Jarred singing karoeke 

Mae at lunch 

A few more notes on the orphanage

I wanted to finish up our SWI visit. After our tour, we walked to the front of the building where a crowd of local townspeople had gathered. An older man, with very few teeth, reached out to Mae, calling her Lala (her nickname given to her by her foster family - Fula/Lala) and she readily went into his arms. As the stench of alcohol hit me in the face, I saw her laughing in his arms and discovered that he and another woman there were neighbors of Lala's foster family. She was happily being passed around and delighted in the familiar faces. We were told that the foster families had not been invited to meet us - too emotionally difficult. We all took a final picture in front of the SWI and were sent off with more fruit. The SWI director took us on a tour of the town and we stopped to take a few pictures at a city landmark, the sports center?? Everywhere we went townspeople stared and asked questions. In that part of the countryside, they see very few tourists, and even fewer with Chinese babies. I hope someday to take Mae back to see where she was born and give her some sense of where she comes from and what her very early childhood was like. I believe that Rich mentioned that on Gotcha day, we received a photo album put together by the SWI, so we actually have baby pictures of her and pictures with her friends. I think this album will be more important than we can ever imagine as she grows up.

Update on Ian the Orphanage

We got very behind on our blog due to Ian's illness and a spotty internet connection in Wuhan. I will try and catch up - first and foremost, Ian is finally through the worst of his illness. WOW is all I can say. Very scary and very hard to deal with in a foreign country. He still had a fever as of Friday (among other problems), but we were able to start treating him with the antibiotics that were brought from home. He is still not eating (after six days) and is still very weak, but is definitely through the worst of it. I believe that somehow Mae sensed that she had to go with the flow and has been an absolute delight. Jarred has been a FABULOUS big brother and has not only entertained her, but really helped us. He is getting his crash course in being a jr. counselor for his summer job. Ian had one more trip to the hospital on Thursday (3/24) for his two hour IV drip of who knows what medicines. Rich and Jarred had gone sightseeing for the last two morninigs, so Rich was on hospital duty. I couldn't go back there. To say that is was unsanitary is a huge understatement. It was DISGUSTING. That afternoon, Jarred, Mae and I had the opportunity to visit or orphange, or Social Welfare Institute (SWI) as they are called here. There were eight families who received children from Chibi, but only three of us opted to go. We all got boarded a rickety mini van, with not springs in the seats (and of course no car seats or seat belts) for our 150 kilometer ride to Chibi. The countryside was beautiful; lots of farmland, water buffalo and mountains. The province of Hubei is full of lakes, so it is very lush and green. We got onto a surprisingly modern tollroad and made it to Chibi in one hour and forty five minutes. As we exited the highway, the SWI director was waiting for us to escort us to the SWI. Chibi has a population of appx. 1/2 million people; considered a small town in China. I recognized the SWI from the pictures; a fairly small two story long and narrow building. The caregivers were waiting out front to meet us. They recognized the three babies, as we discovered that a week prior to Gotcha day, the girls had all been removed from their foster care to ease the transition. Mae readily went into their arms and clearly liked the attention and being spoken to in Chinese baby talk. When we entered the front door, I was struck by how cold it was inside - at least 20 degrees colder than outside. I was glad I had brought a blanket for Mae, as the Chinese are very fussy if you don't have your child layered in huge amounts of clothing. We were greeting in the conference room wiht water and fruit and then given a tour. There is a clinic which consists of a small room that reminded me of the nurse's office in elementary school. The ground floor also had a large playroom for the babies which was very clean and bright. All fifteen babies currently at Chibi SWI are in foster care, so they were not there. We saw the older children's rooms - very neat, spacious rooms with two beds each and lots of blankets piled high. The older children were in school, so it was very quiet. Children who are not adopted can live in a SWI until the age of 18. Then the Chinese government will pay for a university education. They will take care of these children/adults for their entire life if necessary. The back of the SWI is butted by a beautiful bamboo tree forest and we found the spot where a picture of Mae had been taken6 months earlier. Behind that is a retirement community, so the girls have a lot of company and visitors to interact with.
We were given the chance to ask any questions and we discovered that Mae and Leah, a child adopted by a family who lives in Santa Clarita, were fostered by the same family. The mom, Sharon and I started comparing notes on the girl's developmental progress and found lots of similarities. We learned that the girls had a 15 year old foster brother (that may explain the Jarred connection) and that she was grieving over the lost of her two foster daughters. Leah is 19 days younger than Mae and they have been together their enire lives.
I asked to see the place where Mae was found on December 29th, 2003, at two days old. To say it was emotional is an understatement. The reality of her existence all comes crashing down, when you see the spot where a mother or father, at dawn, placed their infant daughter outside a gate of the SWI. When you look at this beautiful, soulfoul child, who is each day waking up to our world more and more, you wonder how this can happen. Jsrred and I took some pictures and spent a few moments grieving for Mae, for the loss of the family she will never know and being thankful that she has come to us. We hope to bring her back here when she is older.

