Thursday, June 26, 2008
Oath Day
Well, today is our last day in Guangzhou. It is pretty much like Groundhog Day. For the record, I start breakfast with a bowl of cereal—one scoop of granola, one scoop of muesli, one scoop of raisins, one scoop of pumpkin seeds, and no milk—just dry. I chase that with one glass of apple juice and one cup of coffee. If fresh pineapple is available, I then get three slices of fresh pineapple and place that on the same plate as one piece of wheat toast (twice through the oven) and four slices of bacon. Chase all that with another cup of coffee and another glass of apple juice. If I feel especially frisky, then I may have a waffle fresh from the griddle. But, then I think about how I look in my jeans and I pretty much do only half the waffle. Other than that, same breakfast, different Asian city, for the past fourteen days.
After breakfast, we all packed a little more. Cole and I then joined Bill for a bit of exercise. Actually, Bill organized an impromptu squash tournament with another adoptive family. They live in Chapel Hill, NC—the wife from Michigan originally and the father from England. I think they have three kids and had adopted a girl who was like 5 or 6. Neat to get to meet them. They were believers—I think my PCS Athletics t-shirt was the lead-in—so go Crusaders—whoops, I mean Chargers. In the end, it is important to note that the father and sons trounced Bill and me, although Cole did manage to pull off one victory for the family. While we exercised, Linda, Shelby, and Piper went to get their nails done. Unfortunately, it was only the hands, as they were told by the staff “we don’t make the pretty toes”. Fortunately, it was accompanied by a pounding hand massage to go with the typical cuticles and painting. Should a man know how to spell cuticles? Melissa and Luke stayed in the room so he could nap, although it ended up being a short nap for whatever reason. I think Luke knows he has entered into party central and has figured out that sleep is for the weak.
At 2:50pm Melissa, Luke, and I went downstairs to meet the other adoptive families to “go take the oath”. So, we loaded up on a bus that took us on about a 30 minute ride to the U.S. Consulate. In my mind, I envisioned an embassy with guards and flags and the like. In reality, it was the fifth floor of a uptown office building. There was security and x-ray but it was not as magnificent as I had dreamt it to be. Basically, Melissa and showed our passports to get into the Consulate. They then handed us copies of our passports (Dave and Missy from US and Yi Duanlu from China) that we then showed to nice man behind platen glass. He validated we matched our paperwork and sent us back to the large waiting area. A super fun guy named Rich, a US citizen who works for the consulate, then came out, introduced himself, read off the list of states represented by all the 50 or so families in the room, and said “Here is the moment you have been waiting for”. He then proceeded to read a one line statement to the entire room that basically said “Do you affirm that all the information you have presented . . . is true? . . . if so, say “I do”. We all said “I do” and the room filled with applause and one of my eyes, the left one I think, filled with tears. So, Luke becomes a US citizen when he lands in Chicago and we hand a sealed brown envelope to a US immigrations officer. We loaded back on the bus and were to the hotel by 5:30.
So, I have no idea what Bill, Linda, Cole, Shelby, and Piper did while we were gone. I know they had a late snack and then went out for a little shopping. I know that because I saw the bags when they returned. I think they also did a mini-photo shoot around the hotel and the island. I think they were inspired by the many instances we saw during the week where camera crews were out doing spreads for magazines using the hotel and island as the backdrop. Hopefully, the photos posted tonight help fill in the blanks.
Some of you have asked for return trip details. First, we leave the hotel and travel to the Guangzhou airport. We fly from there to Hong Kong. We then climb on United UA 896 that leaves at 12:45 pm (HK time) and arrives in Chicago at 2:20 pm (CST). In Chicago, we climb on United UA 5961 that leaves 4:53 pm (CST) and arrives Peoria at 5:48 pm (CST). Pray for safe travels, a restful flight, and that intestinal issues—which are kicking in—remain manageable for all parties.
