Mary's comments

As Tim wrote we went to the Minority Village today. Thank God it was only about a half an hour away and today was much cooler. While we were in the Village we found some very cute authentic costumes for the two girls. They should be very cute on them. Will have to try them on very soon so that we are sure they fit. We plan on doing more shopping in Guangzhou where the prices are good and there is more choices. We were pretty rushed as far as shopping goes here, well except for Walmart on our own (there we had all the time we could ever have wanted), I got the girls matching sweaters the first day here because of the changeable weather and the local customs. They are really cute. Today the girls got some very inexpensive Barbie type dolls... MeiLi was so thrilled. Karah took all the accessories out right away, but I left MeiLi's in the packaging because I knew she wasn't able to change the doll yet. She did manage to pull off one of the legs already, but it just went back in. (Did I say cheap?) I still have a blow up beach ball I have yet to get out to play with. That should be fun. gotta go and settle the girls down for a nice nights sleep.
God bless,
Mary

Karah at Minority Village

MeiLi's Smiles

A Day in Kunming

Tim writing. We all slept well last night. MeiLi woke up once or twice and cried a little bit but Mary quickly comforted her and she went right back to sleep. We ate at the breakfast buffet with some of the families in our group. Then we boarded the bus and went to the ethnic minority villi ages. It is a cultural center with many minorities and their cultures represented. Because it is a weekday and it is not really the holiday season here, there was not as many shows or cultural demonstrations. Still, we got to talk to several people and the girls at the shops. At one point I stopped to talk with 4 middle aged women having lunch together at a table. I jokingly said to them "现在我是很饿！(xiànzài wo shì hěn è!)" which means "now, I am very hungry!". They then offered me some boiled potatoes dipped in spice and laughingly insisted that I have some. I told my guide to tell them I was was just joking with them but nevertheless, I ate two potatoes and they were delicious. Several people stop and seem amazed to see us with the babies and Chinese girls. I greet them and can speak enough Mandarin to tell them we are adopting the babies & toddlers and that the older girls are already USA citizens. Most of them give me the thumbs up sign, smile and say things about how kind we are and thank us. After we came back from the minority village, another family and us decided to brave the trip to WalMart again to get a few supplies and toys for our girls. We stopped at KFC and got some chicken, mashed potatoes, corn & fries. That was basically a late lunch. On the street walking to & from I had MeiLi in the backpack. After that we came back up to the hotel room; Mary rested with the girls and I went back with some families to the local "Green Lake Park". It was delightful. I only took video on my Sony HandyCam so no stills to post but I will describe it. There were people dancing together. We called it Chinese line dancing and it is something the elder people like to do together. There were several people playing Mahjong. There were groups of people sitting around with traditional Chinese instruments playing music. There was an older couple sitting by the lake on a park bench .. he was playing an instrument called the "Erhu" and his wife sang along to the melody. There were many young couples in love just enjoying being together watching the lake while seated on park benches. There was nothing negative at all in this city park. We all walked back to the hotel and I and another family took the elevator to the 21st floor to see the revolving lounge. The view from there is great and I will perhaps take Mary & the girls up there tomorrow evening for a soft drink & some appetizers. I am using only my HandyCam now because I mistakenly thought that my digital camera charged off of my laptop and the battery went dead. So I did not get many still photos today but mostly video instead. We are getting stills with Mary's camera but I did not get any complete family photos today (my bad - sorry), Mary took a few of me & the girls. Today was just a wonderful day. MeiLi has been quiet and reserved and content to ride on my back today. Tonight in the hotel room she is getting rambunctious and actually tossing a few toys around and laughing & talking a lot (albeit we don't know her language). Karah and MeiLi are just now getting ready to go into the tub & it is Mary's turn to bathe them. They are squealing with delight and gathering their toys for the tub. I also had a turn today about an hour ago, there was this somewhat familiar odor coming from MeiLi and I looked over at Mary and twitched up my nose; Mary responded by raising her eyebrows. I then pointed at Mary; she then pointed at me and said "I did it last time" So, it has been a couple years since I had to do this. Oh, the joys of fatherhood :-)

Group at Shilin

Here's most of our group at the Stone Forest today.

