So far….. (Nancy’s version)

So far I have learned more than I ever thought possible! This last week has been a crash course in parenting 101.  Some of my highlights (sorry that is all I have time for).

-This new little man loves his momma!  He wants to be with his momma all of the time!

-No matter how much is on his face, he can’t stand to have anything on his hands and will let you know the instant that he gets anything on his little fingers.

-Kai is going to be a cuddler!  On the bus yesterday as we were going to tour the 6 Banyan Tree temple, he decided to lay his head on my chest- just to cuddle.  It wasn’t even close to nap time yet.  At nap time and bed time he would much prefer me to any crib.  He also has no problem with holding on to me when I carry him.  He acts like he was carried a lot and knows what to do, which is very reassuring to me.

-Kai loves to sing!  He must have had someone sing to him because he is constantly singing the same little tune.  If I hum or sing to him, he will sing back to me.

-He already has me totally and completely wrapped around his precious little fingers.  I have already told him countless times that I will do anything for him and buy him anything (good thing he won’t remember this time right ;)

-He has started a new thing where he likes to crinkle his nose.  He will scrunch up his nose and then giggle.  He especially liked doing this on our plane ride from Zhengzhou with two younger females (early 20’s) that were cattycorner from us.  What a little flirt already!

-He has learned to wave and loves to wave hello and goodbye to everyone around us.

-Kai is super smart!  It take him no time at all to figure out a new toy (even complex ones) and to figure out how to get around whatever we are asking him NOT to do.

-If he can turn an object into a percussion instrument (anything that you can hit, strike, strum, or bang) he will!  HE IS ALL BOY!  He may just take after his momma with the drums though and that is OK by me.

-He loves to people watch.  He is fascinated by others.  No matter where we are, he can stay entertained for a relatively longtime (for his age) just by watching people.  It’s only a problem at feeding times when we need his attention, but otherwise he is just social and will interact with the people he is watching.

-For right now a bottle can cure just about anything.  There is rarely a time that this boy doesn’t have a bottle in his mouth!  Sometimes he uses it for eating but most of the time he just chews on it.  It is his pacifier. If he gets fussy- give him his bottle.  If he gets tired- give him his bottle. I am not going to fight this one any time soon. It is helping us to have the kid that everyone else envies while we are out and about. They all just think that he eats a lot, and that is fine by me. He does need to chunk up but I am sure that his bottle will be the way to get that done.

-He has no problem sharing things unless it is his mommy’s lap.  He will share his cheerios, toys, bottle- but a little girl tried to climb into my lap in the playroom and he made a direct line over to reclaim the lap. No violence, just lots of whimpering and dirty looks.  It should be interesting to see what kind of arrangement Belle and him work out when we get home.

-Kai is slowly warming up to his daddy.  Just last night they were able to get some cuddle time in and he sat on his lap for Skype calls this morning.  It may be a slow progression (slower than Ray would like) but I see changes in the interaction every day.  Soon enough they will be inseparable buddies.  And Ray is doing AWESOME as a dad!  I know that he is hard on himself, but he is doing amazing!

-Many of the locals think that Kai is too pretty to be a boy.  Even the doctor at the physical kept repeating- Oh it’s a boy- in a very surprised tone once the diaper was removed.  His huge eyes and little dimple on his right cheek that just jumps out at you when he smiles are hard to resist. (again this boy has me suckered)  

-The things that I was most worried about and the build up of anxiety surrounding these issues- squatty potties, changing diapers while being out in strange surroundings, bonding issues, etc have really not been that big of a deal.  Feeling crummy with terrible mattresses and not getting a good nights sleep is the worst!  I am not much of a complainer (worrier yes, but complainer no) but you try sleeping on the floor (basically on these mattresses) while being 6 months pregnant and see how your back feels in the morning.  Add to that a 17 lb weight that you can’t hand off all day- the exhaustion may just get me by the end of the trip.  BUT would I trade in the momentary discomfort and fatigue for missing out on this trip? NEVER!!!!!!! 

I know that I am probably leaving out over a hundred things that I want to remember forever.  I will just have to blame that on the fatigue for now.  Hopefully I will be able to get them all down before the real chaos starts- once we are home.

Journey to Kai – Day 10 (Clinic Day)

Kai really didn’t have time to be fussy this evening because we had to be up at 6AM and he only went down around 11PM the previous night.  Up until now, Kai was getting a good 12 hours of sleep every night.  So, we knew he was going to be a handful today.

The alarm hit us hard but on the plus side, we had air conditioning.  With Nancy having a respiratory issue she didn’t want it too cold but sometimes around 2AM she told me she was too hot and allowed me to cool the room down a bit more.

As usual we got up and checked our e-mail and saw that a few family members had replied to our email about arriving in Guangzhou.  We are starting to get the pattern down on how long it takes to get Kai ready for breakfast.  With the nights being so late, I’m not getting to shower before bed like I prefer so we have to both shower in the morning.

I let Nancy shower first while I play on the computer and then I shower next. 

We had been hearing about the White Swan’s breakfast buffet for  months on the Internet and from the other families in our group and now that we are finally at the White Swan we were going to get an opportunity to see what all the hype was about.

I wasn’t 100% sure where the restaurant serving breakfast was located so we stopped on the 2nd floor to talk to reception and they pointed us to the location which is on the 1st floor.

This is where things definitely went bizzaro on us.  Up until now we  were one family amongst about 13 that consisted of “white people”, as soon as we walked into the dining room for the breakfast buffet, this gigantic dining area was filled with families of white people and their Chinese kids.

I hope people aren’t offended by the use of the term “white people” but in reality, that is what we are talking about here.  I haven’t seen a single adoptive family that wasn’t white while in China.  So, we often just refer to ourselves as the “white people”.  But, here in China, the white people are an overwhelming minority and as seen in yesterday’s post, we do experience a bit of different treatment that isn’t always fair (our being asked to not board the plane until every Chinese person has boarded).

The breakfast spread in the restaurant was fantastic.  Take the breakfast buffets at our last two hotels and combine them and you still wouldn’t have a buffet as large as this one.  There were tons of fruit and bread options and the hot food options were ranged from continental breakfast standards (sausage, eggs, pancakes and French Toast) to Asian breakfast items.

The restaurant has a pretty good view of the Pearl River and they seat us near one of the windows overlooking it.  They also had a real easy time conjuring up a high chair which seemed to be a rather difficult feat in Zhengzhou.

I immediately went to locate eggs and yogurt for Kai.  I found the yogurt rather quickly but I couldn’t find the egg station to get him  his scrambled eggs.

Instead, I found the scrambled eggs in one of the chaffing dishes in the hot food line.

I came back to the table and proceeded to feed him.  Fortunately, he likes to eat and makes it pretty simple to feed him.  The hard part is that he likes to people watch and if he’s distracted by something more entertaining he won’t pay attention to the person trying to feed him.

I sort of had an appetite but not really, so I ate light.  Nancy did the same thing and her voice is now completely gone.

The sickness thing is really starting to suck because we are now in the warm part of our journey and we cannot enjoy it.

Once breakfast was done, we headed back to the room to get ready and to make sure that we had everything on Grace and Maggie’s checklist for today.