Some have asked, “Will the blog continue?” Well, I for sure will post one more time just to express thanks, let you know that we are home safely, and share with you any good travel stories. Beyond that, I promise little because it is time to return to the real world. Thanks for making the past two weeks extraordinary for our family.
Dave
After breakfast, we all packed a little more. Cole and I then joined Bill for a bit of exercise. Actually, Bill organized an impromptu squash tournament with another adoptive family. They live in Chapel Hill, NC—the wife from Michigan originally and the father from England. I think they have three kids and had adopted a girl who was like 5 or 6. Neat to get to meet them. They were believers—I think my PCS Athletics t-shirt was the lead-in—so go Crusaders—whoops, I mean Chargers. In the end, it is important to note that the father and sons trounced Bill and me, although Cole did manage to pull off one victory for the family. While we exercised, Linda, Shelby, and Piper went to get their nails done. Unfortunately, it was only the hands, as they were told by the staff “we don’t make the pretty toes”. Fortunately, it was accompanied by a pounding hand massage to go with the typical cuticles and painting. Should a man know how to spell cuticles? Melissa and Luke stayed in the room so he could nap, although it ended up being a short nap for whatever reason. I think Luke knows he has entered into party central and has figured out that sleep is for the weak.
At 2:50pm Melissa, Luke, and I went downstairs to meet the other adoptive families to “go take the oath”. So, we loaded up on a bus that took us on about a 30 minute ride to the U.S. Consulate. In my mind, I envisioned an embassy with guards and flags and the like. In reality, it was the fifth floor of a uptown office building. There was security and x-ray but it was not as magnificent as I had dreamt it to be. Basically, Melissa and showed our passports to get into the Consulate. They then handed us copies of our passports (Dave and Missy from US and Yi Duanlu from China) that we then showed to nice man behind platen glass. He validated we matched our paperwork and sent us back to the large waiting area. A super fun guy named Rich, a US citizen who works for the consulate, then came out, introduced himself, read off the list of states represented by all the 50 or so families in the room, and said “Here is the moment you have been waiting for”. He then proceeded to read a one line statement to the entire room that basically said “Do you affirm that all the information you have presented . . . is true? . . . if so, say “I do”. We all said “I do” and the room filled with applause and one of my eyes, the left one I think, filled with tears. So, Luke becomes a US citizen when he lands in Chicago and we hand a sealed brown envelope to a US immigrations officer. We loaded back on the bus and were to the hotel by 5:30.
So, I have no idea what Bill, Linda, Cole, Shelby, and Piper did while we were gone. I know they had a late snack and then went out for a little shopping. I know that because I saw the bags when they returned. I think they also did a mini-photo shoot around the hotel and the island. I think they were inspired by the many instances we saw during the week where camera crews were out doing spreads for magazines using the hotel and island as the backdrop. Hopefully, the photos posted tonight help fill in the blanks.
Some of you have asked for return trip details. First, we leave the hotel and travel to the Guangzhou airport. We fly from there to Hong Kong. We then climb on United UA 896 that leaves at 12:45 pm (HK time) and arrives in Chicago at 2:20 pm (CST). In Chicago, we climb on United UA 5961 that leaves 4:53 pm (CST) and arrives Peoria at 5:48 pm (CST). Pray for safe travels, a restful flight, and that intestinal issues—which are kicking in—remain manageable for all parties.
Some have asked, “Will the blog continue?” Well, I for sure will post one more time just to express thanks, let you know that we are home safely, and share with you any good travel stories. Beyond that, I promise little because it is time to return to the real world. Thanks for making the past two weeks extraordinary for our family.