MeiLi's smile revealed

We have gotten to see MeiLi smile a few times now and Karah teased a smile out of her today. Here is her delightful smile! Her skin is dark because she was apparently outside in the sun and

has a dark tan. Today she could not be removed from Mary while we were at the stone forest. I think that is a good thing; she is attached to Mary. Karah and MeiLi are now bathed, fed & ready for bed; they are watching some Kid's videos together. One of them was "Nihao Kai-Lan" from Nickalodeon. MeiLi was jumping and playing out the parts with Karah.

Visit to the Shilin (Stone Forest)

This is Mary writing today, Tim has bath time duty tonight! Several families decided since we had a day off today that we would travel the extra couple of hours and spend the extra expense to see the World Heritage site Shilin. For all those who suggested we went, Thank You so much... it was absolutely beautiful. We first traveled around the smaller forest in a couple of trams which was especially easier for those with little babies. Then we got out and walked through the Large part of the forest... the rock formations were almost unbelievable. There were even a couple times I had to warn those behind me to watch out for low ceiling areas. We got to the middle of the area and were "convinced" that we needed to dress up in the "Yi" ethnic group's clothes for pictures... It cost us 10 Yuan each, but what a great picture... actually the ones that they took didn't work , but several people in our group took some so we didn't miss out. In fact, several other people wanted there picture taken with our girls. We then went to lunch at an authentic chinese resturant with duck being the main course... the whole duck, head and all. But I must admit it did taste pretty good the little bit I ate of it (MeiLi was eating most of mine). She was so excited and chowed down big time, helping herself to several pieces of vegetables and rice. She is really starting to bond to me alot, in fact she refused to have Daddy hold her twice for me to do something with Karah. (That's part of the reason he has bath duty tonight, plus its his turn) I have had an interesting time tyring to fit 3 of us girls in the little bathroom stalls to use the public "squatty potty" . We have used A LOT of hand sanitizer after each use, and I have to say that my girls are pros at it now. The bus ride back was like riding in a bumpy sauna... the air conditioning didn't make it to the back of the bus where we were at all very well...and I had a sleeping little girl against me, so that made me even more sweaty. Karah has made great friends with the Morgan/Strubar girls and another little 10 year old little girl named Taylor ... They were pretending the whole way back... something about mommy, daddy and baby. Well the girls are out of the tub and we are getting ready to order room service again since it is about 7:30 and we don't want to redress the girls to go out. We had a fun day overall. -Mary

MeiLi was mourning a bit this afternoon. Mary is comforting her. It's afternoon nap time. After that we will go for Dinner. We are waiting here in Kunming for MeiLi's Chinese passport to be processed and delivered to us. That takes a few days. I have more time to write now. Karah has begun to be jealous a bit too. She is teetering between becoming the "Jie-jie" (elder sister) and

being the "bao-bei" (treasured baby of the family); sometimes she wants Mary to hold her at the same time Mary is holding MeiLi. This is all to be expected. Karah told me it is OK for me to also call MeiLi my bao-bei, but I told Karah she will always also be my bao-bei. Karah & MeiLi walk around holding hands. I'll try to get a picture of that.

After visiting the flower market, we went to a Jade market. We bought both Karah and MeiLi a nice keepsake necklace, not very expensive. The necklace has thier Chinese year of birth characters carved on jade; Karah's is the goat and MeiLi's is the rooster. After that we went to McDonald's. It was interesting. I stepped up to the counter and said "Qing ge wo liang ge da french fries" The young man taking the order understood and gave me 2 large fries for the girls. That was just a snack. We then came back to the hotel to rest up a bit.

Today, we woke up & had breakfast in the Hotel at the buffet. MeiLi has a very healthy appetite. Karah has been a very good big sister helping to feed her and teaching MeiLi how to interact with us. We have actually had a smiles but I have not been able to get a picture of her smiling yet. I have one of her talking I'll post here. We went to visit the flower market. I would have liked to spend half the day there. The local families working there were very friendly and curious. I was able to tell them that we are from the USA and where my girls are from (Chongqing and Honghe), & how old they are. MeiLi seems to fit right in. Karah knows how to tell her some things in Mandarin like hold my hand ( wo wo de shou) . MeiLi understands Karah's body language and is communicating well with us but I doubt she understands the Mandarin words. She seems to be content and interested in what we are doing.

