Squeaky Shoes

Well, it is the end our Sunday here in Guangzhou. Melissa is on the couch giving Luke his bottle, Shelby is reading, and Cole and Piper are playing “Hearts” with Bill and Linda. I hope that you are all doing well and that you are heading to church soon. We awoke early, me especially so, as I spent most of the night hacking up my last good lung. Luke and I have both had little colds but they seem to be clearing up today. Somehow the morning slipped by quickly enough that we ended up scrambling to get downstairs for breakfast. It was another ho-hum meal of eggs however you like them, light as air French toast, and dragon fruit, which is apparently supposed to be a natural laxative. Cole and Bill hurried off to play their squash tournament and the rest of us strolled the shopping on the main level of the hotel. Cole and Bill played four games and finished even. I came and played Bill in another four games and we also finished even. So, Bill held his own against the Nicholson boys. The reality is that Cole feels fine, I can barely walk, and Bill cannot make a fist or otherwise tighten his forearm. However, the tournament resumes tomorrow and Piper is in the mix. We spent most of the afternoon by the pool. Luke just loves the water and is constantly plunging his face in and beating the water with his hands. He and I came upstairs—he to take a nap and me to work a bit. Shelby also came up to read and to make sure that I gave Luke a proper bottle and nap experience. Around 4:00 we all loaded up to stroll the “shopping” around the island. If you have been to Wisconsin Dells or to Myrtle Beach then you understand what I mean by “shopping”. It is pretty much knick-knack items that are all but worthless. We were thinking of Jenny Hatfield the whole time because she is pretty much the queen of souvenir shopping. The best was that at one store Cole paid about 210 RMB (about $30) for some items and Bill paid about 280 RMB (about $40). Of course, they were told it was “best price”. Well, about two blocks later we found Cole’s item for about 75 RMB (about $10) and an entire set of Bill’s item for 140 RMB (about $20) with a display case. Cole felt somehow wronged. I told him that with his curly blond hair and Ray-Bans that they probably thought he was rock star who could afford the premium. The big purchases of the day were several pairs of “squeaky shoes”, so-called because they make an annoying squeak every step that a small child makes. They are just part of the China experience. You can also see from the photos that we were stopped by a group of school children (7 and 8 year old boys) who were practicing their English by asking for names, home states, and credit card numbers. They were super nice and Cole pumped my ego by telling me “Dad, they think you look like Lance Armstrong”. So, I signed lots of fake autographs. By the way, the credit card reference was a joke. We strolled and shopped until about 6:30 and then had another great meal at a barbecue/grill/Brazilian buffet along the river. Cole says it is as close to Ruth's Chris as I am going to get on this trip. It was insanely hot but the food was good and Luke and the kids did very well. Melissa also did okay. Bill and Linda and I were perfect as always. You can see the neon signage of a ship in the background of one of the dinner photos. On that ship was an Arab leader being hosted by the mayor of Guangzhou. The Arab was representing the Asian Games and was here to help celebrate the fact that Guangzhou will host Asian Games in 2010. Very large entourage with red carpet rolling through the hotel and out to the boat, which happened to be 20 feet from our seat. So, a fun night for us. Things have wound down now. Luke is in bed, as is Melissa. Cole and Piper have returned from cards and they, along with Shelby, are slowly getting settled for bed. Luke is doing really well. He is walking more and more, although quite recklessly. He walked right off the bed just a little while ago. He eats superbly, enjoys long strolls, fine dining, and just seems to fit right into the mix.

Wherever you are, enjoy the day the Lord has made.