It’s pretty nice because every night we get a letter slid under our door telling us everything we need to know, in detail about the next day.  It includes the weather forecast, events with times and places we need to be and what we need to bring for each event.  They even provide checklists for the fun events.

Well, today wasn’t a fun event.  This was the very much known about trip to the clinic for Kai’s physical.  This is part of the US Consulate’s requirements for his visa to come into the country.

I bet you are wondering why he needs a Visa when he’s going to become a US Citizen.  Well, he’s not a citizen until he clears US Customs in the United States.  Well, to get to that checkpoint, he’ll need a visa to travel. So, while he’s on that flight home, the United States still considers him a Chinese Citizen and he, in fact, will be flying on a Chinese Passport.  What is funny, is that from my understanding, that since we are the legal guardians of Kai after signing the papers in Zhengzhou he is really not a citizen of China anymore.  So, if anything goes wrong with his visa application he essentially becomes a kid without a country.

We got all the stuff together that we needed.  Instead of trying to dig out just the papers we were told to bring, I brought the entire packet.  In addition to that we packed up Nancy’s backpack with formula, diapers, wipes, toys, etc for Kai.  I had my shoulder bag with the video camera and had my camera around my neck.  Since, Kai won’t let me carry him, Nancy was using the ERGObaby carrier and I had the backpack being utilized as the diaper bag on my back.

We met everyone at the designated location on the first floor of the White Swan and when all heads were counted we headed out the back door and started walking.  Well, as luck would have it, the weather decided to rain on us.  It wasn’t a driving rain but enough of a drizzle that I had to worry about my camera. 

Since it was warm enough that I didn’t need to be wearing my fleece pullover (I had it wrapped around my waste in case it was needed), I used it to shield the camera.

The first place we were heading was to the Victory Hotel to pick up our group members staying there.  Everything is pretty close here, so it wasn’t that long of a walk to get there.

Once we had them we had to go to where our kid’s visa pictures were going to be taken.

The place the pictures were to be taken was tiny so only a couple families could be in there at a time.  So all the rest of us were lined up outside.  There was some shielding form the rain but not for everyone. 

I also forgot to mention that there is a whole lot of construction going on.  Alot of the construction tarps and canopies were providing shelter.  The construction is in part due to the fact that Guangzhou is hosting the 2010 Asian Games and they need to get everything spit polished for the ever scrutinizing eye of the world media.

When it was our turn to go in and get Kai’s visa picture, we were  faced with a very tiny room with a high chair against a wall.  Next to the chair was another chair for a parent to sit in.  We weren’t allowed to touch the child and obviously the child had to look at the camera.  Maggie stood behind the lady taking the picture with a squeaky toy making a lot of noise to draw the attention of the child and have them look at the camera.

You could tell this wasn’t her first rodeo and she was a pro at getting the kids to look their best for their visa photo.  If only someone like that could’ve been around for my visa photo.  I looked like I had been hauled in for a mug shot after a heavy round of partying.

After the picture we were to get in the next line for the clinic next door.  The clinic we were going to was literally the next building over.

When we walked in the place was what you’d imagine a clinic in China to be like.  It was very open and the technology didn’t look to cutting edge.  There was a lot of tile that didn’t look dirty but at the same time didn’t have that feeling of surgery ready sanitization that you often get the feeling of from American medical facilities.

It reminded me more of a high school cafeteria than it did a medical clinic.

There was a doorway in the back that every person who has ever read a travelogue of a trip to bring home a new family member form China has seen.  Outside that door were two rows of metal benches and that’s where Nancy and I parked our butts.  Many other people crammed their selves inside the waiting area inside. 

I did try to capture some pictures but it quickly was getting very crowded.  For you see, there are limited hours for this clinic on a  Saturday and there were groups of adoptive families with kids from many different provinces using many different agencies all converging in Guangzhou at the same time and were all here on Saturday.

In addition to all the adoptive families, there were also local families in the clinic getting their needs taken care of.

We got a bit lucky in the fact that we were sitting in the outside hallway because that is where Grace got to first to hand out the paperwork that we needed to fill out before any of the doctors would see us.

It was a pretty simple 4 question sheet and a signature, then we were told to visit 3 stations:  ENT, “Height, Weight, and Vision”, and “Surgery and Examination”.

As soon as we signed, the doctor in the ENT room must’ve seen that I had done so because she motioned us into her little room.  I’m not sure what she was doing, but she was making a lot of noise and I guess she was making sure that Kai’s reactions to the noises were as expected.  Then she looked into his ears and nose which he  hated a lot.  The way he was screaming, you would’ve thought they were poking him with needles.

After we finished up in that room, we noticed a long line for the “Height, Weight, and Vision” so we went to the ‘Surgery and Examination” room.  It didn’t take long for us to get in there and this time we had a male  doctor.

He asked us to remove Kai’s shoes and socks.  Then he proceeded to look Kai over.  If I didn’t know any better the way he was looking Kai over was like he was inspecting a head of cattle before buying it.  When he took his diaper off you could see the surprise on his face and he looked at us and exclaimed, “A boy!”.  After that, everything he looked at, he just kept saying, “A boy!”.  It was kind of funny.  He had me sign something and then it was off to the next room.

I can tell you one thing, this place was muggy and hot and it was technically considered the winter time in Guangzhou.  I couldn’t image how miserable it would be in this clinic in the height of the hot season.

When we got into the last and final room we knew there wasn’t any way they could test the vision of a 18 month old.  So they just weighed him (7.8kg) and measured his height (we didn’t see that measurement).  They had us sign something and then we had to find Grace.

I couldn’t even use the term “organize chaos” to describe this process.  It was strictly unadulterated chaos.  It was every family for itself and things were pretty courteous amongst families that knew each other but amongst strangers, the game was on.

Since we are a Hague Convention Family, Kai is going to need to have all his shots current before the US Government will allow him to have a visa.   So, Grace was facilitating with the vaccination registration people to make sure we were put in a spot in the line so that we got the shots and got the correct ones.

The crowd around the area to get the actual shots was immense but we were amazed at how quickly we got notice from Grace that we were next in line. 

None of the nurses giving the shots seemed to speak English.  They quickly prepped all the needles.  Based on the shot record printout I was given by Grace, it looked like Kai was going to get 4 injections.  I appear to have read it correctly because the nurses prepped 4 syringes.  One of the nurses handed me the 4 empty cardboard boxes for the vaccines but as luck would have it, they were all in Mandarin and, as you know, I don’t read Mandarin.

Kai was a trooper. They gave him a shot in each leg and each arm for the total of 4 that he was due.

After we were done, we were told to wait 20 minutes before leaving just in case he had any kind of negative reaction to any of the vaccines.

It turned out that Jason and Robyn had gotten done with their stations with their daughter but were in a predicament.  From what they were led to believe from their daughter’s Chinese caregivers she was allergic to a whole slew of medications and no one wanted to give her shots without knowing if it could harm her.  So, they were either going to have to give her shots anyway or leave. They were waiting to find out from Grace what to do.

Since we had to wait 20 minutes anyway we told them we would wait for them and we’d walk back to the hotel together.

Our 20 minutes passed and Robyn told us she was just waiting to speak to Grace but was under the impression that they were just going to make their daughter get the TB skin test (she was 2 which means new US CDC law requires that all immigrants be free from TB before entering the country) and then leave, but she needed verification on that.  She told us if we were tired of waiting to just leave and they would understand.

