Story of China Trip

This narrative has been written so that Lexi will have some idea of what our experience was like when we traveled to China to adopt her.

Special thanks is extended to Jim Clower and especially to Xixi.

Day 1, Friday June 29:
Cathy and I woke up around 1:00 AM this morning. Our first flight is out of Peoria and leaves at 6:00 AM. Jim, our adoption coordinator told us not to miss the flight out of Los Angeles to Guangzhou. Cathy, my mother and I drove to Kewanee to meet up with Cathy's mother. Cathy's mother and father were going to drive their van to the Peoria airport and we followed them in our car. I didn't know how to get to the airport and Cathy's dad drove kind of fast so for a while we lost them. We made it there in plenty of time though. We took the early flight out of Peoria so as to leave us plenty of time in case we were delayed for some reason. We told Cathy's dad good-bye and boarded the jet to Chicago. The four of us are on our way.

June 29 10:20 AM:
We made our connecting flight at O'Hare airport in Chicago to Los Angeles (LAX). On the flight to LA from Chicago we had two young men and a young woman sitting behind us. They talked and laughed real loud all the way to LA. It was really getting to be annoying. We flew over the Grand Canyon. That was the first time I'd seen the Grand Canyon. We were in LA by 10:20 AM. Our flight to Guangzhou is scheduled to leave at 12:00 midnight. We considered going into LA to take a look around, but since we aren't familiar with LA we planned to just wait in the airport. It was a long day, but that was okay. We waited so long for this day there was no way we were going to miss this flight.

June 29 6:00 PM:
We've sat in the airport all day. The women went for a walk at one point and I sat in the chairs to watch the luggage. Some guy came by and tried to get me to give him $25.00. He claimed he needed it for airfare to somewhere. He showed me some money in his hand and claimed he had to get somewhere in a hurry. I didn't give him any money and then watched him ask some other people the same thing.

We ate about an hour ago at a place called Creative Croissants. My sandwich was real creative. I ordered a Santa Fe Chicken Croissant sandwich. I ate most of it and when I picked up the last few bites of the sandwich I noticed a big bug in the wrapper. It looked like a big tic. I got my money back, but somehow didn't feel good about the deal.

Sitting in these chairs at the airport doesn't provide the best place to take a nap. We all dozed a bit, but mostly just sat around watching the people walk by. There was a small store in the international terminal that sold beanie babies. We don't collect beanie babies, but they had one called Cassie that I planned to buy on the way home. It was a beanie baby of a Collie (dog). I thought it was cute and I had two stuffed Lassie dogs when I was a little kid. I didn't want to carry it all the way to China and back so I didn't buy it today.

At one point, while we were sitting in the international terminal Richard Dreyfus walked by. He seemed quite a bit shorter than I thought he would be.

Around 8:00 PM or 9:00 PM we started to meet some of the other people in our group. We had previously met one of the other couples so we knew what they looked like. We met most of the other parents while standing in line to get our boarding passes. Later, Jim assembled all of us near the gate and discussed a few things. We took our first group pictures at this point.

Day 2, June 30/July 1: Top
Our jet was supposed to depart L.A. at 12:00 (midnight). However, due to some delays we didn't actually take off until 1:30 AM (3:30 AM home time). At this point, we'd been up for about 26 1/2 hours. We flew on South China airlines. Shortly after take off they fed us a meal. I asked the stewardess if one of the items they served us was squid. She laughed and said it was a Chinese salad. Cathy thought it was sliced mushrooms. There was some other item that looked like it might be a two-colored piece of cream cheese. Cathy said it tasted terrible. I passed on it. The shrimp was good though. The entree was chicken, rice and some greens. That tasted good. By the time we finished eating Cathy and I were really exhausted. I fell asleep and slept for 10 hours. They told us the flight would tale 14 1/2 hours. Cathy slept for a couple of hours and woke up nauseous. She didn't get sick though. The accommodations on the jet were excellent. We had nice big seats that reclined and they also had a small footrest that came out a bit kind of like a Lazy Boy recliner. The jet was quite spacious with lots of headroom and two aisles. Having two aisles made it so much easier to move around. Each seat had a small video screen. The video monitors showed movies for free, but you had to pay to get the sound. The movies did have subtitles, but they were in Chinese so that didn't do us much good. We watched "Meet the Parents" and "Play it Forward". I had seen "Meet the Parents" before so I had some idea of what they were saying. The video monitor also had a GPS (Global Positioning System). That was nice because it would tell us where we were at and how far/time it was to our destination. Each seat also contained a pillow, blanket, slippers and a small pouch or purse. The pouch contained a razor, toothbrush and paste, eye patches, earplugs and a few other items. I had brought my own eye patches and earplugs, but was really glad they provided the toothbrush and paste after about 36 hours without brushing my teeth. About 1 1/2 hours before we landed they served us breakfast. They offered us a choice of an American or Chinese breakfast. Cathy and I decided to get the American breakfast. It was good. It consisted of an omelet, fruit, muffin, croissant and juice. We arrived in Guangzhou China at 6:05 AM (home time). The flight took 14 hours and 35 minutes from LA to Guangzhou.

As we made our decent to Guangzhou we got our first look at China. Unfortunately, it was a rather drab and dreary day. It rained a bit, but not too bad. We exited the jet onto the tarmac. We entered the terminal and had to go through customs before we could get our luggage. We formed several single file lines to go through customs. A rather large sign stated that we should stand behind a line while we waited our turn and that we should present our documents one at a time. I waited behind the line while Cathy presented her documents. She kept telling me to come up to the counter with her. I didn't want to go because of the sign. Finally, I went up to the counter. The man behind the immigration desk looked at me and didn't seem too happy. A Chinese man standing in the line next to me said, "In China, we do this one at a time". I stepped back behind the line. It's a funny story to tell after the fact, but at the time I decided it wasn't so funny.

After we got our luggage we met Xixi (pronounced "sea sea"). Two of the fathers in our group immediately got on another plane to fly to an airport near the orphanage where their babies were located. At this point, Xixi told us that she had a surprise. Two of the babies in our group would be arriving today instead of tomorrow. Due to the typhoon that had hit southern China two of the babies arrived a day early. The orphanage director of the orphanage where these babies were located was concerned that they wouldn't be able to make it on July 2 if they waited. Lexi was not one of the babies who would arrive early.

We arrived at the White Swan hotel and after registering made it to our rooms. It was nice to unpack and relax a bit. We decided to check out the stores that were located in the hotel. The lobby of the White Swan hotel had several large jade carvings. They were for sale of course and were quite nice, but very expensive. In the main part of the lobby there was a jade carving of a fairly large ship. It was quite intricate.

