Safari Park Day

This morning we had the choice of when to leave, so we chose 10am, so we could sleep in. Somehow, even though we didn’t have to be on a timetable we still had a hard time getting ready, getting our breakfast eaten and getting out to the van! Our guide made arrangements for our normal driver to take us to the safari park. It took about 45 minutes to get there, so I’m glad that we didn’t have to take a taxi. He took us right to the gate and helped us get tickets.

We went into the Safari Park and right away MeiMei told us she had to go to the bathroom. Lydia is unusual in that she rarely has to go to the bathroom – like 2-3 times per day. MeiMei on the other hand has to go about every 10 minutes. I’m afraid she might have a bladder infection. That would be better news than this being normal for her. She never wants to go when we suggest it, but almost every time we go past a bathroom, she says she has to go 2 minutes later. Ahhhh! When we first got her, she only drank a sip of water at a time. Now she downs whole water bottles, so maybe she’s never had to hold her pee before! Whatever it is, I hope we can get it under control!!! Or else we’re NEVER leaving home!!!

After our first potty break, we took a look at the map and figured out where we wanted to head. We took off and headed for the giraffes. They had a bunch of giraffes and for only 30 yuan you can feed the giraffes. Lydia decided that she wanted to do it. She got one tiny branch and the giraffe grabbed it out of her hand with its tongue.

After that we found the koalas. They were so cute! They have been at this zoo for 12 years and they have been reproducing well. They had a TON of koalas. Some of them were snoozing, but some were awake and eating. They also had a “nursery” area with mamas and babies. It’s so different than in the US. I remember going to the San Diego Zoo and there were keepers making sure that no one raised their voices around the koalas. Not so much in China. There were people hollering at them and no one really paid attention. At least that was good for us since MeiMei thought they were so cute and went from shushing us to squealing with delight.

After leaving each animal area, there was a gift shop that you had to walk through. MeiMei knows me as the “Keeper of the Money” since I’ve been the one holding onto the cash. She would walk through the store picking things up and saying, “Mama?” We said no to just about everything. But if she saw something she thought was really neat, she wanted me to take a picture of it. I have about 25 pictures of her and items in the gift shop. Well, all around the zoo were blow up giraffes that looked like a hobby horse. Lydia thought that they would be a good souvenir, so we ended up with one. It was fun for the first 30 minutes until MeiMei started riding it and dragging it around and wore a hole in it. She kept carrying it around until we got her distracted enough to shove it in the backpack.

We stopped to eat our snacks, since it was lunch time and watched the elephants. There was a water pump there – I’m not really sure why – that MeiMei had a lot of fun pumping. She filled her mouth with food and then pumped the pump over and over.

Just beyond the elephants was an area that was labeled children’s zoo/touch zoo. Well, it pretty much only had horses. I’m not sure if MeiMei actually recognized the character for horse, but she kept pointing out a character that was on all of the signs. I took a video of her pointing to characters so we can know if she has any idea, or if like a lot of kindergarteners I know, was making up her own “story”. She kept trying to get me to say the Chinese word for the animals. I was trying to copy the sound and intonation just like she said, but every time, she looked at me with a disgusted look and kept repeating it and shaking her head. Whenever Brian would repeat it though, it was always right. I’m sorry, but Brian has NO skills at language. I’m pretty sure she was just telling him what he wanted to hear. 😊 He even purposefully mispronounced some of the words and she still told him it was good!

We could see a little train nearby, but since we had spent a lot on the tickets already, we didn’t want to start paying for rides. Lydia really wanted to ride and she would have been willing to pay some of her own money, so I went to go find out the price. After a little struggle with the language barrier, I found out it was free. We enjoyed a ride around the “Children’s Area” in the train. There were a few more rides there too. MeiMei rode a children’s roller coaster, we rode another little train, a merry-go-round, and a dragon ride (like the Dumbo ride at Disney). There were two buttons on the dragons. One to make them fly in the air and another that made machine gun sounds. 😊 Not really sure about the reasoning behind that one!?!

We headed over to the main attraction – at least for us – the pandas!!! They had a bunch of pandas. Again, the pandas in the US are much more protected than the pandas here in China. Even one of the keepers was yelling at the panda to get her attention. There were panda triplets born at the safari park 4 years ago and they were some of the mascots of the park. As 4-year olds, they are mostly grown, but a little smaller than the adult pandas. It was so cute to see them eat the bamboo. MeiMei was also trying to get me to say the word for bamboo. That one I think I did ok on!

While on the panda trail, MeiMei fell and scraped her knee. I didn’t have anything to make it feel better, but I did have hand sanitizer. She had used that after all the bathroom breaks and she decided that hand sanitizer is the miracle cure all. She put some on her knees and everything was good. After that, anytime she fell or was upset, the hand sanitizer made it all better.

After the pandas came more gift shops, more rides and a stop for a drink and a treat. There were these cute panda cookies. They looked like they were chocolate and vanilla sugar cookies, but they smelled like carob and Lydia thought they tasted like “gluten free”. MeiMei didn’t mind though. She downed quite a few of them.