It is now Monday morning and we are off to have the babies medical exams. Excuse the typos as there is no time to proof. Jarred and I will add more about Chibi later.

This was not the day we expected

Not sure where to begin today - Mae is a delight and showing a little more of her personality each day. She is getting more comfortable with us and feeling reassured that she will continue to be fed! She as latched onto Jarred, who has entertained her, made her laugh, as well as fallen head over heels in love with her.

Yesterday aftertoon, Ian got sick - fever, throwing up and diarehea. He had a very rough night and by the morning time, when he couldn't hold any medicine down, we called the hotel Doctor. He recommended that we get to a hospital, as he was worried about Ian becoming too dehydrated. As I discovered in my journey (this is Adena writing) through the Chinese medical system, everyone, rich, poor, rural or city person, must go to the hospital for any kind of treatment. The hotel Dr. could not prescribe any medicine, or give Ian a shot (which is what he really needed). So off in short cab ride to the Hubei General Hospital with Ian and Michelle. Michelle is one of the two U.S. Asian Affairs employees that accompanied our group to Wuhan. Michelle has been working for USAA since 1999, but only full time for about one year, as she is a recent college graduate. I could not have made that hospital trip without her. Her genteel personality changed the minute we entered this very modern looking building. The outside looked like 70's Chinese architecture, but the inside looked like a very industrial, 1930's facility. There were 100's of people jamming the registry. Everyone must go through the registry to be seen. We paid our 3 yuan (about 36 cents) and were sent up to pediatrics. I have never seen anything like it. There were probably 100 parents with children, sitting on laps or playing in a totally unsanitary play area - all the kids presumably SICK! And of course, there was a smoking section in the PEDIATRIC section of a hospital (I know I sound stunned). I sat with Ian while Michelle got in line to see the "Consulting Specialist", ie the Doctor. There were about 15 people ahead of us and Michelle fought her way to stay in line, as people thought nothing about cutting in front of you. As I sat, Ian and I got stared at A LOT. Being the only foreigners and both blonde, the staring was non stop. A woman next to me starting speaking Chinese to me. I told her I only spoke English. She asked in broken English: boy or girl (for those of you who don't know Ian, his hair is long). I said boy and she said, "very beautiful". Her very next question was: "How old are you?" I realized she was asking about ME, not Ian. Her questions were asked out of curiosity, but she clearly thought nothing of asking a lot of personal questions. It was quite amusing, as she relayed my information to everyone in the room. Many people were fascinated by Ian's hair and wanted to touch it. After 45 minutes, the specialist saw us, but wanted more specimins (I'll spare the details). That was another 15 mins., then off to evaluate Ian for any allergies. Then back to the specialist for a prescription. As it turned out, the prescription was a two hour IV drip. No shots of Lomotil or Compazine that I had hoped for. The only way they will adminster medicine is through an IV. Michelle said she had had at least 30 IV's, as that was standard. As we entered the IV station, I was stunned by what I saw. At least 50 parents and their children, most of the kids sitting on their parent's laps, with IV's in their hands (and in the heads for the babies). There are metal racks hanging overhead to hold the old fashioned glass bottles of solutions. There was a big nurses area, with a big opening and two well worn matresses on top of the counter. As children were called, they were lifted onto a matress (most screaming) and injected with the IV. Did I mention that the nurses don't wear gloves, nor did they change the sheet after each child was on it? I told Michelle I wanted to take Ian home to rest and we would come back in the afternoon. The nurses kept our bottles of medicine and we went back to the hotel. After a few hours, I steeled myself to take Ian back for the two hour drip. As we walked back into the IV station, of course the nurses remembered us and made a huge fuss over Ian, who was still delirious with fever (Rich is convinced he was speaking Chinese!). Michelle, Ian and I settled in for the glucose, antibiotics and anti naseau drip. I then learned that Michelle was a product of the one child policy and we talked a lot about what it means to have girls here in China. I thought her father must be very proud of her and she said that now he is.....Her parents adopted a 2 year old Chinese girl four years ago and she said the process took years. Much slower than our process. It seems odd - you would think that since the girls are already born, they would make it easier to keep them with Chinese families. Michelle commented on how lucky I was to have TWO boys. We talked a lot about things that women can do in the U.S. (like my job in finance). A man behind us with his 15 year old daughter (getting her asthma medicine) asked if we have the one child policy in the United States. He really had no idea about the US or our governmental policies.