The lobby area of the White Swan also has a pond with a rather large waterfall. It's very pretty. The waterfall is constructed in such a way that you can stand underneath and slightly behind it without getting wet. The area where the waterfall is located is an atrium. The second and third floors overlook the pond and waterfall. The pond had quite a few koi fish.

Jim and Xixi showed us around some of the local stores such as China Doll, Jennifer's Place, and 7 Eleven. There was a meat market down the street from the hotel. All of the "meat" was still alive. They had fish, lobster, crabs, clams, turtles and snakes. I also walked through a local park and saw some elderly people playing a game I believe was mahjongg.

We went back to the hotel room to relax for a bit. I decided to take a few pictures with my film camera. I brought my 35mm SLR, a digital camera and our video camera. I took a few pictures out of the hotel room window. I also went out into the hall and walked out onto a small balcony. Our room was at the end of the hall and we were several stories high. We had a pretty good view from this location. I took some pictures of the Pearl River and the hotel grounds from the balcony. The hotel had a rather large bamboo structure or framework secured to the side of the hotel. The bamboo framework was used to hold some decorative lights. At night the lights depicted a boat sitting on the water, some red flags and the sun. As I stood on the balcony to take some pictures I had to hold the camera out away from my body in order to take the pictures without getting the bamboo in the picture.

Later, we all met and went out to eat together for the first time. Most of the meals we ate in China were eaten as a group. Typically, we would go to a restaurant and sit at two tables. They would bring out several dishes and place food on a large lazy Susan. We just ate whatever looked good. They usually served rice, but there was considerable variety. At out first meal we were served whole cooked shrimp. The shrimp still had their eyes. There were a few things I couldn't identify. Xixi was disappointed that we didn't eat a delicacy of baby pigskin, chicken wings, BBQ pork and something else I couldn't identify. We went back to the hotel to get a good night's sleep. Tomorrow we will get Lexi at the CAB office.

Day 4, Monday July 2 (Today is the big day.): Top
Yesterday was a big day and a full day. Xixi told us to be at the hotel's rear entrance at 8:00AM sharp. She stressed that we shouldn't be late. We got up at 6:00 AM and we ate a breakfast of Pop-Tarts and oatmeal in our room. We were heading downstairs at 7:40 AM when we met one of the other adoptive mothers in our group. She said her husband didn't come back from breakfast yet. I told her that we'd look for him. I found him in the restaurants as he was heading back up stairs. I'm sure his wife had a word or two with him. However, we all made it to the back entrance in time. We all got on our bus and rode to the CAB office. Xixi told us that we worked for 1 1/2 years on the adoption and then everything happens in one day. We're a little nervous since our lives will change forever this morning. It was also exciting though to finally get to see Lexi with our own eyes and to get to hold her. Xixi asked us to stand outside the CAB office building for a few minutes while she spoke to someone inside. It had rained slightly that morning, but it stopped while we waited outside. We stood around for a few minutes and took a few pictures. We went in and went up to the third floor. Jim told us that we were blessed with an elevator. He said this was rather unusual for a Chinese government office. Cathy and Steve Stella and Cathy and I would get to hold our babies for the first time this morning. Cindy and Richard Richter and Jim and Judy King got their babies the day before. All four families and our mothers went to the CAB office to do the paper work. We walked into a small waiting room and after about 15 minutes Xixi said the babies would arrive within 5 minutes. Cathy and I and the two other adoptive parents looked at each other and smiled. A few minutes later we saw a few people walk past the waiting room door. They came back and entered the room carrying our babies. I looked at the first baby and was pretty sure she was Lexi. I looked at another baby and knew that this second baby was the Stella's baby. I then looked back at Lexi and was sure it was her. Cathy was sure she was looking at Lexi as soon as she saw Lexi. There were also a few other babies from this same orphanage who would be adopted by people we didn't know. The orphanage worker handed Lexi to Cathy and we drank her in. Lexi looked at Cathy and then looked at me with wide-open beautiful eyes. She didn't cry and just kept looking at us and around the room. Cathy let me hold Lexi and she still seemed happy. She continued to check us out. Shortly thereafter Xixi came in the room and told us to walk down the hall to have our first family picture taken. They took the picture and it would be placed into a vinyl folder with a Chinese document. We stood in this room for a bit and the Stella's were also asked to enter the room to have their picture taken. We met the woman who was Lexi's caretaker in the orphanage. Cathy had brought a book entitled, "I Love You Like Crazy Cakes" and we asked this woman (through Xixi) to sign the book. She signed it and she seemed quite nice although we weren't able to talk to her since we didn't speak a common language. The woman held her arms out requesting to hold Lexi for the last time. Lexi went to her and we took their picture. When the woman handed her back to me Lexi cried for the first time since we got her. She obviously knew this woman much better than she knew us, but the crying didn't last very long. As we exited that room we stopped in the doorway. It was really the first time the three of us were alone together. I was holding Lexi and Cathy put a hand on her. I said, "You are so beautiful" and we both shed a tear or two. We walked back to the waiting room and there were several people waiting with their babies. The Stella's baby was crying a bit and they soon learned that she liked to be walked around the room. No one cared that the Stella's baby and some of the other babies were crying. Jim and others had warned us that while we are going to be thrilled to meet our new child that they might not be so happy about it. Jim told us that to our new baby we "look funny, sound funny and smell funny". He told us not to be surprised if the baby is rather cranky. Lexi and the Stella's baby wore the same T-shirt and shorts. Two other couples that were not in our group also adopted babies from this same orphanage and those babies were similarly dressed. They looked like little baseball players. After a short wait Xixi would direct us to a few more offices on this floor of the building. We signed various documents and answered their questions. Jim had told us not to "dress up" for these meetings. The people who work at these offices don't expect us to wear suits or fancy clothes and they were not dressed in this manner either. At some point I noticed that Lexi's ear was wet inside. She didn't complain though. She also seemed a bit congested.

While we were waiting in this room I spoke to some of the other parents that we didn't know. Once couple was from Alaska. They said they flew over in the same jet we took to Guangzhou. They had to fly to Los Angeles and then take a jet to China. The odd part is that the jet from L.A. flies north across part of Alaska on its way to Guangzhou. Another couple we met was from Wisconsin. Since we were in China it seemed like they were practically next-door neighbors to us back home.