Lydia was dying to go to the “Bear Forest”, so we tried to follow the map there. I’m usually good at following maps, but the map for the park was not to scale and didn’t have all the paths on it. I knew the word for bear was something like “hua”, so I asked a worker there and pointed to the map. He actually spoke very good English and was able to show us the way. When we got to the “Bear Forest” we saw some snow wolves, but zero bears. I’m not sure where they were or where they were supposed to be, but there were no bears!

Lydia also wanted to see the “Jurassic Trail” where they had a dinosaur exhibit. It was almost closing time and we had to get across the park. We tried following the map again, but no more success was had this time. We did end up seeing the tigers and they had a tiger nursery where there were some very cute baby tigers, so I guess it was worth the detour. We finally asked someone (using the map) and found out where to go.

As we entered the trail, there were animatronic dinosaurs in the “jungle” along the trail. It was pretty cool and they were very realistic. They had sounds and movements that were very realistic. So realistic that MeiMei started freaking out. Brian took her through as fast as he could sat at the exit, so Lydia and I could take a little more time. We took maybe 10 minutes and by the time we got to the end, she was still crying. Have no fear though, I had hand sanitizer! Just to put into perspective how real the dinos were, Lydia wouldn’t stand with her back to the t-rex to get a picture taken. I had her take one of me, but she was a little too nervous to do it herself. They were very lifelike, if that’s possible for an animal that is extinct and I have never seen!

At that point, we were shutting down the safari park. I called our guide, so she could send our driver to get us and after one more stop at the bathroom, we headed out the gate. We found our driver and he was parked in the exact same spot that he was this morning. I’m not really sure, but I think he may have spent the day at the safari park waiting for us. I’m not sure what the going wage is for sitting in a van all day, but hopefully it’s not too much! Don’t worry, we’ll give him a big tip at the end of the week. 😊

We had him drop us off at Shamian Island so that we could eat supper at Lucy’s. Lucy’s is an American style restaurant and it hold memories for us with Lydia. We took her there and she had spaghetti. They heat the plate in the over to melt the cheese. When we got Lydia, she touched the plate and burned her fingers. It was night, so we didn’t realize she burned her fingers because we couldn’t see. The next morning we saw that her fingers had a blister on them from the burn and we felt so bad. She didn’t get the spaghetti this time, but I did. We got MeiMei a grilled cheese sandwich because when we showed her the picture, she said yes. Come to find out, she was just saying, “yes” to the French fries. When Brian tried to get her to eat the grilled cheese, she kept her mouth closed and didn’t even want to try it. He got her to eat one bite, but she was not impressed. She also wasn’t impressed with the spaghetti that I offered her. I’m afraid she might not be so happy with meals at our house!

After Lucy’s, and another bathroom break, we headed out to find some shops that were open. Well, by 7:30, pretty much everything was closed. We started down a street where we saw lights and MeiMei announced that she had to go to the bathroom again!!! Since it’s China, I was tempted to just pull her pants down and have her pee in a drain. I thought that we should at least try to find a bathroom though. On our way to the bathroom, we saw a shop that was open and the guy tried to convince us to come in and shop. I told him that we needed to find a bathroom, and he offered his to us. It was a very interesting bathroom…you had to walk up five steps to get to the “throne” – at least it was a western style toilet – and then the toilet was only about 10 inches off the ground. On the way up, MeiMei tripped and bruised her leg (again), but we made it to the bathroom. 😊 We decided that if we had used his bathroom, the least we could do was look around. We found a chop (stamp) that could have MeiMei’s English and Chinese name carved into it. There was a bunch of other stuff too, but by that time MeiMei was almost falling asleep standing up. We told him we’d come back tomorrow to look some more.

We walked back over by the White Swan Hotel at his suggestion to find a taxi. There was one coming down the road after just a few minutes of waiting. We took the taxi back to the hotel and before we got off the island, MeiMei was asleep.

We’re all tired after our long day and ready for some sleep. Tomorrow we get MeiMei’s visa that will allow her to become a US citizen when she steps on American soil. I can’t believe that tomorrow is our last full day in China. I’m ready to get back to my queen size bed, but I’m not sure I want to take care of the cooking and cleaning again. It’s been nice to have the past few weeks off. MeiMei is pretty good at folding clothes, so at least I might have a helper while we’re at home. 😊

Feeding the giraffe

Koala in the tree

One of the many souvenirs we didn't buy! 

The one we did buy!

Elephants and a giraffe on his head!

An "artistic" picture by MeiMei

She really knows how to capture the mood!

She's a speed demon! She loved all the rides - and no motion sickness :)

Baba doesn't do spinn-y rides, so it was a good time for Mama and MeiMei to spend together

Isn't to sooooooo cute?

"JieJie bobo MeiMei"

Eating the "gluten free" pandas - MeiMei doesn't have too discerning of a pallet!