We were told to return the next day for another two hour drip, so we will see what tomorrow brings.

Jarred< Mae and I had a quiet dinner in the Italian restaurant in the hotel. Bed forwarned, if you stay at the Best Western in Wuhan, the Italian restaurant has five tables and no staff. The waitress and food come from the other restaurant. So, we literally ate alone, Jarred getting his plate of pasta with tomato sauce. It was nice after the long day of crowds.

Jarred, Rich and Mae are off for a sightseeing trip in the morning (which they skipped today, too worried about Ian). There is a possibility we will visit Mae's orphanage tomorrow.

Til then......keep Ian in your thoughts.

Mae and gege Ian 

More first day 

First day 

Mae's first dinner (Chinese food of course) 

Mae and dad 

Mae and her new family 

Mae and Adena 

Mae in our arms 

Gotcha day - watching the first baby be presented 

It's Legal- she's ours now!

Today was the day Mae's adoption became legal! We all packed back in the damned bus and headed back to the same room where we got the girls yesterday. Today, however, the mood in the room was very different. Everyone was very calm and the girls were, for the most part, very content. Bonding had begun (thank G-d!)

First off, each set of parents (and the one single parent adopting this trip) were photographed holding their new daughter. Ian & Jarred were not invited in to the photo. These photos, we are told, are for the all important Red Book, what ever that is. We suspect that there is a permanent photo record of each child and his/her new parents... Of course when we hear "Red Book," it gets all scary sounding...

Then each family is called in to the holding room, which is now set up with desks. We sit on one side, and a government official and a translator sit opposite. We were then asked a set of questions by the official: who will care for the baby, why did you want to adopt a Chinese baby, what are your plans for her education, etc. etc. We were kind of stumped for a moment, wondering if any of these had trick answers to them: if we say that we both work, does someone in a military uniform burst in to the room and grab Mae from us? What if we use the word "baby sitter" or "nanny?" How do we know the translator isn't saying something like "oh man, these two are SUCH losers. Plus, my Smith Barney IRA tanked last quarter. TAKE BACK THAT BABY NOW!!!!!!!!!!!"

Well, needless to say, nothing of the sort happened. We signed all the forms, and provided our index finger prints on 5 copies of said forms. Mae provided them with a print of her right food (that didn't go over too well with her, by the by) and that was that. She is now ours, poor dear.

After hugs and photos, we climbed back on to the bus which we kind of dislike, if I didn't mention that yet. It's so cold and wet outside, and so steamy inside- the windows are completely fogged up. Who the hell knows how the driver sees the road. Oh, given the fact that he snapped some phone wires with the top of the bus while pulling up to the adoption center might mean that he can't see either. Tom, our guide, happily goes on pointing out the various sights but of course all we see is steam and dripping water covering the windows.