At one point we filled out a form that we checked and rechecked several times. Jim also checked the form. This information had to be 100% correct. The wording of our names and other information had to be an exact match of what we had written on the other documents we filled out. If the information we filled out was not correct the "golden eyes" would reject it. Xixi referred to these office workers as the "golden eyes". These people were Chinese government workers who examine these documents every day. They can spot any discrepancy. The "golden eyes" were so concerned about the forms because these documents would be sent to the United States. It would be very difficult to get a discrepancy straightened out after we returned to the U.S. Xixi would instruct us when it was time to go to an office or if we were to wait in the waiting room. She would order us in a strong voice, but not a rude voice. I was happy that she treated us this way because I realized that she was quickly working us through the process and new what she was doing.

Shortly before we left the CAB office Cathy noticed that Lexi's ears were full of puss. We got on the bus and drove to the Public Security Office. I'm not sure of the purpose for this stop, but all 4 families went into the office. We sat in a section of chairs until our names were called. They reviewed our passports and we were out of there in 15 minutes. I was surprised that this stop was completed so quickly. When we got back on the bus Jim told us that the morning's activities went very smoothly. He said we should all be aware that Xixi had everything planned out in sequence very efficiently. Jim said that in the past he had seen the process we completed in a few hours that morning take up to 3 or 4 days to complete. We all clapped in appreciation of Xixi. It was well deserved and we were quite grateful.

After we left the public security office we all went to a restaurant for lunch. We sat down and had some soup. We put a bib on Lexi and she started to cry real hard. We took the bib off and tried to give her some soup, but she cried even harder and wouldn't stop crying. Cathy was holding her and at one point said, "she's having trouble breathing". Xixi picked Lexi up and walked her around a bit. Another Chinese woman at the restaurant took Lexi and got her to settle down a bit. I ate while Xixi and the other Chinese woman tried to settle Lexi down. Cathy wasn't hungry. After a while I took Lexi and tried to settle her down. She wasn't crying quite as hard, but she wasn't very happy either. Some of the younger women who worked in the restaurant helped settle Lexi down. We tried to give Lexi some soup, but she wouldn't eat any of it. It's worth mentioning here again that Lexi probably wasn't feeling very well due to the ear problem and the congestion.

Eventually, Lexi cried herself out and after we returned to the hotel Xixi took us to see the hotel doctor. They told us Lexi had an ear infection, bronchitis and a small abrasion under her bottom lip. She also had a slight infection in her fingernails. They were kind of white and at the time we thought that was why she liked to suck on them. Much later, we learned that she just liked to suck on her fingers infection or not.

The nurses at the clinic cleaned quite a bit of gunk out of her ear and gave her a shot in the hip. They also had her breathe from a nebulizer to help clear the bronchitis. They cleaned her fingers with some disinfectant and then wrapped her hands in gauze. They told us to put socks on her hands to keep her from sucking on her fingers. She really hated all of this and I held her while they worked on her. They gave us three bottles of colored medicine to give her three times a day. After the visit to the clinic we went back to the hotel room to try and relax. We tried to give her a bottle of formula and it took us forever to get it ready. We could boil water, but we weren't sure which type of formula she would eat. We either had to use bottled water or boil the tap water for her bottle. We bought some formula called S26. Xixi said that the S26 formula was the expensive stuff. It cost $8 a can. Most babies in this area drink a formula that cost $2 a can. Lexi wouldn't eat the S26 formula. We did manage to get some of the three types of medicines down her though.

At one point when we were in the hotel doctor's office I asked Jim if it was okay for Lexi to drink formula made with tap water from the hotel. We knew that Cathy and I were not supposed to drink the water. When I said this Jim's face went straight and he said, "Oh no, she can't have that water". I looked at Cathy and the both of us thought, "What have we done!". After a few tense moments Xixi asked if we boiled the water before we gave it to her. Both Cathy and I quickly answered that we had boiled the water. It's hard to adequately describe the relief and other emotions that coursed through us at that time. I was holding Lexi while this was happening and she was already not feeling well. I had visions of Lexi with terrible diarrhea, more medicines and a much worse illness. It was a tremendous relief to realize that we did not put Lexi through more pain and suffering. After that scare we decided to only give her bottled water.

On Monday evening (this same day) we decided to stay at the hotel instead of eating out with the group. The 5 of us (Cathy, Lexi, myself and the grandmothers) went to the deli down the street. We were kind of hoping there would be some American food, but it was all Chinese food. We asked for the food "to go" and went back to the hotel room.

Lexi slept through the night, but Cathy and I only slept about half the night.

Day 5, Tuesday July 3: Top
Lexi woke up a happy baby and took almost an entire bottle. This greatly relaxed her parents. We let her relax a bit and then gave her the three medicines. She hated it of course, but she did get some of it down. After that we gave he a sponge bath on the bed. She didn't like it very much but towards the end she decided it wasn't too bad and relaxed a bit. The medicines seemed to knock her out. We had two appointments with the doctor scheduled for this day. After the morning appointment we were back in the hotel room. Cathy said, "we've had Lexi for 24 hours". I said, "and we've only been to the doctor 3 times".

All 6 families went to a market place before lunch. We took a bus to get to the market. The market was actually several small stores located on a few streets. There were lots of shoe stores and many other small stores. Most of these stores were smaller than a single-car garage. We ate at a restaurant that Xixi said was the second oldest restaurant in Guangzhou. We liked the food at this restaurant. I don't mean to imply that we didn't like the other food, but this food was similar to the Chinese food we would get at a Chinese restaurant back home in the U.S.

We went to the doctor again. The doctor said we should have given Lexi the 3 medicines before we came to the afternoon doctor visit. After her examination they said we should come again the following day in the morning.

We all (6 families) went to a restaurant for dinner that served snakes. This restaurant was located on a body of water. Xixi likes to eat snakes. Robert Richter also liked to eat snakes (Robert is from Texas, rattlesnake round up territory). The snakes are alive and in cages. We walked past the snake cages as we walked through the restaurant to get to our table. They asked us to pick out the snake we wanted to eat. Xixi said the more poisonous the snake the better it tastes. We let Xixi pick it out and she picked out a 5-step snake. It is called a 5-step snake because if this snake bites you you are only supposed to live for 5 more steps. They also had 1 cobra. Xixi said the restaurant had to have a special permit in order to serve snake. Not every restaurant could sell snake because the snakes are wild animals, not farm raised. A man put on a glove that looked like a large oven mitt and reached into the cage to retrieve our snake. The snake wasn't out of the cage very long before he cut its head off. He then drained some of the snake's blood into a small cup. He slit the snake open and Xixi said he drained some of the gall bladder juice into another cup. He then removed the entrails and put the snake into a plastic sack. We all walked past this area (where the snakes and other animals were located) and entered our dining room. We sat down and I noticed the man with the snake had followed us into this room. I noticed he had the sack with the snake in it in his hand. I could see that the snake was still moving although I'm sure it was dead. We were in a rather large room and there was a group of about a dozen Chinese people sitting near us. I didn't understand anything they said, but they appeared to be having a very good time. They were talking and laughing and the acoustics were such that it was rather loud to be in this room. They weren't rude, just having a good time. After a while the food arrived. Some of it was rather colorful. They brought out the snake on a platter. It had been cut into sections in such a way that it appeared as though they laid the snake on a cutting board and sliced it up into 3 or 4 inch sections. I believe it was spiced rather heavily and may have been broiled. Xixi and Robert ate most of it, but I also tried a piece or two. It was kind of spicy and I guess it tasted like chicken. They also brought out the snake skin on a bead of noodles. I didn't eat any of the skin. Steve Weatherall said, "We make boots out of that back home".