The biggest Beanie Boo ever!!!

I'm about to get eaten!!!

Triceratops

Last Step of Paperwork DONE!

This morning we decided to skip breakfast since we had such an early leave time.  We ate a pomelo for breakfast that we got off the street. It was really yummy. It is a citrus fruit and it kind of tastes like an orange or grapefruit, but it’s less juicy. We met our guide in the lobby after forgetting all the paperwork in our room! I realized it after we were in the elevator, so we came back up and got it. At least we realized it before we got too far!!!

We had to go to the medical office to pick up the medical report for MeiMei. That is part of the required paperwork for getting a visa. The consulate is right across the street from the medical office, so Lily, our guide, took us across the street and made sure we knew where we were going. It wasn’t too difficult, since there were other families that were there and all the guards knew what we were doing. We had to sit in a waiting room for a while until it was our turn to have our paperwork checked over. There was a little play area that the girls played in. One of the walls was a chalkboard. Lydia drew some great pictures and MeiMei was writing Chinese characters. I’m pretty sure they were the characters for the numbers, but I’m not positive. I would have taken a picture, but they don’t allow any cameras in the consulate. After getting our paperwork checked, taking the citizenship oath for MeiMei and getting any questions answered that we had, we were able to leave. On Wednesday, Lily will go back and pick up the visa and other paperwork that we need for MeiMei to become a US citizen.

We met our guide back at the medical office and she got the van to take us back. On the way, she took us to a 100-story building. The top 30 floors are a hotel, so the hotel lobby is on the 70^th floor. We went up there and looked around at the city of Guangzhou and the Pearl River. Across from the hotel is another building that is even taller. It is the tallest building in Western China – 530 meters tall. We took some pictures and were just amazed at the enormity of the towers. Looking up was even more impressive than looking down, I think. I’m pretty sure that buildings are in the clouds some of the time. Today was a clear day though, and we could see to the top. While we were looking down at the river, it reminded us that when we came to adopt Lydia, we went on a river cruise down the Pearl River. Lydia thought that sounded like fun, but we weren’t sure how to get tickets and get there.

After getting back to our hotel, it was time for lunch. We decided to head a different way and see what we could find. Well, there wasn’t so much of the other side of the road right away, so we ended up stopping at Burger King. Of course, MeiMei and Lydia were happy to get French fries and chicken nuggets. Burger King has some different foods here in China. One sandwich that they were advertising was a breaded crab cake on a bun with a square egg. There are some things that just wouldn’t go over so well in the US. But…they also had lava cakes with ice cream on top. That on the other hand, I would buy. And we did. Sharing food is a good way to bond, so MeiMei and I shared a lava cake and Brian and Lydia did too. MeiMei thought the ice cream wasn’t the best part, so she fed that to me and wanted to keep the cake for herself. That didn’t quite cut it for me, but I did let her have most of it.

We were going to head back to the hotel room, but I saw another adoptive mom heading a different way. I figured that she was headed to Wal-Mart, which we heard was nearby. We followed her and found an honest to goodness Wal-Mart. We picked up a few things that we needed/wanted like candy and a coloring book. Wal-Mart was on two levels and it was kind of confusing to find things. MeiMei had to go to the bathroom, so we had to search for that. Good thing that she can tell other people what she needs because otherwise we would never have found the bathroom!

After Wal-Mart, we headed back to the hotel for a nap. Lydia fell asleep, but MeiMei just can’t seem to fall asleep in the afternoons. She laid there for a while, but she kept waking Lydia up.

While the girls were “trying” to sleep, I asked the concierge about river cruise tickets. We found out that there is a ticket office behind the hotel, so we could get cruise tickets there. After talking to Brian, we decided to go tonight, since the weather was so nice. Kids under 1.2 meters are free, but I have no way to figure out how big that is, so we took MeiMei down to check. She was below that, so she was free at least. 😊

It was such a nice day that on the way back up, I suggested going to the pool. Lydia was, of course, very excited to do that. The three girls got their swimsuits on and headed to the pool. When we got to the pool, the ladies that were checking people in and out warned us, “It is very cold water!” I knew it was going to be chilly based on how it felt when the girls put their feet in earlier this week. If you know me, you know that I HATE cold water!!! Well, in order to help bond with MeiMei, I got in the freezing cold water and played. We stayed in the shallow end, but MeiMei LOVED swimming. She had no fear at all. Lydia was jumping of the side and she wanted to do the same thing. She jumped into my arms and was laughing and playing and having so much fun. Lydia was enjoying herself too. The water, we found out later, was a whole 69 degrees warm. MeiMei didn’t last for too long before she was shivering. She didn’t want to get out, and Lydia definitely didn’t want to get out, but I insisted that they go sit in the hot tub to warm up. They got warmed up and Lydia wanted to get back in the pool. There was NO WAY I was going to get back in the water, so I only let her get back in after MeiMei was in a towel in Brian’s arms. She thought the water was freezing then too.