We did have a brief stop at a super market/target kind of store. How to explain... It's at least four stories tall. The first floor appeared to be a series of smaller stores- food stores, a high end sporting goods store, eye ware, toys, etc. The second floor was like a huge Target- cloths, linens, shoes, cleaning supplies, electronics, you name it. And man was it noisy! Each section had its own music blaring, along with a designated sales person with a megaphone urging shoppers to come in to his/her section to shop. It was wild. Mae was sitting in the shopping cart happy as can be, and Ian sat in the stroller. At this point, Ian had a pretty bad tummy ache so he was kind of out of it. But the stares we got! Not one but TWO boys- and blond ones at that. Oh yeah, we had a girl with us too. Whatever... At one point, while Adena was buying some contact lens supplies, Jarred found himself surrounded by 5 ladies who worked at the store- all commenting on something or rather. Of course J loved being the center of attention.

The third floor was the actual super market, where we tried to buy as close to what we knew and recognized as possible. Jarred ran to the Pringles display, and brought back two cans- one can was pork and ketchup flavor. Another was steamed pork and lemon. YUMMY!

Back at the hotel, Ian became sick as a dog so we had an appropriately quiet night of it...

Gotcha Day

Today was the day for which we had been preparing for 14 months- the day Mae would become ours at last. And it was a long day indeed. After trying to consolodate as many suitcases as we could, we hit the road for the second time in 24 hours. We left Guangzhou for Wuhan, which is north westGuangzhou, in the province of Hubei. Wuhan will be our home base for the next week, while we deal with the China portion of the adoption.

We arrived at the airport, which is a far cry from the very new, very modern international airport of Guangzhou, at around 11am. We were met by our Wuhan laison, Thomas, who is very chatty and boy does he love his microphone. We landed in pouring rain, with the promise of similar weather for the rest of the week. In the bus to our hotel, we were told that we would be picking up our daughters at 2:30. The usually perky group suddenly turned very silent. For about three mintues anyway...

After checking in to the fabulous Best Western Premiere Hotel, the four of us settled in to a quite lunch, discussing the fact that this would be our last meal as "the four of us." Kind of sad, but also terribly exciting... The fourteen families and their various children, friends, parents, in-laws, etc. all met in the lobby and back on to the bus we went for a very short trip to what is called the Ministry of Civil Adoption Affairs. This is a very fancy name for a very plain, almost run down store front. Picture the lobby of a gone-to-seed hotel lobby and you will get the picture. We all found seats on one of the six or so couches and waited. There was another room behind smoked glass which was obciously the holding room for the babies and their care givers, who accompanied the girls to Gotcha Day. We could hear them crying and making noise behind the glass, and could see blurry glimpes of them in their yellow jackets.

First, each parent was given a small photo album, as a gift from the orphanage. Each album contains around 10 photos of each child along with some very odd landscape photos of the town where the orphanage is located. There are also some very quaint missives wishing the babies good health and happiness throughout as well. It was very hard for us to even look at the photos knowing the real things were just behind the glass.

After a brief speech from a government official saying something very official (no one was paying attention at this point), they began the introduction of the babies. Gotcha Day had begun. One by one, families were called up to the door to the holding room, and one of the care givers would walk out carrying a child in her arms. As soon as the first girl was carried out of the room, everyone stood and everyone started to cry. It became very loud very quickly in that place. Just seeing the joy in these parents faces was enough to melt all of our hearts. Of course each child was as beautiful as the next, and each child was as unique as the next. Finally they called our name and we approached the doorway. We recognized Mae immediately. She certainly resembled the two posed pictures we had been carrying around for the past two months, only this time she was right there in front of us. She was one of the only girls not to cry when brought out of the room. But Mae did begin to cry when Adena and I took her in to our arms. We of course were balling. Big surprise.

What can we say? She's beautiful. We were struck by how incredibly calm she is. Once the initial shock of being handed over to us passed, she settled in to our laps quite comfortably. And she seemed so large! Only after we removed her jacket did we understand why. Mae had been dressed in four layers of clothing. We had heard that the Chinese believe in dressing their children VERY warmly. But this was certainly a case of over-due. No wonder all these girls had cheeks the color of apples- the were all burning up from being wrapped up as they were.