Dave
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
Red Couch Day
Well, it seems the days are getting lazier and lazier. The only push this morning was that I needed to be back in our room by 10:00a.m. to wait for any potential issues that might arise with Luke’s visa application. So, I ate a quick breakfast and came up. Melissa and the kids joined later. Cole, Piper, Melissa and I played hearts while Luke walked circles around the coffee/card table. Shelby finished reading another book—her fourth of the trip I think. We received a call at about 11:30 from Kathy, one of the agency reps here in Guangzhou. To her credit, she did her best to tell me that there was a “huge problem” with the visa application and that we would not be able travel home. Of course, she is laughing as she tells me this and says repeatedly under her breath “I just cannot do this joke well”. So, Luke is ours to take home and we go tomorrow to take an oath of citizenship. Cole has asked me “What is the oath and why do you take it?” Well, I do not know what it is and we take it because they say to. As I said before, this process is like buying a house—you sign where they tell you to sign and pay what they tell you to pay. After we got our good news, I went to ride the Lifecycle for about one hour. Something was wrong with the way I set the saddle height and my Achilles are both hurting—but that is enough of my whining. Shelby and I went out together for lunch while Cole napped Luke. Melissa and Piper went to exercise at the same time. It was a nice father-daughter time for Shelby and me. We of course had a thirty minute devotion, discussed her future career plans, the significance in finding meaningful relationships, the efficacy of a McCain/Rice ticket, and the impact of Bao Steel taking a 96% increase in iron ore costs from Rio Tonto. Actually, we mainly enjoyed stir-fried broccoli, onion rings, fettucine with ham and mushrooms, and Watson’s ginger ale. We are not deep.
We all got dressed-and-pressed for our 4:00 p.m. “red couch” pictures. This was done on the second floor of the hotel, on, you guessed it—a red couch. The first pictures taken were each adoptive family with their new child and current children. Each family was then photographed pretty much simultaneously, in blinding sequential flashes, by all the other adoptive families. You actually felt like rock stars. We did one series with just Melissa, me, and the kids. Then, there was a rising protests from all the other adoptive families that basically said “Bill and Linda came all this way—you better include them in some photos”. And so, we got round number two of flashes. After that picture, all of the babies were then placed on the couch for one large adoptive baby picture. This was nothing short of sheer chaos. There were moms and dads trying to get the attention of the children—as if they were all going to smile simultaneously. There were moms and dads sitting in front of the couch trying to keep them from falling off and/or from walking away. There were moms and dads literally sitting behind the couch, arms wrapped over the top of the couch, trying to prop babies up for the picture. It was awesome. We then did one picture of the entire group, with Kathy, Jason, Bill, and Linda busily shuffling from camera to camera to camera to make sure everybody got a photo.
After the picture session, we had about an hour and a half before dinner. Melissa and I did a little shopping while the kids watched Luke. We then proceeded to the 3rd floor to a very nice Japanese restaurant. Bill had worked us into a private room for just our family. It was a “leave your shoes at the door” Japanese experience where you basically sat on the floor surrounding a table that was actually submerged in a pit—almost to floor level. The food was very good. There was something called a steamed egg that seemed especially repugnant to most of us—except Luke and Bill. For Melissa, it was her “best meal of the trip”, as she enjoyed potato/beef croquets and grilled salmon. Cole, Linda, and Shelby all enjoyed tenderloin and fried rice. I had grilled beef in ginger with fried rice. Bill had something called sukiyaki—which was a meal prepared in a hot oil liquid right a the table. It consisted of Kobe beef , vegetables, and tofu. As an added treat, our delightful chef insisted that the right way to enjoy the meal was to dip everything she cooked into a fresh raw egg. Bill was quite the trooper and heartily dipped away. He suggested he was only partaking to give us all a show but secretly I think he was loving the experience. The miso soup was left untouched by almost everyone. Luke, who is a fabulous eater, ate about 3 plates of food from everyone else and loved being eye-to-eye with the rest of us (because of the submerged floor table). We conluded the meal with ice cream. Imagine me interpreting the flavors as stated by our very Chinese server. Well, burbary was clearly blueberry. Banirra was clearly vanilla. And I thought redba was clearly raspberry. So, Piper and I ordered banirra and loved the vanilla experience. Melissa ordered the burbary and thought it was the best blueberry she ever had. Shelby ordered the redba and was half-way through scoop one when she said “this is not raspberry”. We said, “Sure it is”, to which she said “Then taste it”. Well, as I finished the first scoop, I realized that what Shelby described as “a bean” was in point-of-fact a bean. It was a “red bean” like you would expect to find in “red bean ice cream”. I finished the “red bean” and gave Shelby the rest of my “banirra”.