We showered and headed for a quick dinner before we had to catch a taxi to the river cruise launch point. It didn’t take too long and we had plenty of time to exchange our receipt for our tickets and get into the line. The way people wait in line in China is much different than in the US. They made the announcement that people could start boarding the boat and there was a mad rush for the door. People get so close and you just have to go with the flow. I’m pretty sure Lydia’s lack of personal space is come by naturally! We did get on the boat finally and found our table. We chose to sit on the top (even though there was no covering! – They lady selling the tickets didn’t think we would want to sit there). I remembered from the last time that even though we had tickets to sit down below, we wanted to be on the top to see better. It was fun being in the open air. We were at the front of the boat and we could see really well from there. Guangzhou was lit up so beautifully. They have dancing lights on the side of the buildings and the Canton Tower is lit up in rainbow colors. It was fun to watch the lights and cruise along the river. MeiMei loved it and didn’t have any problem with motion sickness! Yeah!!! We met some other adoptive families on the boat that we flew to China with. It was fun to catch up with them and see how things were going in their family too.

We took a taxi home and MeiMei ended up falling asleep on Brian’s lap. She woke up when we got out of the car, but not very much! Brian brought her up to the room and she went right to bed without even getting her jammies on. Lydia was hungry – again, so she and I went in search of something to eat. Of course, we ended up at the noodle and rice restaurant. We brought back some noodles and dumplings and shared with Brian. We also had to get a bubble tea/juice on the way back too. We enjoyed eating our second supper while Lydia FaceTimed with some of the other cousins she hadn’t talked to yesterday. She’s in bed, MeiMei is sleeping too and Brian was about to abandon me. He’s the one who has been downloading the pictures, so he knows where he’s putting them, so I made him stay up with me. I think I’m going to sleep good tonight! We’re both ready for a good, long night of sleep!!!

Canton Town in the background

The 100 story building we went in.

The two tallest buildings in Guangzhou.

For some reason, when MeiMei saw these batteries, she insisted on having her picture taken with them! :P

Matching-Matching - Their shirts say jie-jie and mei-mei (big sister and little sister).

The freezing cold water!

Trying on Lydia's mask!

Much better in the warm pool!!!

Gunagzhou at night

The lights were animated.

The Canton TV Tower

Another Relaxed Day...

Our morning started off slow and easy today. We didn’t have any plans for this morning. We got up and headed to breakfast. There was a table available outside today, so we got to eat our breakfast outside. We discovered that MeiMei likes watermelon at least as much as Lydia. There was really good watermelon here in Guangzhou. Since it’s a warm weather climate, it must grow all year long. It was sweet and juicy and MeiMei ate a bunch of it! Watch out, Taylors, you might have to buy 2 watermelons when we have dinner together next summer!!!

Since we were outside for breakfast, the girls were watching the fish in the pool. It comes right up next to the patio where we had breakfast. There were signs saying that the fish were on a diet (😊), so we didn’t let the girls give them bread. I’m pretty sure that the diet the fish are on is whatever food anyone will feed them!

We headed back to our room, but the maid was cleaning still so we headed to the outdoor playground. I was going to take pictures, but MeiMei decided that she wanted to take pictures of us. You can tell that she has been posed before. She was arranging us on the play structure and was taking TONS of pictures. It was pretty funny the way she was jabbering and getting “mad” at Lydia for not following her directions.

When we got back to the room, we FaceTimed some of the cousins and then headed out for lunch. We decided to go to the Noodle Restaurant for lunch. I had my favorite broccoli and Lydia had noodles. Both the girls wanted dumplings, but when we got them, neither of the girls liked them. Brian and I thought they were good.

One thing that is different with restaurants in China is that you can, and sometimes are expected to bring drinks with you. We had stopped and got a bubble tea and Lydia and Brian got Pepsi. It was so sad for Brian to discover that Mountain Dew didn’t make it in China. They had it when we were here adopting Lydia, but not now. ☹ Anyway, getting drinks with caffeine was a mistake. We brought the girls home to take a nap, which they both desperately needed. MeiMei went to the bathroom about 7 times in an hour and neither of the girls fell asleep.

Our guide was meeting us to take us shopping at 2pm, so we didn’t have time to get them to sleep. We had her take us to the pearl and jade market. It is a giant mall that is full of shops (more like kiosks) selling pearls, jade, and other precious stones. We got some pearls and jade and I got a garnet bracelet. It is crazy how inexpensive everything is. It’s kind of interesting the way they sell pearls. They have different grades of pearls. They have them strung on a string and you buy a whole string. Then you tell them if you want them as a bracelet, a necklace, etc. They string them on a new string and tie off each bead. MeiMei was mesmerized with the ladies that were tying pearls.