The families were given about an hour or so to get used to the little ones, and over the din of the crying and the laughing, we all had a few moments to ask some questions of the care givers. We confirmed that Mae had been living with a foster mother, and were told that Mae also had a foster brother who is sixteen. We also were told that the orphanage decided to keep the photo album that we had made for Mae, as a keepsake. We were a bit surprised as the purpose of the photo album was for Mae to take the album back home with her. Apparently this is not uncommon, for the care givers to keep these momentos for themselves as a way to keep a connection to the girls long after they have left China for good.

Next we had to sign a one page document which granted us 24 hour guardianship of the girls. This document allowed us to take the girls with us back to the hotel, and allowed us to keep them as ours until the actual notarization and signature of the adoption documents the following day. Then back on the bus...

Thomas was yacking in to the mike as we headed back to the hotel. He kept talking about nuterizing the girls. After a few seconds of concern, we all of course realized he was saying "notarizing..." Mae rode comfortably on our laps back to the hotel. The only time- and we mean only time- she would cry is when we handed her off from one person to the other. She would cling tightly as she cried, but once she was in the arms or in the lap of the next person, she quieted down immediately.

Mae loves to play, and she can occupy herself with the simplest of items- a cup, a book, a pen knife (just joking.) While she yelled at the top of her little lungs as we undressed her, she loved being cool and comfy in her little tee shirt and diaper.

For now, she's a very serious little thing. She watches and interacts, but she is hesitant to laugh or smile too often. She has certain motor skills that are quite age appropriate, such as picking up cheerios without any problem. But she doesn't have the slightest clue as to how to crawl or roll over. But she is none the less quite a lover girl. She won't sit next to you, she will only sit on you. She loves to be held, and insists on it at all times. She smells wonderful, as all babies do. Jarred describes her scent as a cross between baby shampoo and playdough. He's right too.

Dinner tonight was a crazy celebration of sorts. We all sat at large round tables in one of the hotel dining rooms. There were three high chairs at each table, and Mae settled in to hers quite happily. Then Mae's celebration began- the food was brought out. And man can this girl eat. And eat. And eat. As the dishes were placed on the table, we couldn't feed it to her fast enough- soup, veggies, steamed egg, tofu, rich- ALL of it tasted good to Mae. And NONE of it tasted good to the boys. And so it goes.

Finally, the length of the day coupled with the emotional impact of the day finally hit everyone, and suddenly within ten minutes, the place cleared up. To our roomes we all headed, and to our first night as the "fivesome" we had now become...

We will write more tomorrow - the converter situation has wreaked havoc on the laptop, but we will post our first full day's adventure soon.

We"ve arrived

Good Morning to everyone. We had a very long, but uneventful flight from LA to Goungzhou, China. We took off at 11:45pm on Friday night and Ian lasted about 10 minutes. He then slept for the next nine hours. Rich and I tried to eat some dinner (at 1:15am!!). Rich had the joy of experiencing his first Ambien and made it only through the salad. We slept about 8 or 9 hours, which is a great way to pass the time on a 16 hour flight. The boys did beautifully, and had not a complaint about the long flight. We arrived at 6:45am Sunday morning (losing Saturday) and started a very long day. The China team is phenomenal, leading us every step of the way through the largest airport in Asia. We bussed to the airport and found we had no rooms yet. We got back on the bus and arrived for dim sum at 8:30am. A bit early for most of us, but a delicious meal and a chance to meet some of the 43 families in our group. It was great to put faces with names that I have been corresponding with on the internet. The boys ate rice.....it's going to be a long two weeks.

We then got back on the bus and took a two hour tour of Guangzhou. It is a city filled with old, old buildings (the city is 2000 years old) mixed with an enourmous amount of new and ongoing construction. The smell of deisel is everywhere. Since is was Sunday it was not too crowded, but this morning should be an experience. After we checked into our great room (26th floor overlooking a huge building with a flashing CANON sign - feels like Lost In Translation), we took a walk to try and stay awake, with our first stop being STARBUCKS. We could have been in LA, but it was fun for the kids to figure out the money and conversion rate. After reorganizing ALL our luggage for our trip to Wuhan, Hubei, we ordered room service (great pasta), we were all asleep by 8:00pm.

Today is GOTCHA day, so our next post will be from Wuhan and we will meet Mae sometime late this afternoon. We are all feeling very excited with a little anxiousness about saying goodbye to our family of four!