We waited a bit more and we decided to just head on.  As we were walking into the main lobby we saw that Robyn was talking to Grace and we decided to wait a bit more to see what she had to say.  It turns out that since they had to come back on Monday to get their daughter’s skin test read, the could just get the shots done then if it turns out it was necessary because allergies were not standing in the way.

As I mentioned earlier, there was a ton of construction going on.  This, unfortunately, had the affect of masking all the landmarks.  Everything looked the same with all the construction walls and scaffolding.

Fortunately, Jason remembered something that told him that we need to turn and got us going in the right direction back to the hotel.

At least, now, it wasn’t raining anymore.

It really seemed like it took less time to get back to the hotel than it did to get to the clinic. It may have been due to the fact that only 4 adults and 2 kids were going back when 13 families were in the group originally heading over.

Our next event for the day was at Grace and Maggie’s room at 3PM to fill out our consulate appointment paperwork.  It was something like 11AM now and it was definitely nap time.

We were pretty impressed in how quickly Kai bounced back from 4 injections.  He was back to his normal self pretty much by the time we sat down with Robyn and Jason waiting for our 20 minutes to end.  So, the trip back to the hotel wasn’t one that entailed a screaming child.

When we got back to the room, Nancy took some Benadryl and Kai was put in the crib.  Both were out for the count rather quickly.

While Kai and Nancy were napping, someone from the hotel brought by our Adoption Barbie.  Apparently, Mattel toys makes a special Barbie for the White Swan hotel that has her holding a Chinese Baby.  These things are highly coveted by the families who adopt from China.  Even though Kai is a boy and probably will never be interested in playing with Barbie's (but it wouldn’t matter if he did), it will go in the display case of other collectibles.

I spent the time watching a bit of TV and also working on blog posts and surfing the Internet.

Sometime around 2PM, I really noticed an all too familiar smell coming from Kai’s direction.

I tried to ignore it as much as I could. I knew that Kai was not going to have much joy in my attempting to go anywhere near him. 

But, he eventually woke up on his own and I was keeping him in his crib so I could keep working. But that odor was getting a bit too much.  So, I picked him up out of crib and put him on my bed to change him.  As soon as I popped open that diaper, I was like, “WHOA!”.  Wouldn't you know it, the first time I try to be brave, I get enough mortar in his diaper to mason the entire Great Wall of China.

So, I quickly grab a towel and put him on it.  I didn’t want to mess up the sheets on my bed.  Then I started trying to remove the diaper.  I should point out that Kai is not screaming or freaking out any more than he does with Nancy.  In fact, when I reacted the way I did with the discover inside his diaper, he laughed at me.

Now, Nancy has woken up as I’m trying to get this diaper situation resolved.

Now, the embarrassing part.  The stench was more than I could handle and I should point out that I have a rather diminished sense of smell.  I actually tossed my cookies while trying to change his diaper.  I’d like to blame it on being sick, but I pretty much did the same thing in June when my nephew Collin tossed his cookies while we were visiting them during our Disneyland trip for Nancy’s birthday.  Certain smells just trigger my gag reflex.

Nancy was going to jump in and “do it” for me.  I refused to let her.  I told her I was going to finish it.  I had Kai’s legs up in the air holding his two ankles with one hand while scrubbing him clean with baby wipes with the other.  This was a 5 wipe job and then it came to the part, even as a boy, I didn’t know what to do with…..the uncircumcised penis.  Nancy had warned me earlier that we had to clean it and I was trying to figure out how to get that darn skin out of the way so I could make sure no poop got where it wasn’t supposed to.  That’s when Nancy got frustrated and pushed me aside and was going to do it herself. 

Fortunately for my ego, she wasn’t able to manage it any easier but she did get it to happen.  Then we couldn’t get it all to snap back to the way it was before we started.  Now Kai was really screaming.  You’d think we were poking him with red hot irons.  This boy definitely doesn’t like anyone touching his boy parts. 

We got a bit snippy at each other.  I always view Nancy as being the super nurse who knows everything and kept asking her what is going on and she didn’t know and we were both kind of freaking out because we didn’t know if we broke him.  I finally said, let’s just put his diaper back on him and if he’s still having problems on the next diaper change we’ll have to start seeking out answers from other parents of boys.

The next challenge was trying to find a stupid empty plastic Wal-Mart bag to toss all that stinky toxic waste into.

Since one whole large suitcase was full of dirty clothes and the rest were still pretty much packed we had no idea where anything was.  Eventually, Nancy found a bag and I tied everything tightly inside and put in the bathroom trash.

After I came out of the trash, I very proudly pointed out to Nancy that:

• I attempted the diaper change unsolicited
• I had everything under control until the end
• If Kai had been circumcised, I would’ve had the diaper on him without needing any help.

She gave me that victory :)

She did say that she wasn’t going to sit there and watch me get physically sick while changing diapers.  I told her that my mom didn’t do throw up and poppy diapers so it probably runs in the family but I will do it even if it means I drop a couple pant sizes due to stench induced bulimia.

After we got him situated, it was time for me to go to Grace and Maggie’s room to get the US Consulate paperwork situated.

There were only 4 Hague-convention families so it should go quickly.  I was running a bit late but when I showed up they hadn’t started yet.

I sat down on one of the beds and Grace handed me a copy of Kai’s passport and some other information that I’d need to finish the paperwork.  Plus, she gave me the application form that we’d be filling out.

I did notice that Jason or Robyn weren’t there and I was going to call them because I was worried they fell asleep or something but before I could get to the phone, Grace had started the process and I didn’t want to miss a step.

It was great because they told us exactly how to fill out the forms.  That was really helpful because nothing about any form provided by the US Government has been intuitive.

What made me laugh was that we had this huge checklist of documents that we needed to bring and so far we’ve only referenced a few of them and I have no idea what the rest are for.  I guess they are here in case we have any issues arise at the Consulate’s Office about our application for a visa.

Robyn did arrive halfway through the instruction.  After I had all my paperwork done (and I needed a lot of help figuring out what in the heck I had and needed), I saw that Robyn was really frustrated.  Apparently, all their paperwork was in a very organized format but due to the chaos at the clinic and their desperate search for the paperwork from their daughter’s caregivers listing her allergies, all her paperwork was now out of order.

So, I sat down with her and took half her stack and helped her look for the forms she needed to finish her paperwork.  Then, I told her what information came from what form and went where on the application.

I headed back to the room and Nancy was ready to track down a place to get some laundry done.  She had tasked me with asking Grace the name of a place to get laundry done outside the hotel since the hotel’s rates were so high.  She also wanted to know how the process worked.

Grace had given me the name of 3 places she’d recommend and told me that if you dropped off in the morning, you got it back that night.  If you dropped off in the afternoon, you got it back the next day.

Nancy had all the laundry in plastic bags and ready to go.  We threw Kai into the carrier and away we went.  She wanted to try Michael’s Place because she swore she had heard the name mentioned by friends either online or through her Freshwater Ladies (her group of friends back home that all have adopted from China and they meet at Panera every Tuesday to just discuss things that are going on)

We got to meet Michael and he was very friendly.  He told us to come back tomorrow and our laundry would be ready.  It sure was a relief to have that taken care of.  We were quickly running out of clean clothes and I’ve been wearing some items multiple days in a row to make sure I didn’t run out of clothes.