1st Day in Guangzhou

We got up a little earlier this morning because we needed to leave for the airport by around 8:30a.m. We had a nice breakfast, although I cut back to cereal and toast, paid our bills, said good-bye to the hotel staff, and loaded the bus for the airport. Our rep Michael was with us the entire time, managed the bus trip, and moved us through the airport right up to the point where we cleared security. He really did an amazing job for us all week and we were sad to say good-bye. I hope we will see him again in the future. Our plane ride was a little less than two hours and was uneventful until the last 10 minutes when Luke had what can only be described as "an accident". Let us just say there was a moment when I thought it might be beneficial for us to open the doors in mid-air. Once we de-planed and the girls de-diapered, we moved quickly through baggage claim to meet Maggie, another agency rep who helped us get the hotel and get checked-in. We are staying at The White Swan Hotel and there are many, many adoptive families that have stayed here in the past and that are staying here now--and not just from our agency but from many others. It is a beautiful place on Shamian Island (spelling) and sits along the Pearl River. We have included a few pictures of the room we are in and of the view that we have at night. Some have suggested that this is too nice of an experience to pass-up so I am going to lobby for us to live here permanently. This will also give us chance to get to Ruth's Chris, which many of you have begun to question my sanity for passing up when we were in Hong Kong. And besides, the internet (and you all) are keeping us up-to-date with yourselves, the Rays and the Brewers so we have little left to ponder. The best part of our initial day here was that Maggie took care to have a few Papa John's pizzas delivered to our room. Although not a Pegasus, the food was wonderful and Luke is now indoctrinated into pizza--or at least breadsticks. After lunch, we toured the hotel so we could get the amenities in our mind so we could best plan our week. There are two nice pools, a fitness area, squash courts, shopping, an arcade, a fish pond, etc., etc. The weather is high 80s and I am not certain we should leave. Other than going broke in the interim, this would be a nice way to live. After our tour, we put on our suits and went out to the pool. When Luke took his first bath with us, he was not happy. Now, we think he may actually be a fish. He had a great time in the pool with the girls and will happily put his face in the water and likes to "float" on his back. I told Melissa I could have him jumping off the side of Country Aire inside of three weeks and off the board in four weeks but she does not seem up for the challenge. As an aside, take a look at me in the picture with him--I think I am "the white swan". Luke and I came back for a brief nap while the girls enjoyed a little more sun time and Bill and Cole spent time in the fitness room. Bill and Cole actually have a squash tournament planned for tomorrow. Piper wants to play but I told her you had to somehow have Morton in your name--she is pretty ticked--I'll let you know how the tournament unfolds. So, we concluded the evening with a light dinner in our room--for me a penne pasta with pesto sauce. Sorry, I am really scraping for details. Luke is doing well--he still has a few sniffles and a little "digestive" problem. He is usually very content but does have a temper that makes us laugh--it will just take patience to correctly channel it all. It is all good! We do miss all of you, nice hotels and good food notwithstanding. China is a wonderful country, full of super people and many wonders. In the end though, there is no place like home.

Take care.

Dave

Last Day in Kunming

Well, you will quickly recognize this entry as filler. We decided that today would be a “do nothing day” because it is our last day in Kunming (remember Kwun-Ming and not Coon-Ming) before flying to Guangzhou on Saturday. As a result, we have not a lot to share and so we will just do our best. We all slept in today because we stayed up a little later than usual the night before. We had not intended to stay up but ended up doing so because I had a long nap and was feeling better. So, we introduced Luke to late night parties, and although we could not order a pizza, I can say that he does like popcorn. He will fit right in. So, we did our usual breakfast downstairs. I am pretty much eating two breakfast meals each morning. One, a very traditional Western deal—toast, cereal, bacon and the other more Chinese—fried rice, steamed vegetables, noodles. So, I am gaining weight and not losing weight in China. After breakfast, we all went our separate ways. Cole and I went with Michael, our agency rep, to a local bookstore to get some maps of the area, books about Yunnan, and copies of local music. I just wanted some basic information about the area to share with Luke down-the-road. We know where he was born, although we cannot find it laid out well on a map. For those who are familiar, you can go to Google Earth and “fly to” Kuangyuan, Kunming and you can see the town. We know the village is Duanjia in the town of Kuangyuan, but cannot find (yet) a map that shows the village. Anyway, that is the guy-stuff for the day.

Since we just relaxed today, I will tell you about the place we have been staying in this week. I have not referenced it in great detail but we are staying at the Park Hotel—formerly the Grand Harbour. It is a very nice hotel. We were able to “upgrade” from very nice rooms to very wonderful rooms. Melissa and I and the kids are basically in a three room suite—one room for Cole, Shelby, and Piper that adjoins a sitting area that adjoins a room for Melissa, Luke and me. Bill and Linda are then down-the-hall in another nice room. We are sitting on the 17th floor of the hotel and have basically had our run of the executive lounge. They serve breakfast there, as well as afternoon snacks. We have all enjoyed the very nice staff which has gravitated towards us because of our circumstances and our willingness to humorously abuse the local Chinese dialect. So, if you ever felt sorry for us because we were traveling in a foreign land, then trust me when I say you should not. Between the hotel staff, and Michael, this has been a very relaxing trip. Hopefully the pictures posted do the accommodations justice. The afternoon tradition has become a rousing game of “Hearts”. Pretty much everyone rotates through at one point or another, although Shelby prefers to read and watch Luke. Cole was the big winner today—pulling off something we called “the run” because he took the queen of spades and all the hearts, which set everyone else back in an unrecoverable way. All-in-all, Piper is probably the “player” because she has the mind to “count cards”.

