for the Civil Affairs office at 8:30 tomorrow morning to meet Cora!!

Day 2, sightseeing in Beijing

(this top tidbit is from Sophie!)

Day 2 in Beijing. First of all, it was very boring! We went to summer place and temple of heaven.  It's kind of related to forbidden city, because the empower built it, and they talk a lot about the dragon lady and the style was the same as the forbidden city, especially at the temple of heaven.  There are some things u might want to get for our children so they don't get bored while walking a long way. And then they won't complain at u so much.  You should get one of these two things: a bouncy ball on a string, that u can buy at either place, and that are all over the place in Beijing. Or a toy hat you kick with your feet, you play it like a hackiesack.   We saw lots of people exercising at the temple of heaven.

We went to lunch near our hotel at a Chinese restaurant. We had fried rice, Kung Pau chicken and noodles. We took a cab ride home.

At 7:45 we went to the show, "legend of Kung fu".  It was a Kung fu show, but kind of dangerous, 90% dangerous. Because they Had one guy on top of swords, then they put spikes on top of him.

(now from Michelle)

We were so tired after the summer palace. It was pretty cool day temperature wise all day,  but towards the end it was steaming up.  The amount of people at the summer palace was still shocking. Once again, Sophie and James were attracting a lot of attention, with pictures and such being taken.  Sophie was amused by her ball, James was taking pictures like a mad man, and Alice was telling me all sorts of info about the palace and park.  It was interesting, but hard to remember how it all fits together.  Alice was a super great guide, though.

We got back to the hotel, took showers, and had about an hour before the Kung fu show started. So we grabbed a sandwich in one of the hotel restaurants (of course not good and way overpriced, but we expected that). But it was food, and it worked. I'm already missing eating dinner at home, and being able to have the kind of healthy stuff I like. The Chinese food has been really really good, but I'm missing my salads and fruit and yogurt stuff.

The Kung fu show was much better than I expected, but I still couldn't stay awake for it. I nodded off throughout the 1 1/2 hr show.  But the guys were pretty amazing from what I saw!

We got back to the hotel, all were sleeping by 9, thank God!  And all had our first full night sleep.

Oh, and having Alice with us is awesome!  Not having to struggle with the language, figure out where or when to go places is just a treat.  Like she even went with us to the kungfu show. Got us a cab, bought our tickets, showed us to our seats, and then was there waiting for us when it was over.  Guess that must be what it is like to be a celebrity. It's sweet!

Tomorrow is Great Wall, then fly to he fei in the evening.getting so so close to Cora!!!

Beijing, Day 1-ish pics

Man, this jetlag/sleeping business is really tough!  I haven't travelled this far for many many years.  Well really ever, but I don't remember being this messed up when I went to New Zealand/Australia 10 yrs ago?   But maybe youth helped, and the fact it wasn't so far!  Anyway, I can't sleep, so I thought I'd check in!

Sophie and James are zonked out, still.  She went to bed at 5:30pm, and it's not 12:30am - will she make it thru till 4 or 5 am?   That is my hope!  James' superior sleeping skills are definitely working to his advantage right now.  The only thing he is struggling with, is a migraine headache.  Poor guy. He got it on the plane over, which I can't even imagine how sucky that was.  I was so uncomfortable WITHOUT a migraine.  And he didn't even complain.  It stuck with him about 1/2 of the day yesterday on our sightseeing.  Again, he is a trooper.  He even had a visible bruise pop through on his forhead from it.  I feel for all of the davis', and anyone else who had to deal with migraines. But he said it was better last night before going to bed.  It's pretty much clockwork with him - the day or so after he is super stressed, and can finally relax, it hits him hard.  

I'm sharing a few pics from our sightseeing. Beijing is an interesting city.  Some of the parts really reminded us of DC - walking around the tienamin square with all the museums and monuments and stuff.  And of course the massive crowds of people.  We walked a lot yesterday, but totally lucked out that the weather was perfect for it.  Probably about 75-80 degrees, cloudy, with some sprinkles of rain while we were at the forbidden city.  Sophie got VERY tired towards the end of the FC - after walking about 3 miles in the crowds, listening to Alice tell us about the history of China, she was a little over it.  But thank God it wasn't hot, cause I think that would have put her over the edge!  Once we got some lunch in her, and coca cola, and sitting break, she perked back up.