After we dropped off the laundry, we decided to do some window shopping.  I had to remind Nancy that you just look and show no interest and not to linger.

Well, it is a lot harder than it sounds on paper.  The shop owners really work for their money.  They talk to you, want to hear your story and try to find something that they can shove into your hands and get you to buy.

At one store, Nancy’s Achilles heel was found and that was something called “squeaky shoes”.  She even said she’d buy them  without asking the price.  I had to ask for her.  I told her this wasn’t the States and prices weren’t fixed and by saying you’ll buy before prices was discussed you pretty much allowed her to set any price she wanted.  Fortunately, the shop keeper was kind and set a reasonable price of 45RMB (about US$6.60).  I did try a ploy and opened my wallet and claimed I didn’t have any money.  But she didn’t try to hard sell only told me she’d hold them for us.

In reality, there is a big counterfeiting problem here and we were told to be wary of where we spend large bills where larger bills would come back (i.e. give a 100 with a 50 being part of the change back).  So, I needed to split a 100 somewhere safe.  We were planning on going to 7-Eleven anyway to get water so that would be where.

7-Eleven was a couple doors down so we eventually made our way  there after looking in all the shops between.  In one of the shops, there was a very dirty dog.  Kai seemed to not show any fear and an interest in getting closer to the dog.  So we hope that means he’ll accept Belle and Coco.

7-Eleven was a tiny little shop and unfortunately,didn’t sell water by the case.  It really is hard to stay hydrated when you only get 2 small bottles of water for free each day and the tap water is not potable.  You have to boil water and then it takes forever to cool off.  Plus, I still am wary of drinking boiled water.

So, we grabbed to 1.5litre bottles and some goldfish crackers and made our way back to the shop to pick up the shoes.

After paying our 45RMB we made our way back to the hotel and parked our buts for awhile.

Eventually, Nancy got hungry for dinner (we didn’t eat lunch) and I asked if we should see what Robyn and Jason were doing.  I walked down to the room but they had the “Do not Disturb” sign on the door so I didn’t knock.

I went back to the room and notified Nancy so we decided to head out.  Just as we were leaving, the phone rang.  I answered and it was Jason.  He was asking about 7-Eleven and wanted to know if we needed anything.  I told him we just got back from there and we were going to get some food from Lucy’s and it we’ll pass right by 7-Eleven on our way and we could just show them.

They were interested in food, so we decided to all go to Lucy’s together.

The walk to Lucy’s wasn’t too bad.  We did get stopped a couple times by shopkeepers with flyers. With all the construction, many of the stores are almost hidden by all the tarps, scaffolding and debris.  They really have to draw attention to themselves to get us to their stores.

When we walked into Lucy’s you could quickly tell that they were trying to look like an American restaurant.  They had lots of US license plates and posters from US movies on the walls.  In fact, I saw a vanity plate for Walt Disney World on the wall behind the table they sat us at.

They also made it clear you don’t tip the wait people and they don’t accept US$100 or HK$1000 bills (probably due to the counterfeiting problem I mentioned earlier).

There were other families from our group there already, plus families who went there for lunch recommended it.

The service was something to be desired though.  It took forever to get someone to take our order and then a longer time to get the food to us and even longer to get a bill.  The food was really good though.

All the adults got the “Great American Burger” with cheese and Kai  got chicken congee and Ying had a steamed vegetable plate.

We scarfed down our food and drinks and paid our bill as soon as we could get it brought to us.  What shocked was that all our food came to 108RMB (~US$16) for all that food.

As we walked back to the hotel, We parted ways at the 7-Eleven as Robyn and Jason needed to make a quick run for snacks and stuff and we needed to get Kai a bath.  Especially since he decided to spit up a bit of his dinner.  We are now learning that Kai will eat more than his stomach can hold.  So, we are going to have to stop him a bit sooner.

When we got back to the room we wasted no time getting him  bathed and Nancy rocked him to sleep with his nightly bottle.  Shortly after he was in the crib, Nancy was out too.

I stayed up a lot later working on 2 blog posts to get caught up to Friday.  While I worked on the posts, Kai would frequently wake up crying and then quickly fall back to sleep.  I would go over to his crib and make sure all was fine because we do need to worry about aspiration.  One time he didn’t got back to sleep and it was because  his arm had gotten caught in the crib bumper and he couldn’t roll over. 

Another time I couldn’t figure out what was wrong.  He had his bottle, he wasn’t stuck, he wasn’t cold and he wasn’t hot.  Well, I picked him up and stroked the back of his head (one of my mother-in-law’s friends was an expat in China and fostered kids and told her to pass onto us that Chinese console their kids by stoking the back of their heads).  Eventually, he stopped crying and I laid him back in his crib.

I did all this without waking Nancy.  Around 1AM I got the final post done and went to bed.  The next day was a half-day touring day and it sounded like it was going to be fun.

Until Tomorrow…..

Journey to Kai – Day 09 (Travel to Guangzhou)

I’m actually writing this late on Saturday night and into Sunday.  So, the details may be a bit fuzzy.

As I said in the previous day’s post, we may have gone to bed at 9PM, but the fun only began.  Both Nancy and I were up and down all night.  Even though we were taking Tylenol, we could tell our fevers were getting worse.  I really was getting worried that we weren’t going to be able to get out of the airport.  China is really vigilant about foreigners and fevers.  I was sure there would be temperature scanners at the airport and we’d get busted.

Nancy was sure that the Tylenol would do the trick.  It’s a long standing method to bypass the temperature checks if you time it correctly.  So we were taking it every 6 hours on the dot.

Well, sometime in the middle of the night I became unbearably hot.  The kind of hot where you just want to rip off all your clothes and the sheets.  Then, it just ended.  I wasn’t freezing cold that was common with the shifts in temperature when you are running a fever, but more of a comfortable feeling.  I told Nancy I think I just busted my fever.  She felt hers busted sometime recently too.  For the record, she never recorded a fever on the thermometer and refused to do frequent checks of it.

Kai pretty much slept through the night, but he does cry in his sleep a couple times but that is pretty tolerable considering how bad others are having it even with their own bio-children.

6AM came freakishly early.  We did fire up the laptop to see if Nancy’s dad was on Skype.  It was still Thanksgiving in the United States and she wanted to get a call in while her oldest sister and her brother were still at her dad’s house for Thanksgiving with their respective families.

We had a really difficult time getting a video connection today and that hasn’t been the case prior.  My assumption, based on the time in the US was that many people were using Skype as a means to have family calls for free without using long distance charges.

We eventually connected and Nancy and Kai got to talk to the various cousins and siblings.  I was pretty much horizontal on the bed.

I was still wicked nauseous and had no desire to eat.  Nancy told me to just stay in the room but I could tell that she really needed me to help her with Kai so I went anyway, but I must admit I wasn’t the most pleasant camper in the troop.  I really did try to not let my bad mood and sickness spill over, but with Nancy being sick too, we were just one giant keg of nitroglycerin sitting on the San Andreas Fault line.

