Gotcha Day

Aunt Mary reporting in today.  I had the privilege of being a keen observer as well as part of this once in a lifetime experience. It is Monday in China June 11th.  Dayna and Fred were up by 4am again.  I can only imagine their mix of excitement, anxiety and what other jumble of emotions they were feeling.  The boys and I were able to get a few more hours of sleep before showers and heIading to breakfast. (I am grateful that I adjusted to the time here pretty effortlessly) Very similar breakfast choices to the hotel in Beijing, and Fred keeps being an adventurous eater.  I am sticking to what I know.  I am a traditionalist when it comes to breakfast.  Haze and fog again this morning, but clearing somewhat as we finished breakfast on the 29th floor in the rotating restaurant. It gave us a chance to see more of Hefei.  I was particularly interested in the workers who it appeared were preparing trees from a demolition site to be moved somewhere else.  They were putting burlap around the large rootballs.  Actually probably huge seeing I was 29 floors up.   We met Penny promptly in the lobby at 9am and headed on the bus to the Civil Affairs Office.  It is a pretty nondescript office building, fourth floor.  It does have some air conditioning which was welcome, but we all seem to be handling the heat and humidity pretty well.  There is a special room for adoption registration and there is a large Chinese flag on the wall as well as a world map.  There was a Dutch couple who we had seen on the elevator this morning, small world, who had already been introduced to their new son.  Then John and Jean the other Holt family in our party in Hefei were introduced to ReMi. Penny started to get nervous and called the orphanage director a couple of times. Everyone has cell phones here. They were stuck in traffic.  We all took the delay in stride, with pacing and fidgeting.  When Na Hui arrived with a caretaker we all recognized her immediately.  Penny was out of the room dealing with paperwork.  Dayna and Fred approached her and she seemed a little cautious and shy.  That lasted a short time, but once candy and toys were brought out she started to warm up to Dayna, Fred and the boys.  I was snapping pictures; Quade had the video camera and Zane another camera.  I think it was great that I could stand back a bit and record the event.  That way the pictures were taken and Fred and Dayna could focus on Na Hui. The caretaker was a little confused about who Aunt Mary was and she was visibly sad to be leaving her.  We took that as a sign that Na Hui was well taken care of.  She has to bring things very close to her face to see, so that appears to be the major issue that will need to be taken care of.  I see glasses in her future.  She and Quade can have some bonding moments over picking out frames. She had snacks and played with everyone as more and more paperwork was completed.  I probably shed the most tears and still am getting  teary eyed as a write about it.  I has been such a long process, it is amazing that it finally has happened.  Na Hui seemed to enjoy the boys and being silly.  Stickers were put on Quade’s cast and everyone’s faces and arms.  I think you will get some sense of the moment when you are able to see some of the pictures.  Dayna of course was in charge or the long paperwork section and Fred and the boys were able to play some more with Na Hui.  I think she likes her big brothers and her big brothers are having a lot of fun with her.  Look out Juneau, they are going to be quite the pack of jokesters. She seemed to have a lot of fun with the camera, so there should be some interesting shots. It was a short ride back to the Hotel and then it was just mostly exploring the surroundings of our “Weiler Camp” which included hide and seek and jumping on the bed. Lunch was at the Noodle Place in the hotel.  Fred and Quade had checked it out last night.  It was good food and everyone had plenty to eat.  All attempts for a nap have failed thus far.  Fred is going to try a bath.  She is talkative and no one really knows what she is saying, but she parrots back what is said to her and see seems really smart.  She was writing numbers in her coloring book and we think she was giving us the telephone number of her foster family.  I am hopeful that I may get a nap in this afternoon for me and maybe check out the pool.  There has been no melt down yet, but we all expect this honeymoon to end at some point.  For now we all are enjoying this precious new little girl and the addition to the Weiler family.