I think I mentioned that we were going to have dinner sometime on the 21st floor of our hotel—which is a 360 degree revolving floor. Shelby and Piper graciously volunteered to watch Luke for the evening while the rest of us went upstairs for “set meals”. We had six meals to choose from, 2 Western, 2 Chinese, 2 Japanese. Cole and I chose Japanese, Linda and Melissa chose Western, and Bill and Michael chose Chinese. It was a great meal made even more unique by seeing a slowly changing skyline view and the fading of sunset to darkness. Hopefully, the pictures help share the vision.

We hope you are all well. Thanks for keeping up with us and thanks for the comments. I would respond to them each but I am starting to worry about what I am posting on the net. If I ever run for office, this site would pretty much be my undoing.

Dave

Orphanage Visit

Hey everyone it's Missy. I know you are all used to Dave's entries, but for a couple reasons I wanted to write today's entry. First, Dave is in the bathtub soaking away some pretty intense cold symptoms. He hasn't been feeling well all day. Please say a little prayer! Secondly, there were so many questions about Luke in the comments I wanted to add my two cents.

I can't even tell you how we look forward to the comments. It is the first thing we do in the morning. Usually Piper and I go straight to the computer. Thank you for your encouragement and support. Even knowing this is where we are suppose to be and what we are suppose to do there can be alot of insecurities. With that said, back to the questions! As far as his little life goes, he is wearing the 12 month outfits, except for the shorts. I'm so glad I brought two pairs of 6-9 shorts. (Thanks Janet and Katie) He does feed himself off the tray of the high chair, but he also allows us to spoon feed him anything. He is eating great. As far as the cleft lip and palate go, his lip has been repaired since the pictures that we have at home. That was interesting to us. We thought it looked pretty good, but it is better now. The palate inside is interesting, everyone of us has had our chance to look at it, and it is hard to explain. He manages it so well I forget it is there. It is basically just open...not sure how else to explain it. We all have concluded it is not as bad as we thought it would be. He is babbling a lot. Not sure what language it is! We have heard Bye Bye and Ma. But, mostly rarararara and yayayayaya. He has alot of teeth. And he is also JUST learning how to walk. He stands in between the kids and takes about 10 steps. Precious.
Lastly, he has sooo much personality. In other words he is wild. Seriously he can turn on a dime. One minute cute smiling laughing the next wham he's mad as a hornet. But, really just alot of personality. Waves at everyone and is very loud. Hopefully that helps answer some of the questions. Can't wait to be with everyone again.

Piper says Hi from the other room!!!!

Well, this is now Dave and I am out of the tub. Please try to remove the visual from your mind--it makes me uncomfortable. We did tour the orphanage today. It really was a well-kept and well-run place. Very clean, very organized, and very efficient. We met with one of the adminstrative staff and she answered some basic questions. The orphanage that we visited was started in 1987 and was really a spin-off of a social institute that handled infants and adults. There is a staff of about 200 nannies/aunties that are the caregivers and a staff of about 75 that handles administration and medical clinic. Right now, they have about 600 children in their care, although only 100 are actually at the clinic, with the other 500 in foster care situations. We walked through one room that was a physical therapy area for older kids--there were three kids working in there--it made you glad to see they were receiving help. We then saw the room where newer babies, about six months or less, were being cared for. There were maybe ten in the room, all just finished with lunch, and being bathed and put down for a nap. There were cribs everywhere, but interestingly, they were napping them kind of side-by-side on one large mattress--Luke moved through this room probably a year ago. We were also saw the room for returning foster babies--again, Luke just flowed through this room. We did not get to see the third floor, which is where there are a lot more children, because the weather has been changing and I think they correlated that to disease risk. There were several older children that were moving relatively freely throughout the orphanage--one of whom was about an 8 year old girl with a deformed arm. She followed us for awhile and thought it was tremendously funny that most all of us had on sandals. If you look closely at one of the photos, it shows a police car at the building entrance. They had just brought in a child that had been abandoned. So, it was very interesting to see the cycle from the police drop-off to someone like the Nicholsons taking a child home.

HI EVERYONE this is Shelby!!! I just wanted to say hi and that I miss you all!!! LOVE YA'LL!!!!

helloooooo!!! it's cole... just wanted to say "hi". and thanks too all who commented, the first thing we do in the morning have dad work his magic on the computer, cuz we are uncapable, so we can read your comments. and Grace, your hilarious!!!.... thanx so much. and Trish, sorry, no luck with the sweaky shoes in kunming, maybe Guangzhou!!! ttyl, BYE!! :)