At breakfast, Kai was pretty good about eating.  I on the other hand ate nothing.  Nancy nibbled and she had to because even if she’s sick, Kylee has to eat and that can be hard when you are tossing your cookies (for the record, Nancy still has yet to throw up and I think she’s only done so once in our entire marriage).

At breakfast we found out there were several other families that have been bitten by some kind of bug and one mother was having almost the same exact symptoms as I was.  I was glad I wasn’t alone which means that several of us must’ve gotten into the same thing and got us sick.

After breakfast we went back to the room and Nancy did some more packing.  I try to help packing, but I learned a long time ago, that I just get in the way.  I did get my laptop packed up and had it ready to go.

Kai was being really rambunctious so we decided to take him up the playroom.  That trip didn’t last long.  Nancy put him in the ball pit but he wasn’t having anything to do with that.  Then she put him on the floor and he just sort of sat there and didn’t want to do anything.  So, we went back to the room.

We did get a call from Yisha to go to her room to pick up Kai’s passport.  When we got there, once again, all the families were there.  In addition to Kai’s passport, we got his immunization records and is “searching ad”.  This is an ad put in the local paper with the child’s picture and description.  It is part of the process that must be followed to track down the child’s family before they are officially listed as abandoned.  Unfortunately, the copy of Kai’s ad is a really bad one.  You can make out the Chinese characters, but not his picture.  Also while I was there I paid our new gas tax fee of 100RMB (roughly US$14.81)

Some people had some really nice official immunization shot record booklets, but I just had a simple computer printout.

I ran into Jason and Robyn down there and told them how crappy we were feeling.  They told us that they were heading to the playroom and offered to take Kai and watch him for us so we could get some rest.  I told them that he didn’t want to be there the first time we took him so I doubt he’d be a very willing participant.

When I got back to the room, I told Nancy about Jason and Robyn’s offer and she was appreciative but said I made the right decision.

We didn’t need to have our luggage out for the bellmen until 2:20PM and it was around 11AM.  Kai was getting tired so we put him in the crib and then we laid down.  I set the alarm for 1PM.  That would give us a little over an hour to pack before we needed to have the luggage out for them to collect.

Those 2 hours went very quickly, but it was very productive.  I felt a bit more refreshed after I woke up.  The fact that I took a nap speaks volumes since I never take naps.

Nancy was a highly efficient packing machine at this point.  She had the bags packed and ready for collection way before the 2:20PM deadline.  I was insistent that Nancy pack my winter coat because I didn’t want to deal with it on this trip. I felt that I’d prefer to be a bit uncomfortable for a short time than uncomfortable for a long time having to haul that jacket around when I didn’t need it anymore.  Nancy and Kai were bundled up.

At 2PM I went downstairs and settled up the room bill.  We had put a few meals onto the room instead of paying cash.  I put it on our Credit Union Visa because we would only get a 1% foreign currency exchange fee on that card.  According to the receipt we had only racked up about US$80 in meal charges on the room which wasn’t too bad.  One of the more expensive was room service (of course).

I went back to the room and we just waited for the time to put the bags out.

We didn’t need to be at the lobby until 3PM, but I didn’t want to go down until the bags had been collected.  I just so happened to poke my head out into the hallway when the bellman was collecting our bags, so I tipped him while he was there.

Then, we went to the lobby.  There was a lot of standing around and chit chat going on.  As usual, my sciatica was flaring up fast.  It’s worse on hard, unpadded surfaces like concrete, asphalt and marble.  I have found that if I crouch down and put all my weight on my toes, the pain goes away. I’ve been doing this a lot on this trip and I really don’t care what people think of me doing it.

People were getting their pictures taken with Yisha in front of the giant, rather pathetic Christmas tree in the lobby (they had an actual real Evergreen which I assumed based on it’s thread bareness was local).

We asked one of the dads to take our picture. He asked me to hand over the huge camera and was surprised when I gave him my little point & shoot.  I informed him that the big camera has to be specially packed into the rolling bag so it’s staying put until we get to Guangzhou.

I was so glad when the bus rolled up to allow us to get on.  They were using a separate van for the rolling carry-ons so I took those bags to the van so they could be loaded. I waited until I saw them get loaded before I went to board the bus.  Nancy was already there with Kai.

The bus ride was claustrophobic like all of them have been except I now have more lap baggage being that I have my big electronics backpack and Nancy’s backpack which is now serving as Kai’s diaper bag.

Once again, I was cranky and Nancy was having none of it.  In all honesty, I’m a lot like a dog when it gets sick.  I want to curl up somewhere be left alone and if not left alone, I bite.  I’ve always been this way.  Before Kai, I’ve always been able to recuperate this way, I’m having a hard time with the idea that I’m no longer allowed to take care of myself first if that means that Kai will be neglected.  I’m putting him first, just having a hard time with it.

When we got to the airport, Yisha was insistent that the moms and kids go into the airport where it was warm and that the dads stay and bring the luggage in.

When we were all in, then the dads were told to line up at the group check in counter.  I must say that compared to the Beijing check in, this was much more efficient.  Yisha was at the counter with everyone’s passports and their boarding passes.  When you walked up to the counter, she pulled your stuff out and worked with the gate agent to get you processed.  They stapled the baggage claim tickets to the dad’s boarding pass and you went and waited with the others until all the dads were done. We had a 20kg limit per adult plus an additional 10kg for Kai.  Our bags came in at 11kg and 19 kg.  So we were looking good.  Even if we went over, they were combining all the weight allowances for the whole group and adding all the actual weights to determine if we needed to pay fines. From what we were told, using this method, they’ve never had an overage fee assessed.

The next step was security.  This is when we said goodbye to Rita and Yisha.  Unlike in the US where you see a person who checks your boarding pass and then you enter a long line for x-ray and metal detector, here they used the person who checked your boarding pass as a traffic cop.  It appeared as if they were only letting one family through at a time. This really helped alleviate the pressure that one feels to get through security.

Based on what happened in Beijing, I decided to remove a few more items from my bag to hopefully get it through the first time and I was successful.  I repacked my bag on the other side and was able to rejoin Nancy without causing her any alarm about my safety…hehe.

We had plenty of time to get to our gate this time and Nancy sat down and asked me to locate some water. Next to the bathrooms was actually a boiled water room.  So, I went back and got one of Kai’s bottles and filled it up with the boiling water.  Unfortunately, Kai isn’t accustomed to drinking formula at such lava-like temperatures like other babies in China, so I was going to have to wait for it to cool down and we had no idea how long that was going to take.  Fortunately, another family had water and gave us the 4 oz we needed to make Kai a bottle.  In thanks, we gave them one of our Enfamil packets since their formula all was in their checked luggage.

Our flight didn’t board on time and nothing about the boarding announcements was in English so we had no idea why.  But, we got in line when we noticed everyone else doing so.

When we were about to board the plane a stewardess in very broken English said us Americans have too much luggage and must stand aside.  They then let all the Chinese patrons board.  We, of course, observed that they weren’t boarding with any less luggage than we were.  In fact, some were boarding with more. 

After everyone else was allowed to board, we were.  As we were afraid, we were then told there was no overhead storage and we were going to have to gate check our bags.  I was a bit nervous because my very expensive camera was in one of those bags and I wasn’t allowed to get it out and carry it onto the plane.  At least it was going to be delivered to me on the gang plank when we got to Guangzhou.