After our purchases of fine jewelry, we headed to Shaimian Island. This is an island in the pearl river in Guangzhou that is special to adoptive families. It used to be the location of both the medical exam office and the consulate of the United States. Adoptive families would come to Guangzhou and never left the island. There are American restaurants there, shops that sell souvenirs, and a hotel called the White Swan. When the consulate was there, everyone that adopted stayed at the White Swan. It is a 5 Star hotel and it catered to the families who stayed there in the “hay day” of Chinese adoptions. Our guide showed us around the hotel and took pictures of us in some of the picturesque locations. One thing that was a tradition at this hotel was to take pictures of newly adopted children on their red couch. If you ask anyone who adopted a child from China during the White Swan era, they most likely have a picture of their child on the famous red couch. Well, the hotel, knowing the importance of the red couch, kept one and put it in one of the lobbies. Our guide took us to the red couch so we could take pictures there. 😊

After the White Swan, we went to a shop and got a few things for the girls…dresses, shoes, and some other special things for MeiMei. While I was picking things out, MeiMei was walking around the shop picking things out for herself. There were tons of little toys she kept picking out. The lady that ran the shop thought she was so cute and so good that she gave her a bubble wand. She was pretty happy about that. We decided to head back to the hotel so that we could have an early bedtime.

Brian decided that McDonald’s sounded good for supper, so off to McDonald’s we went. It had been sprinkling all day, but when we went out for supper, it had started to rain pretty hard. Of course, we didn’t bring our umbrella, but we didn’t want to go back to get it, so we headed off in the rain. We had some great American fast food. MeiMei loves French fries, and apparently, ketchup. She eats her fries with ketchup, and she also tried dipping her apples in the ketchup too.

On the way home, it was still raining. MeiMei LOVED the rain. She kept laughing and looking up at the sky. Inner Mongolia is very dry, so it probably rained very rarely there. Also, living in an orphanage, she probably had never been outside in the rain. She was totally enjoying the experience.

We got back and got the girls ready for bed and tried to get them settled into bed. Lydia wanted to fall asleep in our bed, since the beds are so small, but MeiMei would hear nothing of the sort. She kept pointing to the spot next to her in bed and saying, “Jie Jie” (big sister). Lydia had to sleep next to her!

I got chilled in the rain, so I decided to take a hot bath in our huge bathtub and watch the tv in the bathroom. Yes, this hotel room is crazy big! Brian said it’s a good thing we aren’t staying here any longer or we might not be able to go back to our normal size bathroom. It’s almost 9pm, but I think I’m ready for bed. We have to get up early tomorrow because our appointment at the US consulate is at 8:30am. We might just have granola bars for breakfast. I’m not sure I want to wake up at 5am!

Wishing she could feed the fish. She kept telling me to go inside and get some bread.

This girl has no fear

Some of MeiMei's artistic photography!!!

She did not approve of the selfie!

Brian's face is hilarious...I don't think he was in as much discomfort as it looks like!

One of the famous Shaimian Island poses

In the White Swan

Lydia's official red couch picture

MeiMei's official red couch picture

Yummy McDonald's!!!

A Relaxing Day

What a great day today was…We didn’t have to get up at any certain time, so we had a leisurely morning. We all slept pretty well last night. MeiMei fell out of bed, but she was still sleeping. Brian brought her into our bed – which, by the way in China, happens to be a double bed! We couldn’t sleep with so many people in a double bed, so Brian put her back in her bed and we slept until after 7am. We enjoyed a breakfast that wasn’t rushed this morning.

After breakfast we decided to explore the hotel a little. We went back out to the garden and watched the fish. We walked all the way around and found a little pagoda and a cat that didn’t want to be petted. We also decided to check out the pool area. It was so beautiful around the pool. It’s not really very hot here, so I’m not wanting to get in the water. The pool water felt really cold to me, but Lydia and MeiMei took their shoes off and waded on the steps. Lydia said that it was starting to feel warm, but I’m pretty sure it was just numbness setting in. 😊

We had to be back in the room between 11am and 12pm for the results of the TB test. I’m not really sure what was going on, since no one came to look at MeiMei’s arm. Maybe it was some other kind of TB test, but our guide said that if we didn’t hear from her, everything was good. “No news is good news”, she told us about a dozen times yesterday.

I discovered that one of my friends from elementary/middle school lives not too far from here because her husband owns a translation business in China. She found out we were close by and took a bus to meet us here at our hotel. It had been over 20 years since we had seen each other! It was so fun to catch up.

We hung out in the hotel room for a while, and then decided to go get something to eat. I have really been craving some Chinese food like sweet and sour, rice, etc. We weren’t sure where to get that around here. My friend said that kind of food is more common in Beijing, so since she knows Mandarin, she started asking around where we might be able to get something like that. We found a restaurant and ate sweet and sour pork, spicy green beans, eggplant, and shredded pork with Chinese tortillas. It was so yummy! It hit the spot. I didn’t want to leave China without having the kind of Chinese food I really enjoy.

After lunch, we walked around a bit and found a bubble tea shop. She and her husband LOVE the bubble milk tea. She helped us order. Brian got bubble milk tea, I got a passionfruit bubble tea with coconut, and Lydia got kumquat lemonade. Everything was delicious. MeiMei really liked the bubble milk tea. I’m definitely going back to get more. It was soooooo good.