We got to experience the subways (super easy to use), buses, rickshaws and walking yesterday.  Of course the rickshaws were our favorite!   It was surprising how pretty much everywhere we went things were translated into English.  Now granted we were in the touristy areas, so I guess that makes sense.  But still, even without our guide, I think we could have navigated pretty well.  Alice has been great, though.  She's lived in Beijing for 12 years, and is a wealth of info, and really sweet.   Also very good with sophie, which helped.

The old Hutong area, was neat, and you'll see a picture of us with an old woman.  We got to go see her home in the Hutong - beautiful courtyard, and 9 rooms where she lives with 3 generations of her family.  It was so quiet and peaceful there - shocking, considering it's smack in the middle of the city, but not really any cars in the Hutong, so you couldn't hear a thing.  She was very kind, and kept saying how beautiful sophie was, and how happy she was that we were adopting a little girl from here.

Oh, and Sophie was like a celebrity, like many of you had told us she would be.  In Tienamen square, many people came up to her and asked to take her picture, or for her to join them in a pic. She was a sport about it, and did it a few times.  We really didn't see that many westerners, which I was surprised by.  It's summer break, so the majority of the tourists we saw were chinese families visiting beijing, it seemed like. And I guess if people are visiting from smaller cities, they really don't see tall blonde people in real life very often!  So sophie and james were a big hit.  

In conclusion (haha) Beijing is a pretty cool city, if you like huge cities.  It is fun to explore, but the crowds get to you, and I think 2-3 days here will be plenty for me.   Also the history and buildings so far are pretty amazing - Chinese history, both politically and culturally,  with all it's dynasties is very complex, which James is eating up.  I can't keep track of all the emporers and leaders, but of course he's on top of it.

Oh, and we are TERRIBLE at trying to speak Mandarin.  I struggle with even thank you.  I don't know how people get it?  Alice says one thing, and I just can't make it sound the same?  So we are making up our own language, and being very silly about it in our room.  Maybe that's the lack of sleep, but we're cracking ourselves up.

I see all these beautiful little girls walking around, and see Cora in so many of them.  In TWO days we will finally meet her!!  More beijing sightseeing tomorrow (summer palace, kung fu show at night, and i forget the other big park area).  Then the Great Wall on Sunday.  Then off to He Fei on Sunday evening at 5pm.  

Okay, back to bed for me to try to get a few more hours of sleep.  Until tomorrow!

Michelle

[note:  This message delayed from Friday, July 26th]

Day 1 in China!

We have arrived, safe and sound! Definitely longest day ever of travel ever. Started at 5am leaving from our house in Minneapolis, arrived in Beijing about 24 hrs later. It was 9:30pm by the time we got to our hotel in Beijing. Alice, our guide, was waiting for us at baggage claim, and so far seems great! She had our itinerary all planned out for today's events.

The travels went smooth overall - Sophie was a trooper, and we all got a "few" hours of sleep here and there. James more than the rest of course!

Our first bump, was that when we got to hotel, they didn't have the room we booked. Well they had a reservation, but not the same one I ordered. So we got shuffled into a kind of crappy room, with 2 twin beds. Once we got on the internet, I got the ipad going, and brought up my reservation confirmation. Then trucked back downstairs to show the desk guy. Yep - they had it, but instead of looking under my name, they looked under James Davis (very silly to think the husband would have booked anything:)). So then we grabbed all our bags, and went to the correct room. MUCH nicer in every way!! And a king bed, instead of 2 twins. So by midnight, we were all sleeping and comfy. Holy cow it was a long day(s).

Sophie and I were up by 4:30, and have just been putzing around the room.So though not too much sleep, we still feel rested. I'm sure this evening will be a different story. Off to breakfast now, and then we will meet Alice, and be off to tour. Tienanmen Square and the Forbidden City today, and I can't remember what else. Should be good!

[note: This message delayed from Friday, July 26th]