We found our seats and sat down…or at least attempted to do so.  I’ve never been on a plane so small.  They said this was a 737-300 but we could barely fit into our seats.  I’m 5’3” tall and my knees were cracking on the seat in front of me.  I could barely get my backpack down between the crack where my legs were supposed to go so I could stow it under the seat in front of me.  To top it off, the seats were very narrow.  Now, I have an idea what it must fee like for a normal sized person on an US domestic carrier.  I could only image how much pain they were in on this flight.

We were really worried about how Kai was going to do on his first flight.  Well, he did remarkably well.  With the cramped quarters it was impossible for Nancy to eat.  I tried my best to help her by feeding her (since I could put my tray table down), but it was almost impossible to do.

To top it off, Nancy was sure Kai had a soiled diaper, but they were constantly bringing the carts up and down the aisle so she couldn’t get out.  I was also, at this point holding all the jackets and Kai’s socks (he was wearing his snow suit so had no shoes on).  Combine that with the zero leg clearance, I was miserable.

Nancy finally got a break in the action and made her way to the  back of the plane where a line had already developed that looked like it consisted of every family in our group.

After what seemed like an eternity, Nancy came back to inform me that his diaper was clean and dry.  So, we just say back and waited for the descent to begin.

It finally came, but as we were descending, I dropped Kai’s container of Cheerios and managed to lose one of his socks.  The Cheerios went between the legs of the gentlemen to my left who made no effort to help me even though he watched it pop out of my hands and fly into his personal space.

I must say, I’ve never been the biggest fan of kids on planes but I have always tried to help the parents when I could and now I have a better appreciation for what they’ve gone through.  I am just glad that Kai was not a screamer.  But, this was only his first flight.  In fact, he spent most of the flight flirting with the girls two rows back and all the stewardesses.

The landing came none too soon.  As with what seems to be common in Chinese culture, everyone pops up and gathers their stuff and starts moving toward the doors before we’ve even come to a full and complete stop.  So, here we were in row 8 and weren’t even going to be able to get out until the entire plane had disembarked.  To top it off, I still had to find my Cheerios and the missing sock. 

At least, once the lights came on, I caught the glimpse of what might’ve been the Cheerios and was able to dig it out from under the seat in front of the guy in front of me, without any help from him.  Despite the fact, that at one point, I practically had my head in his lap.

The sock, I found with a stroke of luck.  It was actually under my seat and I had to perform some serious contortionist moves to get it off the floor.

Well, we eventually made it off the plane and were waiting for our gate checked bags when we were told they would be sent to baggage claim.  Well, I could only hope that all that padding Nancy put around my camera with the clothes protected it.

We made our way to baggage claim and followed the masses.  It was pretty late in Guangzhou (some time past 9PM) so there weren’t too many flights arriving.

Nancy was tired and sore so she sat in some of the chairs to the side, while I tried to muscle my way in to the conveyor belt.

One thing that always bothered me is that an entire family will try and stand there and wait for the bags.  Please, have one representative there or at least 2 (one on each side of the loop) and have all the others wait in a clear and safe distance.  It does no good to the general well being of the mass as a whole to have a kid standing there to just holler out when they see the bag.

The odd thing was that our checked bags came out before our gate checked, but all 4 bags did arrive.

I was going to manhandle all four rolling bags to the bus, because I did it before and I am just good like that, but I guess, with everything else that has happened all day and with us both being easily irritable, Nancy insisted I use a luggage trolley.  Apparently, they are free here and free is my kind of price.

I have to admit that it was a heck of a lot easier to move the luggage this way.

We made our way to our CCAI reps, Grace and Maggie, were taking roll call when we arrived.  After everyone was accounted for, we made our way to the bus.  One nice thing is that one of the families that was with us in Beijing, who didn’t go to Zhengzhou was rejoining us here.

The first thing we noticed after leaving the baggage claim area was how warm it was in Guangzhou.  We left Zhengzhou needing winter coats and here it was balmy enough for shorts and a t-shirt.

We finally made it to the bus and apparently half of our group was going to the White Swan (the most common hotel for adoptive families) and the other half the Victory (often chosen by parents who this isn’t their first adoption because it’s cheaper).  They had us group our luggage by which hotel we were going to.

Nancy and Kai were already on the bus and Nancy was doing her best to keep Kai awake.  We knew if he fell asleep on the bus there would be no getting him back to sleep without help from Benadryl.

Once on the bus, we were introduced to our guides and given the high-level itinerary for the week.  We were also informed that each night they’d provide us a more detailed itinerary for the next day with the weather report and what we need to bring to each appointment.

They also passed out some bottled water.  Bottled water is our lifeblood since none of the tap water is potable and unless it’s bottled you cannot drink it.  You also must not drink water out of any bottle that has had the seal broken when you receive it because it’s not unheard of where bottles have been refilled from a tap and then resold.

The ride to the hotel was pretty scenic.  The quality of the high rise apartments seemed to be a notch higher than what we were used to seeing in Zhengzhou.

When we got to the White Swan all families were told to get off the bus.  Apparently, the Victory wasn’t equipped for such large busses so they were going to have to move all of them to a smaller van to get them to their hotel.

We were also told that all our bags including our carry ons will be brought to our rooms and to just make our way to the lobby to check-in.

When I got to the lobby, Nancy and Kai were already in there sitting on the couches trying to stay away.  I got in line and waited for my turn. 

When I got to the front of the line, our guide Grace was facilitating by making sure there was no communication problems between the person checking us in and us because of language problems.  I secured the room with my credit union visa and got our room keys.  I grabbed Nancy and we went to the room.

It now was somewhere around 10:30-11:00PM.  Nancy immediately put Kai in the crib and she was starting to crash out herself but we still didn’t have our luggage.

I kept looking in the hallway for our luggage and it just never seemed to come.  Eventually I started wandering the hall to see if anyone else had gotten their yet. It appears that most of the families were in the same boat.  Finally, one of the other dads went looking for it and came back to report that it was in the service elevator lobby. 

I went there to tell the bellhop which bags were mine and he hauled them to my room where I tipped him.

I brought the bags into the room where Nancy quickly unpacked them so we could find clean clothes.  We were desperately going to need to get clothes cleaned tomorrow.

I fired up the laptop, paid my 300RMB (~US$44) for a 7 day window of service (the more days you bought the cheaper the per day cost) and sent out an e-mail letting everyone know we had made it to Guangzhou alright.

Up to this point, I am 2 days behind on my trip reports and honestly, I was too sick to care.  I joked that I wanted to just throw up on the blog, “Sick and cannot remember what I did” and leave it at that.  But, ultimately this is a journal for Kai’s future reference and I knew it would get done eventually.

Nancy and Kai were now fast asleep and I was not far behind them.  One of the nice things is that we now have air conditioning and can be comfortable.