We came back and enjoyed that in the Garden’s garden. She took some pictures of all four of us in front of the waterfall and other picturesque places. It’s not quite the “red couch” of the White Swan days, but the picture in front of the Garden’s waterfall might take its place. (If you’re not a China family, you probably don’t understand the last reference, but it’s kind of a long story. If you’re really interested, ask me and I’ll tell you sometime.)

Back in our room, we discovered that MeiMei is quite fond of taking pictures. She had my phone and kept snapping pictures of me, Brian, and Lydia. She counted and had over 70 pictures that she took. By the way, she’s really good at counting, writing numbers, and she could even read a few characters that my friend pointed out to her. Pretty impressive for five years old!

We decided to try out a place called the Happy Monk for dinner. They have American food. Lydia had mac and cheese, Brian had a burger, and I had a quesadilla. MeiMei just kept pointing to the French fries pictured on the menu, so we ordered her fish and chips. She ate all the fries, but she wasn’t so sure about the fish. It was actually pretty good fish fry. I’m not sure what she’s going to do back in Wisconsin on Friday nights! I guess maybe she’ll just eat mac and cheese like her big sister! 😊

By the time we got done with dinner it was pretty late, so we headed home for a bath and a little snuggle time. Baba and MeiMei are in bed already and Lydia is listening to an audio book. I’m not so tired yet, but I’m sure I will be soon. It was a fun, but tiring day.

Tomorrow we don’t have any appointments, but our guide is going to take us shopping. It’s going to be nice having another day where we can relax. Until tomorrow…

Lydia enjoying her noodles and cocoa krispies for breakfast. Only in China!

V for something Chinese! It's popular to do this when getting your picture taken in China. :)

On the bridge in the garden.

First Day in Guangzhou

This is what we did today in Lydia’s version:

          First, we woke up and ate breakfast for breakfast I had noodles and cereal. Then we went to a hospital and Ruthie got a shot and her eyes checked. Also, the doctor asked my dad if Ruthie was smart and my dad said the people in the orphanage were saying she was smart plus she has been very smart. So, the doctor asked her 2 questions and said she was smart. Then we got Subway and sat outside for a picnic then Me and Ruthie fed some fishes. After that wet took a nap but I did not take a nap instead I listen to a book and wrote part of the blog.

When the alarm went off at 8am this morning, I really didn’t know what hit me! We had arrived at the hotel, checked in and found jammies and were in bed around 3am this morning. I really wasn’t feeling it this morning when we had to get up, but I pulled myself out of bed and took a shower and got dressed.

We headed down to breakfast, which was another buffet of endless choices. Lydia ate noodles with TONS of garlic on them. I could smell her across the elevator when we came back up to the room! There were plenty of other choices to eat that the rest of us got. There wasn’t a lot of time to spend eating, so we made our choices quick, ate and came back up to the room to finish getting ready.

At 10am, we met our guide in the lobby to take us to the medical appointment. I was pretty nervous that MeiMei would be sick on the way there, since it was the same time of day that it first and second happened the past few days. Brian was ready with a bag, just in case, but we made it the 20 minutes to the appointment without incident. 😊 Yeah! Thank you, Lord. This van has seats that ride a little higher, and I also gave her half a Bonine. I’m still a little nervous, but hopefully it doesn’t happen again! (She was fine on the plane – she slept the whole time.)

The medical appointment went pretty quickly. We only had to wait a few minutes for everything to start. Lydia, Brian, and MeiMei went in to the different exam rooms. In one of the rooms, the doctor asked Brian if she was smart. Brian said that her teachers at the orphanage said she was. The doctor said she would check, asked her 2 questions, and confirmed with Brian that she is, in actuality, smart! If only the people in America knew it only takes 2 questions…My job as a teacher would be much easier. 😊 One of the things that MeiMei had to have was a TB test. They wouldn’t let us go into the room for that. They give her a shot and depending on how that area looks tomorrow, we’ll know if there needs to be further testing. After that, she came out and I had to put pressure on the injection area for 5 minutes. I’m not sure what that is all about, but she did sit on my lap for a whole 5 minutes. I was feeding her candy, so that probably made me bearable too!

After the TB test, we headed back to the hotel. Our guide checked our paperwork and made sure we had everything, got copies of MeiMei’s passport for us, so we’re all set for our appointment at the consulate on Monday.

We decided to take a walk and find lunch. When we came back from the medical appointment, our guide pointed out where we could get some food, shop, etc. There was a Subway and Lydia thought that sounded good. So off we went to find Subway. Because of where the hotel is located, and the main clientele, this area caters to Westerners. There are many people who work in the stores and restaurants who know English and the menus are available in English too. I was surprised when I ordered the subs that I could do it in English. It was nice to be able to communicate a little more than was possible in Huhhot. Since we aren’t eating raw vegetables, the subs were a little sparse. Lydia enjoyed her favorite tuna, while the rest of us had meat and cheese with pickles and olives. We also stopped at 7 Eleven to get some drinks, chips, and of course, a little chocolate.