Last night went well. We made another harrowing trip to WalMart to get needed baby/toddler supplies. This Walmart is hard to describe. It's like the center of a shopping mall and has other stores all built around it. It is 3 stories and has a hard to find entrance on the second floor, then multiple exits. We started out at the hotel and then several families with babies filed down the narrow alleys & streets with the babies. I had MeiLi in a back carrier. There is no apparent right-of-way for pdestrians so you have to be very careful. The Walmart also has ramps between floors to push the shopping carts up & down. It seems very dangerous if there is a lot in the cart. We bought two bright pink Walmart shopping bags (they don't give you bags for free) and Mary put MeiLi baack up on my back as we left the store. So I had MeiLi on my back and a pink walmart bag full of supplies in each hand. We had seperated from the group so Mary & I walked back to the hotel; we sort of got lost for about 20 minutes but we finally managed to get back to the hotel. I had to cool off (I'm no spring chicken and this is over 6000 feet in elevation). Aftera bit of rest we went across the street and found a restaurant that has good western food. I got a hamburger, Mary got pizza, MeiLi & Karah had spaghetti with ham & cheese in it. It was very good. We were seated in an upstairs area which had the windows all open with no screens. This is a sub-tropical area that is called the city of eternal spring so the temperature is very nice. In the restaurant the vines halfway cover all the windows so it seemed like being in the jungle. After dinner we came back to the hotel and bathed the girls together. They played with some plastic toys we bought at Walmart. The girls & Mary retired in the King size bed & I sleep on a cot. We all slept very well. MeiLi woke up once and cried but Mary comforted her quickly & it seemed she was just thirsty. There was a thunderstorm right about the time we went to sleep so we got a good light show and it poured rain.

Mei-Mei is with us!

This is Tim writing..We have MeiLi! It was a very emotional day for all of us and the other families. MeiLi is now calm in the hotel room. She is accepting food and drink, and is playing well with Karah. She does not speak Mandarin or understand it. She has been saying a few words in her own dialect which is called "Mile" (mee-lay). We met the orphanage director and the nanny who has been taking care of MeiLi. They told us that MeiLi was actually an orphanage child but the nanny took her home with her at night and was her foster mother. We have no smiles yet but she seems to be settling in fine. I can't really describe how I feel, finally being able to hold her and kiss her cheeks. I'm letting Mary do the initial bonding right now so I will put up more photos later. Words just can't describe this. Thank you Lord that everything has come together for our daughter to finally be with us.

We are getting ready to go to sleep tonight. We had an interesting jaunt down the street to a 3 story Walmart. The first floor was mainly raw meats and vegetables and if you have ever been in an Asian Market you would understand that it was stomach turning. The second level was dry groceries which wasn't too bad and the top was regular household and clothing sort of stuff. It really didn't have as much as I had expected. I was able to buy the girls sweaters (since our baggage was too heavy before). And we got another suitcase to bring some souvenirs home. It was a job to get to the store and back again. The road was threatening and so we had to walk down to an underpass to get there... it was like spokes of a wheel so we had to keep peeking up to the top to see if we were at the right street... we did finally made it back, and ordered room service... then Karah fell asleep... so I guess hers goes into the frig. Tomorrow is the BIG day and we have already been warned that it will be fast and long. I guess that since two areas are coming from a long ways away, they have to get it all done tomorrow and get back. So we had better get to sleep like Karah so we will be ready for it. -Mary

Karah Climbed the Great Wall!

We arrived in Kunming. We are now in our room at the Grand Park hotel.

I'm feeling quite stressed at the moment for several reasons that I will not go into but everything is OK with us. Tomorrow is our forever family day when we meet MeiLi!

Today we visited the Great Wall & the Summer Palace. It's been very fast paced.
Tomorrow we fly to Kunming!

Great Wall Visit

北京
北京
北京 北
Today we went to see Tienanmen Square and the Forbidden City. Really we just walked through it about 1/2 mile. It is so grand in scale that it's hard to get good pictures. It was warmer there than by the lakes & trees of the Hutong area we were at yesterday. We met our group today also & are getting to know everyone. We came back to the hotel and went swimming for awhile. Now, back at the room, Karah is napping & we are relaxing.

More Hutong Moments

Here are a few more photos from yesterday in the Hutong area of Beijing. The young lady with Karah is helping to guide us. She is a local university student. Her name is "Sunny". We really appreciate her help and Beijing hospitality.

Karah seems to really like her a lot.