Well, after reading these last two posts, I guess I may have given the impression that Nancy and I may be fighting a lot and that isn’t the case.  We have both been sick and during tense moments or moments of stress, we tend to snipe at each other a bit, but a majority of the time, despite the illness, we have been having a good time getting to know our son.  I felt that people who sugar coat the trip reports don’t really do a service to those people who read these wanting to know how the trips are.  This isn’t a vacation ya’ll this is real life and in our case, the start of parenthood in a foreign country with nothing familiar around us and to top it off sick.  I’d be hard pressed to find any well adjusted couple not be getting a bit agitated with each other at this point and if they claim they are, I’d say they were lying or needing to have their names submitted for sainthood.

Well, tomorrow is one of the day’s we’ve been dreading….the infamous physical examination and inoculation day….oh joy

Journey to Kai – Day 08 (Thanksgiving)

I’m going to have to apologize in advance because I’m writing this on Saturday (3 days after the event) so the details might be a bit fuzzy and lacking.  You’ll see why later in the post why it took 3 days to get it onto “paper”

After another late night getting the blog posts current, I finally went to bed around 1AM. 

We woke up around 6AM (this is a growing trend for us as we figure out how long it takes to get Kai up and ready to go).  We decided to see if anyone was on Skype.  We knew it was early enough for Nancy’s dad to be up so we sent him a text via Google Voice to tell him to jump on Skype.  While we waited for him to show up, we talked to my mom on Skype while we waited for Nancy’s dad to jump on.

We were able to have a nice talk with my mom before that happened and the we switched to talking to Nancy’s dad.  Up to this point, Nancy’s dad was the only family member on Skype that hasn’t had an opportunity to see Kai yet.  So, we wanted to make a point to try and make that happen today.

After getting our conversations in, we made our way down to breakfast.  We were touring the Henan Museum.  Yisha told us that this museum was the 3rd largest in China and it had just recently undergone a renovation and reopened on November 18th.

We were able to secure a high chair at breakfast again (only a few available in the restaurant) and I did my part by being the primary person to feed Kai.  We are hoping that by my continual assumption of this role will eventually help Kai realize that I’m someone he can trust.

I didn’t get to eat much again.  I’m finding that when you are on a timetable, and your child can only take very tiny portions (just a fraction of the surface of an infant-sized spoon) you are the one that doesn’t get to eat.

After finishing breakfast, we went back to the room to gather our belongings so that we can go to the Museum.  This is always fun now because you always seem to forget something for the child.

We were supposed to meet in the lobby around 9AM and once again we were just cutting it close.

Today, the temperature took a dive and it was much colder than the previous days.  So, the 5 foot walk from the hotel lobby and the bus, was a bit nippy.  Not to mention the bus temperature wasn’t up to the typical Chinese preference of sweltering.

As has been happening lately, I’ve felt very claustrophobic on the busses.  With Kai not wanting to be held by anyone but Nancy that means that the only role I can fill is that of pack mule.  I don’t use that term in a derogatory way it’s just the truth.  With Nancy being pregnant and carrying Kai with the ERGObaby carrier, she just cannot carry anything else, so I do. 

So, when I’m sitting in those tiny seats on the Chinese tour busses, I’m holding:  my shoulder bag with my camera supplied (and extra storage for Kai’s stuff), Kai’s diaper bag (aka Nancy’s backpack), and my Nikon D300.  It really becomes hard to move and to top it off, Nancy and I crammed into those seats.  I still don’t know how the families with more average sized adults are coping.  With my being 5’3”, I’m quite a bit smaller than average.

It wasn’t long after we pulled away from the hotel, my stomach was starting to not feel so good.  I mentioned something to Nancy and she said she was feeling the same way.

By the time we got to the museum, we were both ready to throw up.  It felt like car sickness but I’ve been on enough of these busses to know that it couldn’t be car sickness or I’d have been suffering the whole time.

Our first inclination was to blame the McDonald’s we had the previous day.

As time passed we quickly got exponentially worse.  By the time we actually got into the Museum, we were ready to die.

We were told that we were going to be at the museum for 2 hours and that just seemed like torture and there was no real easy way for us to get back to the hotel.

We did have to go through security to enter the museum.  That entailed running our bags through an x-ray machine and us walking through a metal detector. 

The museum was laid out with numbered rooms with each increasing number representing a different dynasty of Chinese history.

I must say that Chinese history and archaeology is extremely fascinating.  What is really cool is to see an artifact and see it dated back something like 8000 years way deep into the BC.  Sometimes, I’m amazed at how advanced their art, society and infrastructure was for such an ancient time period.

About 30 minutes after arriving at the museum, the nausea was really getting to Nancy so she we went to the restroom so that she could try and throw up.  She wasn’t in there very long when she came out and said that there weren’t any western toilets in the bathroom and she just couldn’t stare at that hole in the ground any longer and try to think about throwing up.

The whole time she was in there, Kai was sitting in my lap and wasn’t being really fussy.

We also knew that Kai possibly had a messy diaper because he was exceptionally fussy and we heard some rumbling noises on our way to the restroom.

Nancy had informed me there wasn’t anywhere in the ladies restroom to change Kai because there weren’t any counters (the sinks for the bathrooms are on the outside of the restroom and shared between the men and women) and the floor was sopping wet (the floors in the bathrooms are always wet).

So, we decided to go all commando on the situation and drop his trousers and change his diaper right there on the bench near the bathroom.

That is when we found out the extent of the damage.  Kai had his  first blowout since coming into our family.  It was up his back and smelled to high heaven.  He was wearing a Chinese diaper which don’t seem to go as high up the waist as diapers acquired in America do.

Oh, it was messy and Nancy was having to change the diaper in full view of the bathroom going public.  We were quickly getting an audience of mostly older Chinese.  To add insult to injury, we didn’t bring a second set of clothes for the little guy, so even though we were able to change his diaper, we were going to have to put his clothes back on that has some mess on it.

As I was coming back to Nancy after locating a place to toss all that toxic waste, Nancy told me, “And that is why I told you to bring more than one pair of pants”.  I was like, “What?” and she told me to look down.  Well, you see, when I was holding Kai in my lap while Nancy was in the bathroom, all of Kai’s “overflow” was seeping into the crotch and inner thigh of my pants.  So, now I looked like I had a bout of incontinence and had a huge stinky wet spot on my pants.

Now mind you, both Nancy and I were now feeling violently ill and now I know why they use that term violently, because you want to kill anyone around you and when spouses are both that way at the same time, lookout a missing button on your shirt could start a nuclear melt down.

Fortunately, our altercations were mainly snide remarks, dirty looks, and a few statements with raised voices and things weren’t helped by the fact that Kai wouldn’t let me touch him to help so I get to stand around feeling useless (I wouldn’t know what to do even if he would let me).

Once we got him in a new diaper, Nancy put him back in the ERGObaby carrier because she didn’t want people to see him with his giant poop stain on his back.

To top things off on this fabulous day was that both Nancy and I suffer from sciatica and Kai won’t let me carry him in the baby carrier so Nancy has to do it and his weight, plus Kylee’s weight really puts pressure on her back that doesn’t ever get relief. My sciatica is so bad that if I stand still for more than a few seconds, I have a pain that is so painful that it brings me to tears.  At home, our backs seems to get reset when we sleep, but here in China, they like to fill their mattresses with bricks and our backs just pick up the pain where they left off the previous day and build on it.  So, my first steps out of bed in the morning are tear inducing and so are Nancy’s.