It’s so nice here in Guangzhou. It was in the 70s today, which feels like heaven to me. We decided to make a picnic of our lunch today. We’re staying at the Garden Hotel that is aptly named because of the garden in the back. There’s a huge koi pond, flowers, trees, waterfalls, and just a wonderful relaxing place. That’s where we ate our lunch. The girls loved watching the fish and they fed them a little extra of the bread from the sandwiches. The fish were piling on top of each other to get to the food. MeiMei LOVED watching them. We’re excited to take her to the safari park here, since she is so interested in the few animals we’ve seen.

After lunch, we thought a nap was in order since we had such a short night. I fell asleep right away, but I guess it took MeiMei a while to fall asleep. By the time the two of us woke up, it was after 5pm. Whoops!

MeiMei came to us wearing fashion boots, which look cute, but aren’t so great for walking in. We had seen an H&M across the street, so we thought we’d check and see if they had any shoes that might work better. They did have some clearance shoes for 20 RMB (about $3), so we got some shoes that will hopefully be a little more comfortable for her. She also wanted some hair clips with Hello Kitty. Lydia LOVED Hello Kitty when she came home. I just couldn’t resist, plus they were on clearance for about $1, so she has some new, cute barrettes to wear. We headed down the street to find some place for supper (even though it felt like we had just eaten lunch!). There was a place advertising noodles and rice. Of course, there aren’t any restaurants in China that serve noodles and rice, so we HAD to try it. I didn’t really care because I figured I wouldn’t eat anything anyway. It was a great little place with cheap eats that the girls liked a lot. Upon looking at the menu, I discovered that they had broccoli. You know I’ve been really wanting vegetables, so I order the broccoli. It was so good – and it’s not just me. Brian ate some and said it was the best broccoli that he’d tasted. I’m not sure what they did to it, but it was really good. I’m totally in favor of eating there again!

We also met another adoptive family that was eating there and staying in our hotel. In the lobby of the hotel, we ran into a few other families and found out where some good restaurants are, where the play room is and other good tips. We ended up going up to the play room to burn off a little energy. Another adoptive family was there with their 5 kids and Lydia and MeiMei played for a while.

We came back to the room and played hide-and-seek. This room is ridiculously big – 2 bathrooms, a bedroom, living room, office/workout room, and walk in closet, so it’s a little better place to find hiding places. They had fun doing that. MeiMei sat on the couch and counted before she went to find Lydia and me. She counted all the way to 100 in Chinese. I was so impressed, I almost came out of my hiding spot to tell her what a great job she did. We’ll definitely have to get that on video!

It was late, so we got the girls in bed and now it’s almost midnight and I’m typing this blog. We don’t have anything to do, except have the TB test checked tomorrow. If everything is good, that’s all that we need to do for that. We’re looking forward to sleeping in, if Lydia cooperates. 😊

Our Family

Subway in the Garden

Watching the fish

Who doesn't love noodles?

Mama would rather have broccoli!

More noodles!

MeiMei loves her Baba

Playroom

View from our 25th floor hotel room

Baotou

So…we didn’t think we’d get a chance to blog tonight, but thanks to getting to the airport 2 hours early, and a 1 hour and 45-minute delay, we are sitting here with nothing to do!

We left early this morning to make the trip to Baotou, Xuan Xuan’s hometown. We had to have all our stuff packed up and ready to go. Because of our shopping trip, we weren’t packing as light as we were thinking we might be! We took 2 trips from our room down to the lobby to get everything down. We had the suitcases, plus we also had the gifts and sleepers that we had for the orphanage. The mini-vans here are a little smaller than the ones we have in the states, so it was a tight squeeze! Lydia and I sat in the back with some of the suitcases. We thought we better have MeiMei sit in the middle to try to eliminate some of the carsickness.

I gave her some “natural” motion sickness medicine because I only had full strength Bonine and I wasn’t sure how much of that I should give her. Well, we made it a little while, but sure enough – puke! Of course, we didn’t have any bags handy, so it went all over the floor again. (Lydia said we better give the driver a really good tip, since he’d have to clean up 2 puke messes in 2 days!) We got it cleaned up and I made an SOS call to my sister-in-law, Jaime, who deals with motion sickness herself and with her kids. I ended up giving MeiMei Bonine, but she puked about 10 minutes later. ☹ So I don’t think that any of it got into her system. By that time, her stomach was pretty much empty. She fell asleep for a little bit and we got to the orphanage without any more incidents.

When we got to the Baotou orphanage, we were welcomed by Ms. Xue, the dean who had brought MeiMei to Huhhot for our Family Day. They didn’t say I couldn’t take pictures, so I started snapping them left and right. We were hoping to meet the director of the orphanage, but he was in meetings or something, so we didn’t meet him.