Arriving in Hefei

Yesterday we left Beijing from a modern state of the art airport and arrived in Hefei.  We were welcomed by an older dingy well worn facility.  Hefei appears to be more of a lower to middle class city.  The skies are hidden from sight; all one can see is the smoke from the annual field burnings that occur in the summer months. You can smell the sweetness from the burnt fields in your room.  The smell is what I would imagine skunk cabbage would smell like if you were to light a pile of it in your house. You wake up with a taste in your mouth from breathing the smoke like you had stayed up all night smoking Pall Malls. The buildings are old and worn here.  The colors of the buildings matching the tan and grey streaks deposited on our window from the winds and summer monsoons.  The modern look of Beijing mixed with its centuries of history is all gone.  The view from our window is more what one would expect from Somalia or a bombed out region in the Middle East. City blocks are leveled, apartment buildings in the process of being demolished with open walls from the wrecking ball.  The old is being cleared and made ready for the new.  Crain’s litters the horizon as new modern high-rises replace the brick buildings of old.   We are now in a different China.   We met our new guide Penny at the airport, arrived at the hotel and checked in and then Penny took us around the corner to a mall/grocery store. The first thing we saw when coming into the store was the shoe department and make-up counters that were quite large. Then as we moved further into the store it became groceries. We bought water and snacks and checked out the meat department.  Meats are sold in open refrigerator cases (not wrapped). There was also fresh fish. We knew it was fresh because the fish were still swimming around (some not for too much longer, they were starting to list). The bull frogs were looking pretty healthly though. We saw smoked ducks and chickens (gutted with heads and feet intact). Mary even found the peanut butter she had been wanting. We purchased a gallon of water, a 12 pack of water, peanut butter, 2 containers of potato chips, a 6 pack of beer (came with its own bottle opener), a bag of pumpkin seeds, 2 liter bottle of 7-Up, and a reusable shopping bag for $15 US dollars. After doing some laundry in our bathtub and hanging up the clothes line, Fred and Quade went to the Noodle restaurant in our hotel for dinner. The menu had some English words but they were the only ones in the restaurant that understood what the meant. They pointed at the menu for what they wanted. Quade’s dinner came with a hardboiled egg (the white part of the egg was brown) Fred said it tasted good, but they could not find out what kind of egg it was. Don’t worry Fred is fine. Today we will meet (get) NaHui. The countdown is on, less than 3 hours until we meet our guide to go to the Civil Affairs office. It is 6 am now and we have been up since 4 am. We have read over the schedule for Hefei and have worked on some simple Chinese phrases. It is almost time to go to breakfast. Breakfast is on the 29th floor and is the tallest restaurant in Hefei. I don’t think the view will be very good today though because the smoke is so thick. I hope that the smoke clears at least a little before Friday (when we leave for Guangzhou) so that we can see the expanse of the city. (Yesterday after the rain in Beijing we could see the mountains around the city. If it hadn’t cleared and we hadn’t been at the Great Wall, we would have never known the mountains were there.) It kind of reminds me of Juneau with the heavy clouds covering the ground (except these clouds are also smoking).

A Link to Pictures

Pictures!

Bargaining in the Shadow of Mao

Bargaining in the Shadow of Mao   Yesterday after our orientation we had lunch at the hotel.  It was a nice meal similar to the one we had at the Jade Factory.  It was just like going to any Chinese restaurant in the States.  The only thing missing was the number in front of the dish and no fortune cookie at the end of the meal. We left the hotel with our tour group.  We have 4 other families traveling with us who will be picking up their child on Monday and staying in their province until Friday and then we will all meet up in Guangzhou.  We will be traveling with one family the whole time as their child in also in Anhui Province.   Ok back to yesterday’s adventure.  We went to Tiananmen Square and walked from there to the Forbidden City.  It was quite a substantial walk.  Beijing is a lot like Washington DC with all the national museums and monuments.  The tour was a lot of fun.  Tracy our friend we made yesterday and I decided we needed Mao watches.  So the hunt was on.  Shortly after entering the square we were approached by a man selling goods.  We inquired about the watches and told him we wanted 10 each he only had 5 and said he would return with more if we gave him some cash.  We told him to come back with the watches and we would make the deal then.  After a heated round of negotiations that our guide Nancy got involved in (the 2 of them went at it and became visibly angry) we set a price.  Our vender said he would find us on the tour and then vanished as quickly as he had appeared.  We went about our tour and after 30-45 minutes he returned (The cool thing about this is there were thousands of people in the crowd and he found us.  He worked hard for his $).  I purchased 10 watches and Tracy purchased 5, the man then left and said he would meet us outside of the Forbidden City with 5 more watches.  We never saw him again.   During the tour and throughput the day I was approached by people selling trinkets, a women with a small child asking for money (speaking in Spanish seemed to be a good deterrent for her), a man who did an ink sketch of me (I looked fairly Chinese in his rendition), a lady of the night and many people who wanted my picture. I started this post before we went to breakfast.  I have had many interruptions with Skype and packing and going to the post office so will end this short and not have the whole rundown on yesterday.   To summarize, the group we are traveling with is great, we had a great time in the afternoon in the hotel lobby drinking beer and having a private showing of propaganda posters from as far back as the 1950’s ( I now have around 40), the post office opens at 9 am in China even on Sunday, Mass was fun, we are packed and ready to go, split pants for children are not wasteful like diapers, people take their birds for walks, sitting side saddle on your scooter makes room for more people and finally sleep deprivation gives you more time for late night walks.  