One of the funny things that was going on in the museum was that random people were coming up to people from our group and asking to have their picture taken with them.  I had multiple people do this with me.  The funniest was when this 20-something girl ran up all giddy, grabbed my arm like it was a prom photo and smiled brightly as her boyfriend (I didn’t see a ring) took our picture.

There was one family in our group that had 3 older boys and I swear by the time we were done at the museum several queues had formed of people waiting to have their picture taken with them.  It was like a Character Meet-and-Greet at a Disney theme park.

Needless to say, we were rather excited when it was time to leave the museum.  All we wanted to do was go back to the room and puke and pass out.  But, despite all the misery we really did enjoy the museum and highly recommend anyone going to the Zhengzhou region, to stop by and visit the museum.  We are just upset that we couldn’t have enjoyed it more because it was really impressive.

The ride back to the hotel was a really long one and we were so agitated that we were just sniping at each other the whole way.  I know that I was probably the biggest instigator because I don’t do sick well and I rarely get sick and when I do, I’m usually really miserable.

On the way back to the hotel we were informed that Mama Mia was going to be holding a Thanksgiving Buffet and that you had to get reservations.  Most people were going to be there at either 5:30PM or 6:00PM.

Jason and Robyn wanted to know when we were going but we couldn’t tell them.  We were informed at the museum that there was an extra step we had to take in order to secure Kai’s Chinese Passport.  This was due to the fact that our trip was so last minute they didn’t have time to do his “interview”.  So, we were going to have to physically take him to a passport office so they could see him before they would release the passport.  We knew that Yisha was going to call us some time around 2PM to tell us when and where we needed to be. 

So, I told Jason that I’d have to get back to him on dinner.

When our bus got back to the hotel we didn’t waste any time getting back to the room.

The unfortunate thing for us was that Kai slept on the bus ride home.  That was unfortunate because it meant he wouldn’t go back to sleep once we got back to the room.  We so desperately needed him to get back to sleep so we could take a nap.

As I was lounging around on the bed hoping I’d feel better, I eventually got so nauseous I ended up deciding to just get it over with and made myself get sick in the bathroom.  I know it’s not pleasant but it often makes my stomach feel better if I just get it over with.  I was sure I had gotten some bad food (now I was pretty sure it was at breakfast).

It did indeed make me feel a lot better.  I ended up deciding to take a shower because I just felt so bad, I thought a shower might help refresh me.  That, unfortunately, was not a good idea either.  I was feeling better before the shower then after the shower I felt worse than before.

2PM came and went and we heard nothing about what to do in regards to Kai’s passport.  So, I went to Jason’s room and we decided to go get our reservations.  It turns out that the Thanksgiving buffet must’ve been popular for more than just the hotel guests because we were told that the reservations were almost filled up.  We were able to secure a table for 6PM.

I went back to our room and just as I was fighting sleep we got a call from Rita (Yisha’s assistant) asking us to meet her in the lobby with Kai.

We grabbed Kai and headed downstairs.  Rita was there already waiting for us.  She was trying to tell us we weren’t dressed well enough.  We had thought that we would be driving to where we needed to go, but apparently, it’s in walking distance.  So, we had to run back upstairs to get our winter coats and get some warmer clothes for Kai.

Once we were properly attired we headed on our way.  Apparently, the place we were going was near the park we were at the previous day.

It was cold outside, really cold.  To top it off, Nancy couldn’t carry him the entire way because we didn’t bring the carrier. 

So, we decided it was just too important for Nancy’s comfort for me to take him for a bit and just deal with the screaming.  Well, he ended up screaming for a bit, but between the attention from Rita and his being able to see Nancy, he calmed down rather quickly.

But, in my effort to pay attention to Kai and avoid getting hit by bicycles and mopeds I didn’t notice a giant concrete pylon in my way and cracked my knee into it pretty hard.  I managed to keep going without dropping Kai but it sure hurt like crazy.

We finally got to the passport office where we sat down while some paperwork was passed to the officers.  A gentleman came up to us, said in English, “If you have a happy life, he will have a happy life” and gave us Kai’s passport.

We had to give Rita Kai’s passport because it was needed to finalize the notarizations we initiated yesterday.

We walked our way back to the hotel and Rita went back to the notarization office to drop off Kai’s passport.

We went back to the room and tried to settle in.  Fully clothed, neither of us could get warm.  I even climbed under the covers with all my clothes on and was still shivering.  I knew this was a bad sign, so I got out the thermometer….sure enough I was running a fever.  I knew enough to know that I didn’t have the flu, but China freaks out with foreigners with a temperature.  So, I had these waves of panic about us getting quarantined and not able to leave Zhengzhou.

We both started popping Tylenol and I started my Z-Pak and Nancy started her antibiotics.

At this point we were still waiting for a phone call from Yisha to tell us when we could come and review the notarized documents. She originally stated that it would be around 4, but that came and went.

Around 4:30, we got the call and I went to her room to review the documents.  I thought it was going to be one family at a time, but it was all of us.  The room was hot and it just made it harder for me to concentrate because I was feeling so yucky.

I reviewed the documents as I was asked, then paid my money for the use of the bus while we were in Zhengzhou.  We were also informed that China had instituted a new fuel tax and it would impact our flight the next day.  So we were told that we’d need to have another $100RMB the next day.

We were told to have our spouse review the documents as well and if anything was wrong to bring them back to her so they could be corrected the next day.

When I got back to the room, Kai was till in full effect driving Nancy nuts.  She tried her best to review the documents.

At this point, we decided it would be stupid to try and go to the dinner so I went to Jason’s room to tell him we would be trying to rest and to go without us.

Then I went back to the room.  All during this time, we were also trying to pack.  This was just exacerbated by the feeling of yuckiness and the fact that Kai was always underfoot. 

There was one breakthrough moment in the evening though. Nancy was needing to do some packing and Kai let me pick him up and put him on my lap while I worked on the computer.  That may seem trivial, but it’s not.

I honestly have a lot more respect for parents.  At least with pets, you can just contain them somewhere and get your work done. But, with children you cannot.

Kai was like the Energizer Bunny this evening.  His usual bedtime came and went and still wasn’t tired.  We were exhausted and had decided we could finish packing the next day but we needed Kai to go to sleep.

We decided to give Benadryl a shot this evening.  We needed to test it on him anyway because on some kids it makes them more amped up than sedated.  The last thing we wanted to do was try it on him on a plane and have a psycho kid until the medicine wore off.

Well, it didn’t kick in right away and Nancy wanted to go to sleep.  I know she wanted to keep having Kai sleep in a bed with us, but I told her that it would be in everyone’s best interest if Kai slept in a crib that evening.  Even though he wasn’t getting tired, I told her to put him in the crib and we’ll turn out the lights.  With his life in an orphanage and the foster facility, I was sure he would know what it means when the lights go out. 

Sure enough as soon as we turned the lights out he was laying down in no time.  We did learn something interesting.  We found out why he does the weird stuff with his legs and arms while sleeping in the bed.

When he’s in his crib, he likes to push his feet through the individual paces between the slats and then grab on to different rungs with his hands.  I guess this is one of his self-soothing techniques.

Kai eventually went to sleep and so did we and it was around 9PM.  Well, I say we went to sleep but the fun was just beginning.

Until Tomorrow