This restaurant also had several other live animals in the area where the snakes were located. They had a pretty large cage that contained lots of birds, mostly chickens. I noticed one small cage, about the size of a parakeet cage contained toads. For a minute I thought they served toads, but then realized that they probably fed the toads to the snakes. I noticed that one of the fish tanks contained largemouth bass. They looked exactly like the largemouth bass I catch back home.

We (the group) returned to the hotel and then went to a photography store across the street. We needed to get a passport photograph for Lexi's passport and the other baby's passports. She didn't like it when we sat her on the seat to have her picture taken. We held her there so she wouldn't fall, but she kind of cried anyway. When we got her actual picture she was crying, but it was kind of cute. We returned to the hotel and gave Lexi a bottle. She took some of it and then we gave her the three medicines. We went to bed exhausted. We laid in bed for probably less than 60 seconds when Lexi threw up her formula. It was quite a mess. She got it all over her face. We cleaned her up, but it was kind of difficult. We didn't want to use the tap water because it's not fit to drink. Lexi constantly sucks on her fingers so we used bottled water. After we went to bed Lexi would attempt to clear her throat about every three minutes. It kind of worried us, but she slept through the night.

Day 6, Wednesday July 4: Top
What a day this turned out to be. We tried to get Lexi to eat and drink this morning, but didn't have much success. We took Lexi to the medical clinic in the hospital and they decided that we should go to the Guangzhou children's hospital to get Lexi a penicillin shot and maybe a chest x-ray. Before leaving the clinic they cleaned Lexi's ears again. Xixi and Jim thought we should take Lexi to see Susan. Susan is a Chinese doctor who was staying in a room on the 16th floor. She is caring for a Chinese baby that will be adopted. She seemed intelligent. She examined Lexi's ears and she agreed that Lexi should go to the children's hospital for a penicillin shot. Several times she stated that the hospital would take good care of her and that they only use each needle one time.

The other families in our group were going to a museum and were waiting for us to finish seeing Susan. We all got on the tour bus and headed out. Earlier that day we were aware that we probably would not be going to the museum so I loaned my mother our video camera. She didn't know how to run it so I gave her a crash course in how to use the camera.

The first stop was at the children's hospital. Xixi, Cathy, Lexi and I got off the bus. We walked into the hospital and Xixi asked us to wait at this one spot while she spoke to a woman at the registrar's office. We could see Xixi speaking to the woman behind the counter. The woman looked at us and said something to Xixi. Xixi came back with a smile on her face. Xixi had told her that we were Americans adopting a Chinese baby and that the baby had bronchitis. The woman behind the counter said, "Big noses, bronchitis..., upstairs". We laughed when Xixi told us this story. Apparently, there had been a number of Americans who came to the hospital with Chinese babies who had bronchitis. During our trip Xixi would refer to us Americans as "Big noses". We called her "The Dragon Lady". None of this was serious or malicious, it was all in fun.

We walked up two flights of stairs. This place is very busy with lots of parents and kids. Many of these people stared at us like we were a two-headed calf at the county fair. Some of the people were nice and smiled at us too. I think most of the people were just interested in getting their kids in to see the doctor so they could get out of there and get back to their day. Xixi asked us to wait on a bench while she walked into an office. She came back after a few minutes and said, "Let's go". Xixi said she paid an extra $9.00 to get us a more private doctor's office. This doctor's office would also have a much shorter line because most people would not pay the extra fee. I told Xixi she made a good decision.

We waited in the doctor's waiting room for a few minutes. There were only a couple other people in this waiting room. As I looked around the room I couldn't help but notice this rather unusual phone on one of the tables. It wasn't sitting on someone's desk and I'm not sure whether it had a special purpose. It was an older style phone with a dial, not buttons. The two most unusual aspects of the phone were its size and color. It was red and very large. The part you hold up to your mouth and ear was normal size, but the rest of it was really big. It was really rather odd. I joked that it must be the bat (Batman) phone. I later told one of the other men in our group about this phone and he said it must have been the direct line to Mau. After a short wait we were allowed to see the doctor. She was an older woman and she examined Lexi. She didn't speak English, but Xixi was there to translate for us. She agreed that Lexi should get penicillin. She prescribed 4 penicillin shots for Lexi over the course of two days. Lexi was to receive a shot in the morning and another in the afternoon for two days. She also said we could get a chest x-ray if we wanted. We said we'd like Lexi to have the chest x-ray. The doctor also said that Lexi's mouth was crooked when she cried. We thought this was an odd thing to say although it was true. Later, Xixi told us the doctor felt that her mouth was crooked because of the sore under her bottom lip. She had a slight abrasion under her lip.

We went back downstairs and waited by the x-ray room. While we waited to be called we changed Lexi's diaper. We changed Lexi's diaper and then went into the x-ray room. The x-ray machine looked modern, but the stand they asked us to set Lexi on looked really old. Lexi hated sitting on this stand because she was kind of confined to a small space. We then went to a different area of the hospital to get Lexi her shot. This portion of the hospital is an open-air section. The offices surrounded a courtyard. There were many offices with lots of glass. You could see through a few rows of offices due to the glass. There were lots of kids in this area getting shots. It was assembly-line injections, but orderly. They did a test on Lexi's arm to see if she has a reaction to the penicillin. We then waited 20 minutes. Lots of kids were screaming because they didn't want the shots. Some of the kids seemed to be very brave. I saw one girl who looked to me to be about 9 years old. She got a shot near her lower neck or close to the shoulder blade. She cried a bit, but seemed to handle it quite well. Lexi didn't have a reaction so we went back to the small office to get her the shot. We got in very quickly. People are only in these small offices long enough to get the shot and then they get out so someone else can get their shot. Lexi hated her shot of course and cried really hard. We sat in the waiting area for 15 more minutes and then caught a taxi back to the hotel.