We found out that MeiMei had been in some sort of foster family for the past month or so within the orphanage, but they were in Beijing for winter camp, so we didn’t get to meet them. They did show us a work room where children and adults with disabilities work making bead crafts. They sell the crafts for donations to the orphanage, so we bought a TON to bring home as gifts.

Then they took us up to see the kids who were in the same room as MeiMei. She was like a celebrity when she walked into the room. They were all hugging her and they wanted to meet her JieJie (Big Sister). They were all impressed with Lydia. I asked about taking pictures and they said it was ok. I couldn’t believe it. When we first walked in there was a sign that there were no picture allowed, but they didn’t mind when I asked.

We headed downstairs where we went to the sleeping room. The kids all crawled into their beds and started taking off the layers that the Chinese feel is healthy for everyone to wear. I guess since they were going to sleep under covers, they could take their coats off! I always thought that it was only children that they bundled up, but being here in the winter, I see that the adults stay bundled up too. They wear their coats inside over layers and layers of clothes. They keep the buildings to warm too. Usually, I’m all about staying warm, but this is a little excessive! Rant over… We saw the bed and the room where MeiMei stayed most recently, and then met some of her teachers.

There is a school connected to the orphanage where the kids go for lessons. It looked like she had been going there for preschool and now for kindergarten. We got some of her school books when they brought her to us. We met the teachers and we could tell that some of them were very close to MeiMei. A few of them were crying and hugging her a lot. I could tell that they care about her and for her very much. It made both Brian and I very emotional seeing them and her crying.

I’m so thankful that she had as good of an experience as an orphanage can be. There was a lot of love and care for the kids there. Ms. Xue also cared so much for the children. It is nice to see that in a culture where some kids are not valued, there are people who see the great value in them. It was such and emotional visit. I’m so glad that we got to go and see where MeiMei lived for the first 5 ½ years of her life. Not very many people have been allowed to go to the orphanage in the past 5 or 6 years, so this was a great gift. We thank the Lord that He allowed the authorities to have a favorable response to our request to go.

After the orphanage, we headed to a Mongolian Hot Pot restaurant. Hot pot is a traditional Mongolian food. We had it one other time in California with my cousins whose daughter is also from Inner Mongolia. The restaurant we went to in Baotou was amazingly the same chain that they have in California!!! Hot pot is an interesting concept. You go to the restaurant, order some food that is uncooked. They bring you a pot of boiling broth, put it on a hot plate and then you choose what uncooked food you want to cook in your broth. We had beef, lamb, vegetables, and noodles. It was all sooo good. Lydia LOVED it!!! One option they had for adding to the broth was some kind of mushroom – really tall, small mushrooms. I’m not sure what they’re called, but Lydia decided to try some – without knowing they were mushrooms. I wasn’t about to tell her what they were. As many of you know, mushrooms are Lydia’s least favorite food.  Well, she really liked them! When I told her what they were, she was completely grossed out, but still said they were good! Our driver, Mr. Oo (I have know idea how it’s spelled), also ate with us. He got some of the food from the buffet for us. He brought us a bowl full of what we thought was cold soup. We tried to eat it. It was not so tasty. It had a really strong flavor. I wasn’t sure what, but I couldn’t choke down a whole bowlful! Come to find out, it was peanut sauce to dip the food in after it was cooked! No wonder it was so strong for a soup!!! Oh the things we do when we are learning a new culture!

After hot pot, I asked Aggie to stop at a Starbucks that I had seen just around the corner. One of my friends collects Starbucks mugs with the different towns in China. She didn’t have a Baotou, so I had to go find one! There wasn’t a parking lot nearby, so the driver stopped across the street and told me to hurry. I had to cross the 8 lanes of traffic to get there. Remember Frogger? That was me today. I just followed a Chinese person and hoped that I made it! I’m glad I did. The Baotou mug is really cool. It says Baotou, of course, but it also has some of the sites of the city and yurts, traditional Mongolian homes, on the back. I got the mugs and also got to experience cross the street like a real Chinese person!

There was one more puking incident after lunch. I’m not sure what we’re going to do to get this under control. Hopefully smoother roads, less jerking around, and a higher seat will help when we get home. Just pray that it’s only car sickness and not plane sickness too.

We stopped at MeiMei’s finding spot on the way out of town. It was originally at a school, but the school moved and it’s now a factory. It was kind of sad because it looked so abandoned and miserable. I’m sure 5 years ago it was a nice school with people around, but today it was just dirty and run down.

We headed back to Huhhot. MeiMei slept most of the way and there was no more puking – yeah! Aggie decided to stop at the passport office to see if by chance the passport was ready. And, yes! It was ready for us to pick up. I’m so glad. She was planning to send it to us in Guangzhou, but it feels much better knowing that we have it in our hands. 😊 We headed to the airport and here we are. We are almost ready to board the airplane now. There’s not time to add pictures, so I’ll add them tomorrow. Sorry for those of you who are dying to see us!!!

Happy Thanksgiving – our dinner was chips, coke, and Oreos – at least that’s pretty American!