Adoption Day

Today is a special day where we make our adoption official and the group was leaving at 0930 am. We had to wake up Rui so we could eat at the hotel breakfast buffet. We got to the buffet around 815. We didn't realize that it would take us 2-3 times longer to eat. We spent most of our time exploring what Rui ate and almost forgot to eat ourselves. It is impossible to enjoy a buffet breakfast in 15 minutes. Tomorrow we plan to spend 2-3 hours there to eat (haha). My cool photography vest has been converted to a diaper vest (not very macho....ha!). I also learned that bottles leak (when they fall over in your pocket) and that is soo not cool. We were rushed to eat, rushed to get the right stuff to register and notorize documents for Rui. We had no time for lunch and ate dinner around 8pm.

After going to the registration office (same location where most of the children were delivered), we went to the notary office. I think it's an official government building. We had to climb up 6 big flights of stairs and everyone was in such a fantastic mood that I felt I was in a dream. Huffing and puffing up the stairs reminded me of the reality that it was not a dream. Walking back in 90 degree, super bright,humid, and in full traffic was no picnic. We spent time playing dodgeball with the scooters driving on the sidewalk. I felt like target practice. People would look at us, or our caucasian friends and point at us and create a traffice jam. I felt like yawning and doing a full stretch clobbering the scooters driving by too close to us. But I didn't. Some older people would come soo close to us that I thought they were either pickpockets or trying to smell us.

Our reward for finalizing our local documents for adoption was to go to a brand new Walmart that opened in May 2009. We took our rented bus there to shop for 1.5 hours and then took the same bus back. It's a drag to buy drinking water ( I appreciate where I work even more DDWEM) because it's soo heavy, because you have to carry it in plastic bags. I spent 178 rmbs for water, snacks, and soda. Some parents are already getting tired carrying their child and three families purchased a small stroller. Arlene is in great shape and with her special ERGO child carrier, we hope to avoid buying a stroller. We learned the average monthly salary here is 1100 rmb a month. We spent roughly $600 rmb on formula and donations of clothes to Rui's orphanage. I understand more now how, in their perspective, they see us as being rich.

I was looking for butterfinger bars , granola bars, chocolate bars and kungfu dvd movies and didn't find any snacks, just the typical asian crackers. The dvd movies didn't have english subtitles and were 14rmb (2.50 us). As long as I buy dvds from walmart and not peddlers, I should have no problems with customs. I'm hoping to visit another shopping type mall (with AC) to relax and shop for nick knacks.

Tonight we at at a hotel next door to us. It felt like we were living in a hotel filled mafia type folks. The whole parking lot is filled with cars in total black with tinted windows. Apparently a black color car is cooler to drive than a white color car. I'm glad they didn't belong to the mafia. Our first dinner out with Rui went well. She surprised us by using a spoon and eating on her own a little bit. She also surprise us by breaking a small plate with her over active hands. Oh well. We sure left a mess there. sigh.....

Ending today's blog on a funny note, guess what is the name of the restaurant they have here for their non-super fancy meals? They just serve really nice meals there. It's called Mamma Mia!

Our First Full Day in China

Today should be our first full day in China. The time is 543am and I'm finding it hard to sleep due to the hard bed. Looking forward to our first buffet. I think people think we're crazy here because we keep taking pictures of the food and even the dishes. haha

The buffet was really nice. It was really nice eating with big plates again. We could drink a lot of juices but was reminded about that we couldn't just drink their water. It was funny seeing roughly 9 families up at 7 am loading up on everything from yogurt to wonton soup, chow mein, and sausages. The best average price for water is 2 bottles for 5 rmb dollars.

We then went to Tiananmen square and the Forbidden City and the Hutong section area and a silk factory. We had over 13000 steps. It tuned out today was the beginning of a 3 day holiday and it felt like everyone wanted to go to the same place. The weather was blue sky, light clouds and breezy. It was great and wow it was really sunny. The light fog I believe was pollution that is slowly catching up with us. Arlene and I both have sore voices, mucus buildup. We walked through the FC on the main center line direction and it was beautiful. I was worried about pick pockets and I had to act really mean sometimes to the peddler sales people and random people that would surround us closely for no reason. There were guards/police everywhere. We heard that a teenager tourist girl was taken to the police station for littering a piece of paper. She must of did it on purpose in front of them. At FC we were listening to our guide, when a little chinese boy pulled his pants down 15 feet away and did a number #1. We were soo shocked that no one took a photo and no reacted but us. We were laughing too hard. We saw this incident again on our way back to the bus.

We had a good history lesson on FC and everyone was exhausted by noon due to the pollution and walk. We had a nice 12 course meal. One teenager had to try a little bright red veggie and ended up drinking up a half a pitcher of water afterwards. He didn't heed my advice about peppers. He said he knew what he was doing. He underestimated the power of a small red pepper. He did heed my advice about milk later to neutralize the effects.

We went to a government silk factory afterwards. We had a great lesson on the silk worm, and their products. It was like a live government informercial and it was impressive and kinda pricey. Many of us couldn't buy much because we were still packed to the limit on baby stuff and couldn't pack any more. We wanted to buy a silk bed cover but after they nickel and dimed you, it was roughly $500 dollars US. Here are pictures of a rickshaw . . . the Hutong Section . . . and a waterway.