Xixi said we should stop at the deli to get something to eat before going back to the hotel. After eating lunch we went back to the hotel to try to get Lexi to take some formula. She wouldn't eat much. At 4:00 PM Xixi, Lexi and I went back to the children's hospital to get Lexi her second penicillin shot. We took a taxi to the hospital. The same woman gave Lexi her second shot. While Lexi and I waited for 15 minutes in the chairs after her shot Xixi went to check on the x-ray. The x-ray showed that Lexi had bronchitis, but no lung problems. We went back to the hotel and shortly after that we all met downstairs. We walked through the hotel rose garden and ate at a restaurant next to the Pearl River. I believe the restaurant was called The Rose. Our food arrived, but Lexi seemed very warm. It was a warm evening too so Cathy and I took Lexi back to the hotel room. Cathy said I could go back and eat if I wanted so I went back downstairs. It was a nice meal although it was quite a warm evening. Sitting right next to the Pearl River I was rather surprised that there were no mosquitoes bothering us. It was also kind of a pretty area. Across the river there were some large electric signs on the top or side of some tall buildings. I went back upstairs and Lexi was kind of fussy. We gave her the medicine and tried to give her some more formula. We gave her a bath while she played with the toy rings the Gromley's gave us. She seemed pretty happy. Later, when we tried to put her to sleep she had a gagging episode where it sounded like she had difficulty breathing. She would some times throw up or spit out a bit of her formula. We walked her until she tired herself out.

Day 7, Thursday July 5: Top
We woke up this morning and gave Lexi a 1/2 bottle of formula. We put the medicine she needed into the formula as the doctor suggested. She took it but refused a second bottle. Xixi and I took Lexi to the children's hospital to get her the third penicillin shot. When we got back we took Lexi to the hotel clinic. They cleaned her ears, fingers and wrapped her hands with clean gauze. After returning to the hotel room we got ready to go to the Guangzhou zoo. Xixi told us to meet downstairs at 9:30 AM to go to the zoo. Xixi and Jim had to go make some preparations for the babies' visas or make a trip to the CAB. Since they were both gone we had a young Chinese woman named Nancy as our guide to the zoo. She didn't speak or understand English as well as Xixi, but we did okay.

It was really hot this day. Before leaving the hotel I went to the front desk and borrowed some umbrellas. The main reason we went to the zoo was to see the panda bears. When we arrived at the zoo and got off the bus the heat really hit us. We started looking at some birds and after a while Ruth suggested that we see the pandas and then decide what else we wanted to see (due to the heat). Everyone agreed with her suggestion. Nancy wasn't sure where the panda bears were located, but we walked in the general direction. After we walked quite a ways we reached a hill or incline. Cathy told me that Donna (her mother) couldn't walk up the hill. Donna was going to wait until we came back. I had a hard time explaining to Nancy that Cathy and Donna were going to wait at the bottom of the hill for us to return. I wasn't sure we would be coming back this way. After trying to explain the situation to Nancy and not being able to explain it to her I decided to walk up the hill a ways. Fortunately, the panda bear cage was not too much farther from the location where Cathy and Donna were waiting.

When Lexi and I reached the panda bear cage there were two Chinese women and a Chinese man standing right in front of the cage. This made it difficult for us to see the one panda bear they had in the cage. After some time passed the people in front of the cage finally moved and we were able to see the panda and take pictures of it. After that we walked back to where Cathy and Donna were waiting.

Everyone was ready to head back to the bus due to the heat. We found a tram that carried most of us. Nancy, our guide and Steve Stella walked back because all of the seats on the tram were taken. When the tram came to a stop we all looked at each other and realized that we were not back at the entrance where we had entered the park. The tram driver was saying something in Chinese, but we couldn't understand him because Nancy was walking back. The tram driver did speak enough English to tell us to get off the tram. He motioned with his arms and said, "get off, get off". Someone told us he called us lazy Americans because we took the tram instead of walking. No one was very offended by this and we probably would have walked if it wasn't so hot.

We stood around for a bit and tried to decide what we should do. There was a large map of the zoo near the tram so we looked at the map. We decided that we were located at the rear entrance of the zoo. We weren't real concerned about our situation and we decided to just stay put. We were concerned that Nancy might have walked back to the front entrance of the zoo. The babies were pretty hot so Cathy, Lexi and I sat in the shade. We gave Lexi a bottle and she drank some of it. While we were sitting there a Chinese man and his infant son were close to us. The little boy wanted to come close to us, but he was too shy. His father wanted to take a picture of us and his son. We made several attempts to get him to stand next to us, but he was too shy. He smiled and laughed through the entire experience. His father finally took a picture of his son standing somewhat close to us. Shortly thereafter Nancy and Steve showed up. Nancy called the bus driver and he picked us up at the rear entrance.

After we left the zoo we went to a restaurant. This was the same restaurant were we ate lunch on Monday, right after we left the CAB office with Lexi. Lexi liked the restaurant much better this time. This restaurant had several different kinds of meat (whole animals) hanging on hooks behind a window in the kitchen. Like many Chinese restaurants they also had several tanks or aquariums of fish and seafood near the restaurant entrance.

After lunch we went back to the hotel. We had a short rest period and then got ready to go to the medical office. Lexi's grandmothers stayed at the hotel while we went to the medical exam. This medical exam was required before the babies could be issued a visa to enter the United States. Since the medical examination office was a short distance away we just walked over there in a group.

The medical examination office was air-conditioned which was nice. All of the doctors in this office were Chinese, but the exam was being performed in order to get a visa to enter the U.S. so it was not a requirement of the Chinese government. We sat in a waiting area for them to call our names. They would call our name and then we walk into a small office and they would perform some aspect of the medical exam. The first exam was to weigh Lexi. She weighed 14 pounds. We were then lead into another office where a doctor tested her hearing. They shook a baby toy that made noise behind her head and she turned to look at it. She easily passed the hearing test. After that exam was completed they lead us into another room where a doctor would examine her body. Lexi didn't like having the doctor exam her body. Everything was going okay and then the doctor noticed that her mouth was crooked or pulled to one side when she cried. The doctor called another doctor in to look at Lexi. They were speaking in Chinese and then called another doctor in. Xixi was speaking to the doctors while Cathy and I stood there wondering what was going on. The doctors could speak English so they asked us if we knew that Lexi's mouth pulled to one side when she cried. We said that we were aware. I told them that her mouth didn't do that when she smiled or wasn't crying. They asked us to make her smile. By this time Lexi was quite worked up because there were three doctors examining her, Cathy and I were standing next to the gurney and Xixi was also close by. We were in a small area so it was rather crowded. Cathy mentioned that Lexi usually smiled when we took her diaper off so we took it off in an effort to get her to smile. She was quite worked up at this point and wasn't going to smile for anyone. One of the doctors asked us if we would reject or abandon Lexi because of the condition of her mouth. We said we would not abandon her. They asked us if we considered her a special needs child. We said we loved her and would not reject her. After more discussion in Chinese they asked us if we would take Lexi to a doctor when we got back home. We said we would take her to a doctor when we got home. That seemed to satisfy them and we were threw discussing the issue. During this entire ordeal I was concerned of course, but I really didn't think this was going to escalate into an issue where we would not be able to bring Lexi home. Cathy was not so sure.

