Guangzhou
Saturday, October 21st
There was no official blog post from Friday October 20th because we spent most of the day packing and traveling, and because we had a rough night Thursday night which left us all tired Friday. Kanhka and I woke up to the sound of Luke getting sick in his crib around midnight Thursday night/Friday morning. This resulted in a 4 hour cycle of clean the baby, change the bedding, wash the clothes, and repeat. You could tell the poor guy felt terrible - his tummy was rumbling and he could just not settle - but he never cried. He just wanted to be left alone in his crib. I'm not sure if this is a product of his orphanage life or just his personality, but he did not want to be held and comforted. If we tried, he would just arch his back and point to the crib. We think we all probably ate something bad since Kanhka and I didn't feel quite right either, but luckily we never got sick. Even more of a blessing though, by the morning Luke was feeling better too. Just in time for a day of traveling.
On Friday morning, the end of our 6 days in Xi'an, Luke's birth certificate and his Chinese passport were all completed and ready for pick up. This means we could now legally leave his province with him, but we still have about a weeks worth of appointments and waiting to do in Guangzhou, where the US embassy is located, before being able to travel home. While all of the paper work and waiting time (before and after being matched with Luke) can be frustrating, it is all important to assure that international adoptions are of true orphans and free of fraud. China is part of the Hague convention, an international convention that helps regulate adoptions. This was important to us since many countries do still struggle with corruption within their systems, and we therefore only looked at countries that were part of the Hague convention when we started considering where to adopt from. For anyone considering international adoption, I'd recommend reading more about it. But now I've digressed...
Yesterday evening Luke took his first plane ride and did great! He loved watching planes on the runway and then slept the entire rest of the trip. We landed in South East China where the weather is warmer and the skies BLUE!! I didn't realize how much I missed seeing the sun shine in Beijing and Xi'an until we left our hotel this morning. Unlike the other two cities, there is virtually no smog here. Guangzhou is the third largest city in China with 18 million people, and the hub of a lot of international business. Because it has one of the US Consulate offices, it is also the hub for US adoptions. I was blown away this morning at breakfast seeing all of the adoptive families at the buffet. There are probably no less than 20 American adoptive families in our hotel alone, on this one day. It seems like such a large number, but in reality it is so few. So few for the need. Some estimates put the number of orphans close to 1 million in China. There are millions upon millions of orphaned children around the world. I look at Luke and think about how different his life will be now. How different our lives will be now. I thank God that He directed us here. And I hope and pray that families will come for the other children too.
Our first appointment here in Guangzhou was for Luke's medical exam. This took place at what appeared to be the equivalent of a health department in the US. He saw two Chinese doctors who looked over his medical history (the limited history that we have), checked vaccine records, and gave him a quick exam. Like his sister at the doctor or dentist, he was too busy watching what they were doing to be bothered by it. They documented his scar under the "skin" exam, and that was it. Once Luke's TB test comes back negative in 48hours (pray that it is negative!) we can officially apply for a US visa. In the meantime, we see the city of Guangzhou.
This afternoon, we discovered a nice park right across the street from our hotel. The lake and flowers were beautiful. Which by the way, the flowers are one of the things that has surprised me most about China - they spend millions of dollars on landscaping and seasonal flowers in all of the big cities. We just walked, took out a paddle boat, and explored with Luke and the Becker family. One of Luke's favorite things to do right now is walk holding both Kanhka and I's hands. If he's on the "wrong side" of one of us, he will stop walking and move to be in between us both so he can have each of our hands. Oh, and it has to be the pinky finger to hold. No other finger will do. This little guy has stolen our hearts...
There was no official blog post from Friday October 20th because we spent most of the day packing and traveling, and because we had a rough night Thursday night which left us all tired Friday. Kanhka and I woke up to the sound of Luke getting sick in his crib around midnight Thursday night/Friday morning. This resulted in a 4 hour cycle of clean the baby, change the bedding, wash the clothes, and repeat. You could tell the poor guy felt terrible - his tummy was rumbling and he could just not settle - but he never cried. He just wanted to be left alone in his crib. I'm not sure if this is a product of his orphanage life or just his personality, but he did not want to be held and comforted. If we tried, he would just arch his back and point to the crib. We think we all probably ate something bad since Kanhka and I didn't feel quite right either, but luckily we never got sick. Even more of a blessing though, by the morning Luke was feeling better too. Just in time for a day of traveling.
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| First Plane Ride |
On Friday morning, the end of our 6 days in Xi'an, Luke's birth certificate and his Chinese passport were all completed and ready for pick up. This means we could now legally leave his province with him, but we still have about a weeks worth of appointments and waiting to do in Guangzhou, where the US embassy is located, before being able to travel home. While all of the paper work and waiting time (before and after being matched with Luke) can be frustrating, it is all important to assure that international adoptions are of true orphans and free of fraud. China is part of the Hague convention, an international convention that helps regulate adoptions. This was important to us since many countries do still struggle with corruption within their systems, and we therefore only looked at countries that were part of the Hague convention when we started considering where to adopt from. For anyone considering international adoption, I'd recommend reading more about it. But now I've digressed...
 |
| Fascinated watching planes take off |
Yesterday evening Luke took his first plane ride and did great! He loved watching planes on the runway and then slept the entire rest of the trip. We landed in South East China where the weather is warmer and the skies BLUE!! I didn't realize how much I missed seeing the sun shine in Beijing and Xi'an until we left our hotel this morning. Unlike the other two cities, there is virtually no smog here. Guangzhou is the third largest city in China with 18 million people, and the hub of a lot of international business. Because it has one of the US Consulate offices, it is also the hub for US adoptions. I was blown away this morning at breakfast seeing all of the adoptive families at the buffet. There are probably no less than 20 American adoptive families in our hotel alone, on this one day. It seems like such a large number, but in reality it is so few. So few for the need. Some estimates put the number of orphans close to 1 million in China. There are millions upon millions of orphaned children around the world. I look at Luke and think about how different his life will be now. How different our lives will be now. I thank God that He directed us here. And I hope and pray that families will come for the other children too.
Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world.
James 1:27
James 1:27
Our first appointment here in Guangzhou was for Luke's medical exam. This took place at what appeared to be the equivalent of a health department in the US. He saw two Chinese doctors who looked over his medical history (the limited history that we have), checked vaccine records, and gave him a quick exam. Like his sister at the doctor or dentist, he was too busy watching what they were doing to be bothered by it. They documented his scar under the "skin" exam, and that was it. Once Luke's TB test comes back negative in 48hours (pray that it is negative!) we can officially apply for a US visa. In the meantime, we see the city of Guangzhou.
This afternoon, we discovered a nice park right across the street from our hotel. The lake and flowers were beautiful. Which by the way, the flowers are one of the things that has surprised me most about China - they spend millions of dollars on landscaping and seasonal flowers in all of the big cities. We just walked, took out a paddle boat, and explored with Luke and the Becker family. One of Luke's favorite things to do right now is walk holding both Kanhka and I's hands. If he's on the "wrong side" of one of us, he will stop walking and move to be in between us both so he can have each of our hands. Oh, and it has to be the pinky finger to hold. No other finger will do. This little guy has stolen our hearts...
Oh my goodness. The pinky finger hold between you two 😍That made me tear up. What a sweet boy God has given you!!! Enjoy Guangzhou!
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