After dinner, Piper and Shelby and I went to the hotel arcade for car racing, motor cycle racing, and air hockey. We must have knocked the air hock puck off the table a half dozen times—I am sure they were excited to see us leave. When we returned to the room there was yet another rousing game of hearts being played by Bill, Linda, Melissa and Cole. Bill seems to wax-and-wane between thinking the Japanese meal was a great experience and wondering if the raw egg is somehow creating a digestive problem. My bet says he is up all night.
Luke is in his late night routine. He walks around the room, kinda chanting, kinda laughing, and hiding in other parts of the room. When you “find” him, he squints his eyes, tilts his chin down, and lets out this deep belly laugh/grunt. He is having a big time.
Tomorrow is packing day. At the end of the day, around 3:00 p.m., Melissa, Luke, and I go to the U.S. Consulate (no bags, no cameras) to take “the oath” and receive Luke’s visa. If I can tell you more about it, then I will. If it is a matter of security, well, then I will not. Unless, of course, you mention “nitecruzr”.
Give us a minute to get pictures loaded.
Dave
We all got dressed-and-pressed for our 4:00 p.m. “red couch” pictures. This was done on the second floor of the hotel, on, you guessed it—a red couch. The first pictures taken were each adoptive family with their new child and current children. Each family was then photographed pretty much simultaneously, in blinding sequential flashes, by all the other adoptive families. You actually felt like rock stars. We did one series with just Melissa, me, and the kids. Then, there was a rising protests from all the other adoptive families that basically said “Bill and Linda came all this way—you better include them in some photos”. And so, we got round number two of flashes. After that picture, all of the babies were then placed on the couch for one large adoptive baby picture. This was nothing short of sheer chaos. There were moms and dads trying to get the attention of the children—as if they were all going to smile simultaneously. There were moms and dads sitting in front of the couch trying to keep them from falling off and/or from walking away. There were moms and dads literally sitting behind the couch, arms wrapped over the top of the couch, trying to prop babies up for the picture. It was awesome. We then did one picture of the entire group, with Kathy, Jason, Bill, and Linda busily shuffling from camera to camera to camera to make sure everybody got a photo.
After the picture session, we had about an hour and a half before dinner. Melissa and I did a little shopping while the kids watched Luke. We then proceeded to the 3rd floor to a very nice Japanese restaurant. Bill had worked us into a private room for just our family. It was a “leave your shoes at the door” Japanese experience where you basically sat on the floor surrounding a table that was actually submerged in a pit—almost to floor level. The food was very good. There was something called a steamed egg that seemed especially repugnant to most of us—except Luke and Bill. For Melissa, it was her “best meal of the trip”, as she enjoyed potato/beef croquets and grilled salmon. Cole, Linda, and Shelby all enjoyed tenderloin and fried rice. I had grilled beef in ginger with fried rice. Bill had something called sukiyaki—which was a meal prepared in a hot oil liquid right a the table. It consisted of Kobe beef , vegetables, and tofu. As an added treat, our delightful chef insisted that the right way to enjoy the meal was to dip everything she cooked into a fresh raw egg. Bill was quite the trooper and heartily dipped away. He suggested he was only partaking to give us all a show but secretly I think he was loving the experience. The miso soup was left untouched by almost everyone. Luke, who is a fabulous eater, ate about 3 plates of food from everyone else and loved being eye-to-eye with the rest of us (because of the submerged floor table). We conluded the meal with ice cream. Imagine me interpreting the flavors as stated by our very Chinese server. Well, burbary was clearly blueberry. Banirra was clearly vanilla. And I thought redba was clearly raspberry. So, Piper and I ordered banirra and loved the vanilla experience. Melissa ordered the burbary and thought it was the best blueberry she ever had. Shelby ordered the redba and was half-way through scoop one when she said “this is not raspberry”. We said, “Sure it is”, to which she said “Then taste it”. Well, as I finished the first scoop, I realized that what Shelby described as “a bean” was in point-of-fact a bean. It was a “red bean” like you would expect to find in “red bean ice cream”. I finished the “red bean” and gave Shelby the rest of my “banirra”.