After the medical exam we walked out side. Xixi told Cathy and I that occassionally an adoptive couple will use the medical exam as an excuse to reject a child. The adoptive parents who want to do this could use some small issue such as Lexi's lip as a reason to reject the child. Xixi said the doctors probably gave us a bit of a hard time to make sure we really wanted to adopt Lexi.

After we left the medical examination office Xixi took the Stella's and us to the children's hospital. Lexi got her last penicillin shot. The Stella's got some medicine and their baby a penicillin shot. After returning to the hotel we decided to order a pizza from Pizza Hut. It was a Hawaiian-ham pizza. It was pretty good, but the cheese was different than what we were used to. We had it delivered to the hotel.

This afternoon, mom asked me to take a look at their TV It wouldn't come on for some reason. I got it going and discovered that we received HBO for free. We didn't have a lot of time to watch it though.

At 8:00 PM all of the adoptive parents met with Jim and Xixi to go over some paper work. This was the most tedious and boring aspect of the entire trip. However, it was necessary. We were going to meet in a room on the main floor of the hotel, but it was rather noisy and would have been difficult to hear. Jim decided that we should just meet in his hotel room. The grandmothers (three of them) were tasked with watching all of the babies while we worked on the paper work. They were going to lay some blankets on the floor outside of our rooms, but the hotel staff said we couldn't do that. I believe some of the babies were pretty tired and fell asleep. They put some of the babies in their cribs and walked/carried some of the other babies.

After the meeting I cleaned out Lexi's ears. There wasn't much gunk in them this time. We also gave Lexi a bottle which contained three types of medicine to battle bronchitis. She didn't take much of it though. We went to bed pretty exhausted.

Day 8, Friday July 6: Top
Today we leave for Guilin. No official tasks are scheduled for Guilin. It is simply a pleasure trip so that we can see some of the country. We paid the hotel a few dollars to leave some of our luggage at the White Swan hotel while we are in Guilin.

Lexi's ears look a lot better this morning. She also ate a fair amount of her cereal. We're trying to get our stuff packed up because they are going to pick up the bags we'll take to Guilin so that we can leave at 10:00 AM. We'll also have some carry on luggage that we'll keep with us.

As we walked through the Guangzhou airport many Chinese people smiled and spoke to us. Apparently, the people at the airport aren't as used to seeing Americans with Chinese babies. At the White Swan Americans with Chinese babies are a dime a dozen. We ate at a restaurant in the airport. Lexi ate some steamed eggs. She is eating and drinking more today than she has on any other day since we got her.

In the Guangzhou airport we stopped at the baggage check counter area. This area of the airport is quite large with very high ceilings. There were also quite a few people at the airport although it wasn't real crowded. While we waited we decided to take a few pictures. Three of the babies were in umbrella strollers and we carried the other three babies. We decided to have the babies in the three strollers line up and have the fathers who were carrying the other three babies stand behind the strollers. We took several pictures and some of the Chinese people in the airport started to gather around us. Some of them took pictures of us too. I showed several Chinese people the card which stated that we were Americans adopting Chinese babies. They would at first look at the card with a rather blank expression and then after they read it they would smile and some of them would give us the thumbs up.

While we were waiting at the baggage check in counter Jim came to me and said there was some problem with my luggage. As we walked towards the check in counter he said something was beeping. At first I didn't know what it might be and then I realized it was a watch I bought just before we left for China. It had an alarm setting that I couldn't turn off. I started looking through the bag, but it was a rather large bag with a lot of stuff in it. After I looked for a bit and was unable to locate it the Chinese person at the counter told me to let it go and not worry about it.

We rode on a bus from the airport to the jet. There aren't any open windows on the bus and it was really hot. It was also raining a bit so it was really humid. The bus had some seating, but was constructed more like a subway car where most of the people stand.

The jet looked like it was quite new. We had to walk up some steps to get on the jet since it wasn't physically connected to the airport. As I walked into the jet I noticed that there was quite a bit of steam or a mist blowing out the vents at the top of the inside of the jet. I believe the air conditioning caused the steam due to the high humidity. There wasn't anything wrong it just looked odd. John Sapp and I and our two girls shared three seats with John sitting next to the window. Lexi likes to lift up the brim of my John Deere baseball hat. Occassionally, she would knock it off my head and it would gently hit her in the face. When this happens she gets scared. This happened as we were sitting on the jet waiting to take off. Lexi threw a fit. Xixi was sitting across the aisle from me. She took Lexi and was able to calm her down. We gave Lexi some 7-Star tea as the jet took off. We hopped this would make her ears pop. The flight to Guilin is only about 45 minutes by jet. I took her back and Lexi drank half a bottle of formula until we landed. That was great. We've been having a hard time getting her to take fluids. That probably also helped her ears pop as we landed.

After we got off the jet we went to pick up our luggage. We walked towards the exit. When we got outside we stood next to the building while we waited for the bus to pick us up. The wall we stood next to had large panes of glass. On the other side of the glass were young Chinese women. They were quite excited to see the babies. Cathy was holding Lexi so she walked over next to the wall. They stuck their fingers between the gaps in the glass so that they could touch Lexi. I held up the card, which had Chinese writing on it. It stated that we were Americans adopting Chinese babies. After they read it they were very happy for us.

We boarded our bus and rode on the bus for about 30 minutes. The area between the airport and Guilin is quite nice. It is a rural farming area and you can also see the vegetation covered mountains. The mountains or hills are limestone. We also had a new guide with us while we were in Guilin. Xixi was still with us, but now we also had a young Chinese woman named Lili. Lili told us a bit about this area of Guilin. She said this area of China was known for three things. They are the limestone mountains, the caves and the one other thing I can't remember. Maybe it was rivers or underground springs.

When we got closer to Guilin we began to see buildings and some people. The buildings were rather depressed looking. When we actually entered the city it was quite crowded. Lili or Jim told us that Guilin had 385,000 people. Guangzhou has around 6 million people. However, Guilin seemed much more crowded to me. We were headed towards a hotel where we would eat at a buffet. At one point Xixi told us to look at a few of the stores we drove past. Some of them were selling snakes and other animals for people to eat. We could see the snakes lying in cages.