Flag Raising at Tiananmen Square

Flag Raising in Tiananmen Square   This morning Dayna and I left the Hotel around 3:30 am and started walking to Tiananmen Square. A pedicab driver picked us up and gave us a ride to the square. It cost us 30 Yan (under $5.00 US) and was worth every penny. It was a quite a ways from the hotel. We were able to get there earlier enough to get a spot in the front row for the flag raising ceremony. They have crowds and crowds of people who show up daily for this event.  There were 10,000 people or more gathered for this event.  It was real cool. On the way back we walked.  In true form we found a shortcut through an old kind of dirty part of town.  The mornings are quite with little activity.  We saw people opening up shops and sweeping the sidewalks preparing for the day.  Although we are in a city of nearly 20 million it is spread out and does not seem to feel as crowded as we thought it would.  The streets are wide on the main drags and one needs to be alert when crossing them.  The lines and lights are more of guides and suggestions than the rule of thumb.  When we were driving back from the wall yesterday we were in Friday afternoon rush hour traffic.  People do not look over their shoulders when changing lanes they simply veer in the direction they wish to be and wedge in between the other vehicles.  We will not be renting a car and taking any road trips this go around.  I will practice at home and learn to drive like a local.  When we come back I will be ready to conquer the highways and byways of China.  Until then those of you in Juneau keep a sharp lookout for me. It is wonderful to have this time to see the country and acclimate some before going to

Great Wall and Hu Tong Village

Great Wall and Hu Tong Village
Having trouble accessing the blog but we are hoping that Aunt Suzi will be able to post for us, so if you are reading this she was successful. So thank you Suzi!
Wednesday and Thursday, June 6th and 7th- Quick flight rundown: The food was pretty good and lots of it. We got on the plane in Portland and after reaching cruising altitude had drinks, peanut, and pretzels. An hour or so later we had dinner, a while after that we had ice cream bars, more drinks in between and this was all before Tokyo. The only problem was that one of the movie stopped working in the middle so we will have to finish “We Bought a Zoo” another day. We did not sleep on our first 9 hour flight so by Tokyo we were tiered. The flight from Tokyo to Beijing (3 hrs 20 min) we had dinner again and everyone napped. We were scheduled to arrive in Beijing at 10:05 (arrived early) and were in our rooms before midnight. Needless to say we all slept very well.
Today (Friday, June 8th )we met our Beijing guide, Nancy. She has been working for Holt and Lotus for the past 10 years. We started our day with a wonderful breakfast buffet. The Chinese do not eat breakfast the way we do. Fred had noodles and broth (black seaweed and cilantro) with sides of , sautéed oyster mushrooms with hot chili oil, German sausage, yogurt shot (which was gross, he says he won’t make that mistake again), steamed buns, dumplings, and bacon. I had similar items, with plans of noodles tomorrow. Zane, Quade, and Mary took the more traditional route with crepes, waffles, and pancakes. We met our guide at 8:30 am in the lobby of our hotel. Another woman, Tracy, who is also adopting with Holt was in our tour group. After a quick bathroom break and a run back to the room, we all hopped into the van and headed for the Great Wall. The Wall is about an hour to an hour and a half away from our hotel. On our way there the traffic was great, very smooth. On the way back not so much (rush hour and the lines on the streets are only suggestions). We all hiked about half way up the mountain (the third tower) and Fred and Quade went up to the fourth tower. Quade wanted to go all the way to the top so we all grabbed some cold water and bought some T-shirts and waited for him to climb the rest of the way up. We had our pictures taken MANY times (mostly by a large group traveling from Malaysia) and had great time. Fred even got a picture with a policeman with his Billy Bob teeth. After we left the Wall we drove back to the city, stopping for lunch at the jade market. Lunch was very good and learning about the Jade was fun but I was ready to leave. Next was the Hu Tong tour and the meeting of our rickshaw drivers and additional guide Tina. Hu Tong are the historic homes in the center of the city. Many families will live in a HuTong, each having separate living spaces but sharing a court yard. The one we had tea at, had been in the family for 4 generations. The oldest of the Hu Tong are 300 years old. In Ch*na you can only own a home for 70 years then the gov’t gets it back. The only exception to that are the HuTong, so obviously they don’t become available often. We also went to a Hu Tong market, where there were smoked meats, fresh vegetable, spices, and tourist stuff. We all (even the boys) worked on our bargaining skills and got some cool stuff. Fred’s favorites were the authentic propaganda posters from the 60’s and 70’s. We are now taking a couple hour break in our hotel room before we meet Tracy to go find dinner and check out the night market. No squatty potties yet.

At the Portland Airport

We have arrived at the airport and are now waiting to board our flight. The flight from Portland to Beijing is 16hrs but I think a couple of those hours are changing planes in Tokyo. We can see our plane out the window from where we are sitting and it is large but not two floors. Okay need to go run around the airport in preparation for the long trip.