After dinner, Piper and Shelby and I went to the hotel arcade for car racing, motor cycle racing, and air hockey. We must have knocked the air hock puck off the table a half dozen times—I am sure they were excited to see us leave. When we returned to the room there was yet another rousing game of hearts being played by Bill, Linda, Melissa and Cole. Bill seems to wax-and-wane between thinking the Japanese meal was a great experience and wondering if the raw egg is somehow creating a digestive problem. My bet says he is up all night.
Luke is in his late night routine. He walks around the room, kinda chanting, kinda laughing, and hiding in other parts of the room. When you “find” him, he squints his eyes, tilts his chin down, and lets out this deep belly laugh/grunt. He is having a big time.
Tomorrow is packing day. At the end of the day, around 3:00 p.m., Melissa, Luke, and I go to the U.S. Consulate (no bags, no cameras) to take “the oath” and receive Luke’s visa. If I can tell you more about it, then I will. If it is a matter of security, well, then I will not. Unless, of course, you mention “nitecruzr”.
Give us a minute to get pictures loaded.
Dave
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Cow and Bridge
Well, today was a totally unplanned and unstructured day. We did our usual lazy and extravagant breakfast. I am trying to encourage Melissa to start cooking a big breakfast for all the family but she seems somewhat totally resistant. After breakfast, Bill, Shelby, Piper, and I went back out for more shopping. We went to Jordon’s in order to meet our need for more stuff. We bought so much more stuff that we had to purchase another suitcase just to put bring the additional stuff home. I heard George Carlin passed away, so I thought I would use a bit of his “stuff” routine. I would not encourage any of you to listen to his tapes. After shopping, we convened at the pool, without Luke, as he was already down for his mid-day nap. For the record, he usually huffs-and-puffs for about 3 minutes before falling fast asleep. The weather here has been very hot, although today was much more pleasant than yesterday, which was quite humid. Some of us exercised later in the afternoon, but we mainly sat by the poolside. We finally figured out that you can order food by the poolside, so we had a very late afternoon round of Caesar salad, tuna sandwiches, and burgers—we need sustenance to get us through till dinner. Somewhere during the day I ran back out to pick up our laundry—two bags washed, dried, and folded for about $25—we need this type of service in Morton. Around 6:00p.m. we met almost all of the adoptive families in the hotel lobby for dinner. We strolled about 11 babies about 10 minutes to a Thai place called “The Cow and Bridge”. I am not certain what the name means—sorry, I should have asked. We ate quite well. Mainly rice and noodle dishes and some unique greens (not collard). For those who have never eaten Thai food, it is basically like eating wings, you pick either hot, nose running, or forehead sweating. I chose nose running fried lettuce and forehead sweating fried noodles with beef. The food, for me, would have been perfect if I had been able to chase it all down with coconut ice cream, which my brother Henry says is the only way to end a Thai meal. We returned to the hotel and spend a few hours, and a few RMB, in the game room of the hotel. It is like a small, tiny, version of a Dave and Buster’s. Some of the photos you see are from the game room. We checked the blog—love the comments and keep ‘em coming—and then played a few rounds of hearts. Piper is still counting cards and Cole keeps spoiling my ability to “run” the table. Everyone is in bed and I am just keeping this entry short because I am tired. We are beginning to think about packing—which is a good sign we are excited to come home. Tomorrow we should get final adoption papers completed so we can take Luke’s citizenship oath on Thursday. Tomorrow is also the traditional “red couch” picture day—that should be chaos with as many babies and families as will be involved. Those pictures will be fun for you all to see tomorrow.
Take care.
Take care.
Monday, June 23, 2008
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