When we arrived at the hotel where the buffet was to be served I was wondering what the inside of the hotel would look like because many of the buildings in that area looked rather depressed. Very close to the hotel there was a man on a piece of construction equipment tearing down a building. I noticed this because the equipment he was sitting on looked like it was perched on rather shaky ground and he was tearing down a building that was quite a bit taller than the machine. We entered the hotel and it was quite nice. They even had a couple of Chinese men in the area where the buffet was located playing guitars. We all sat down and then took turns going to the buffet (I went to the buffet while Cathy watched Lexi and vice versa). I looked the buffet over a bit and noticed that they had a pan with steamed fish heads with chili. Xixi said she has eaten fish heads.

I had a couple of plates of food and then Xixi said she was going to take the men to a gentleman's club. We weren't sure what a gentleman's club is in China, but Xixi said they served duck tongues. Jim King, Richard Richter, Xixi and I gathered a few things and started to walk out of the hotel. Xixi didn't say how far it was to the gentleman's club, but we started walking. We walked through a building that kind of looked like a large garage. There were a variety businesses in this building. Some of them were eating establishments. We exited the building on the opposite side and walked down a street. The street was quite busy and very crowded. It was crowded, but not so much with traffic. There were all kinds of vehicles parked on the side of the road. There were also a number of eating establishments and all kinds of shops that sold goods. This area was rather depressed looking, but I wasn't concerned for my safety. As we passed one eating establishment Xixi said, "That restaurant serves dog". She said they cook it in a pot in the middle of the table. These restaurants on this road are really small establishments. Each one might serve just a few people at a time. The one that served dog only had two or maybe three tables. The restaurant is basically a small building with no front. You just walk up and place your order. They had one table out front with a pot cooking dog. I walked up and looked at it for a second.

At the end of this street we walked onto another street that looked much different. Xixi said Guilin had spent quite a bit of money and effort fixing up some of the streets in an effort to attract tourists. This street had nice restaurants and other new looking businesses. We walked into the restaurant that contained the gentlemen's club. Near the entrance of the restaurant were 6 large dark bottles that could probably hold about 10 gallons. Each bottle contained a variety of contents that were pickled. They looked like they were about half full of berries and other stuff. One had a fairly large snake in the jar. We also walked past 4 elegantly dressed Chinese women who were performing a traditional Chinese dance routine. Maybe that is why they call this a gentlemen's club. Each of the women had her face covered with white makeup and other brightly colored makeup. We then entered a private dining room. Xixi's friends were already in this room. I didn't realize it at the time, but we were here to eat an entire meal. A few of Xixi's friends didn't speak any English so Xixi would translate some of what was said. There was lots of food on the table. One of the items was the duck tongues Xixi told us about earlier. It is rather hard to describe a duck tongue, but I'll try. Duck tongues kind of look like the wishbone of a chicken. There is a little piece of meat and some gristle protruding from between the Y of the wishbone. This is the part of the duck tongue that you eat. The entire duck tongue is black or very dark. I believe this is due to the fact that it cooked in soy sauce. I ate one so that I could say I ate a duck tongue. Robert Richter and Jim King ate several of them. I believe Robert ate more than anyone. He's from Texas and enjoys going to an annual rattlesnake round up so these duck tongues fit into his diet fairly easily. After a while Xixi left to get another friend. Lucy was also in this room. I had heard about Lucy, but this was the first time I had met her. She is quite pretty. Jim will sometimes work with Lucy instead of Xixi. After a while, Xixi returned. She brought Lili back with her. Lili was our guide on the bus when we arrived in Guilin. Lili looks quite young (more on that later) and I kept thinking that Lexi will probably look like Lili in several years. Xixi and her friends were having a good time watching us eat these various kinds of foods they had ordered. Much of it was different from anything we have back home. It was good, but I wasn't very hungry since I had just eaten at the buffet prior to coming to this restaurant. One of the things I tried was barbecued pig skin. They told me to wrap this in a tortilla and dip it in the barbecue sauce. It was quite good. The skin was kind of crisp. I watched one of Xixi's friends eat a goose foot. I had seen goose feet at some other restaurant in China. I didn't eat any of those. Lili told us a story about someone she knew in America who had told her children to eat all their vegetables because there were people starving in China. They all laughed. I'm sure there are people in China who do not have enough to eat as there are in any country in the world. However, they made it clear that Chinese people like to eat and most Chinese people have plenty to eat. While we were sitting in this restaurant and on the way to this restaurant I kept wishing I had brought my camera. I left it on the bus when we arrived at the buffet. I would have loved to have had a couple of pictures of the Duck tongues and the other people we ate with at this restaurant.

After we left the gentleman's club we walked back to a bus and headed back to the hotel. All of the people who did not go to the gentleman's club were already back at the hotel. When I entered our room Cathy told me that she had a rather rough time with Lexi. To make matters worse she told me that I had the key to our suitcase in my pocket. I had forgotten that I had it with me. Cathy wasn't too mad and would have been justified in being quite upset. She was not able to fix Lexi another bottle since I had the key. Lexi probably would not have taken it anyway, but it was still a bad situation. I opened the suitcase and received another surprise. There was a white substance all over the inside of our suite case. At first I thought it was sugar, but it was salt instead. Someone had told us to put some salt in Lexi's baby food so we bought a canister of salt at a store near the White Swan hotel. The canister contained much more salt than we would ever need on this trip. The canister lid rotated so that a hole could be exposed to pour out the salt. The lid had worked its way around and dumped quite a bit of salt into our suitcase. Fortunately, we had put many of the smaller things into zip lock bags. I still had to take everything out of the suite case and shake it all out.

Day 9, Saturday July 7: Top
Today we took a riverboat cruise on the Li River. When Cathy and I woke up we looked out the window. Across the street there were some buildings that were kind of dilapidated. In one area there was one building that was single-story and constructed with an open courtyard in the middle. It looked like a broken water pipe was sticking out of the ground with water coming out of it. As people woke up they would come out of this building and use the water pipe for drinking and to wash off.

We ate a buffet breakfast that was located in the hotel. It was nice, but we ate in a hurry so that we could go back to the hotel room to make Lexi a bottle. We always had to warm her formula or she wouldn't take it. We all boarded the bus at 8:15 AM. We drove through the country side for about a half an hour. It was raining a bit. Someone said that it doesn't normally rain here at this time of year. It was raining now because there was a typhoon off shore to the south. We saw lots of fish pools, rice patties and water buffalo. Lili told us that the Chinese people in this area say that the water buffalo have the best job in China because they only have to work a few days a year. They use the water buffalo to plow in the spring and harvest in the fall. At one point the bus stopped and some of us got off and took some pictures of the country side. It is really lush and beautiful here. Everything seems to be green. Lili told us that this area of China is not much good for agriculture. The ground or dirt is a dark red color. She said the dirt is used to make bricks.

We arrived at the boat landing. It was raining fairly hard when we got off the bus. I was carrying Lexi, a backpack and my camera. I had a fanny pack on around my waste. I bought a large one so I could carry quite a bit of stuff. The strap on it was long enough to fit around a much larger person. Cathy kept referring to it as my purse. As we walked up and then down the stairs to get on the boat my fanny pack slipped down below my waste and behind me. It was kind of funny, but I had a hard time carrying Lexi, my stuff and still try to keep hold of the fanny pack. I was also glad to see that the boat had an enclosed area so that we wouldn't be standing out in the rain.

The scenery was gorgeous. There were lots of vegetation converted haystack mountains. We took lots of pictures. Cathy, Lexi and I sat next to a retired couple from California. We also sat next to a woman and her two teenage daughters who were from Ohio. They were nice and many people asked us about Lexi. We cruised for cruised down the river and would occasionally go up on the roof of the boat. It was really beautiful. Along the river's edge there was quite a bit of bamboo. It looks a lot different when it is growing. It kind of curls at the end like a large green fuzzy candy cane. After about an hour and a half they served us a meal. There was lots of food again. There were quite a few people on this boat. One of the items they served us was a small crab that appeared to be cooked in some batter. The entire crab was about 5 inches in diameter. I asked Xixi how to eat the crab. She said, "eat the whole thing, just eat it". I took a bite of a crab. It was pretty good. I ate 3 or 4 of them. I believe the cruise lasted for 3 or 4 hours. At one point we met another boat. It was loaded down pretty good and they had to bring up a second boat to take off some of the cargo. We had a hard time getting around these boats in this shallow river. At one point, they asked everyone to stand on one side of our boat so that we could squeeze around the other two boats. We also encountered some local people on the river. It was kind of charming and looked like something you would see in a documentary or a movie. The local people would make a raft out of a few pieces of bamboo. They could stand on this small raft and either fish or try to spear fish in the river. I saw one small raft with a Chinese man standing on it. He had a goat on the raft with him. We also saw water buffalo. Some of them were swimming across the river. There were also certain natural sites to see. One was shaped like a woman holding baby. It did look like a woman holding a baby to me. Another one was called the seven horses or something similar. This one was a large flat wall of rock that was kind of white. It had large dark streaks that ran across it. If you looked close you were supposed to be able to see 7 horses. I couldn't see any horses, but they had a brochure that showed you how to see the horses. We also had a Chinese man that came with us and took a video of our experience. He later sold us a video.

At one point Cathy gave Lexi a bottle. An elderly American man came over to us. He told me his wife said that she could tell that we were good parents to our baby. Some of the other people had told her that we adopted Lexi. I told him thanks and spoke to him for a while. I told him where we were from and that I worked for John Deere. He told me that he'd bought a new walk behind mower like the one I bought this year. However, he said he took it back to the dealer because they couldn't make the self-propelled mower go slow enough for him. He said the dealer gave him 100% of the money he spent on the walk-behind mower towards a John Deere riding mower. He said he loves it and cleans it up after mowing. He wouldn't let his wife use it. She was sitting there and said that was okay with her. They were from South Dakota. We also met a young Chinese man who was back home in China for a while. He was a student at the University of Illinois.

While we were eating the retired guy from California reached for something and knocked over a large glass of tea. It ran all over the table. A while later, he was reaching for a bottle of water and bumped into it by accident. It spilled all over the table. I thought it was rather funny and he seemed to think so too after a bit. He wasn't clumsy or anything, it was just an odd coincidence. He told us that they had been to the Great Wall of China and to Beijing. Their trip was winding down and they would be heading home soon. The woman from Ohio who had the two girls had gotten sick earlier in the trip. She had eaten something or drank some water that wasn't fit to drink. She had really been sick.

When we reached the end of the cruise it was raining pretty hard. We got out our umbrellas and headed off the boat. There were several small shops on the road between the boat and the bus. We would have liked to have stopped and looked at some of this stuff, but couldn't because it was raining so hard. As soon as we got off the boat we saw an old Chinese man. He was standing in the rain with a large hat on his head and a piece of bamboo in his hand. He held the bamboo horizontally and had two large black birds sitting on it. He wanted us to give him money so that we could take his picture holding the birds. He was kind of interesting looking and we might have done it if it wasn't raining so hard. The vendors at the small shops would wave some of their items for sale at us as we walked by. It took about 1 3/4 hours to get back to the hotel in Guilin by bus.

When we got back to Guilin we walked into some small shops next to the hotel. The first store was kind of like a small grocery store. It also had a fair amount of alcohol. Some of the bottles were dark and had odd articles in the alcohol. A few of the bottles contained alcohol and snakes. We bought some bottled water and went back to the hotel. We bought lots of bottled water while we were in China. It is readily available almost everywhere we went.

We went back to the room and Lexi was in a real good mood. We played a while and then we tried to feed her. She threw a fit and it took a while to settle her down. We got her to take a short nap. When she woke up she was real crabby and she wouldn't settle down no matter what we tried. Our mother's stopped in and they were concerned too. We thought her ears or bronchitis might be bothering her. We were finally able to get 4 ounces of baby formula in her, changed her diaper and she calmed down.

We decided to go out to eat with the group. The meal was actually at a dinner theater near the hotel. It is kind of hard to describe, but there was some road construction in front of the hotel. We walked out the hotel and down the street a short distance. We then crossed the street to get to the dinner theater. There was a woman on the corner with a small cart. She was setting it up as we crossed the street. When we got inside and situated I decided to go back to the hotel to get my camera. There were more people in the street at this time. When I went back to the dinner theater the woman had her cart set up and was cooking some kind of meat on a stick. There were also several young kids who were selling roses. They would swarm around me and say something in Chinese. We entered the theater. Cathy Stella asked Xixi if we would be returning to the hotel at some point during the next day. Xixi said we would not return until the end of the day. She was not happy to hear this and neither were we. We weren't mad, just kind of disappointed knowing that it would be a long difficult day if the babies didn't get a nap or if they didn't feel well. We were also concerned because Lexi wasn't taking much formula. When she did take formula it had to be warm. If you don't have a thermos then it is almost impossible to heat Lexi's formula. I asked Xixi if it would be possible to get a thermos. She said she would try to buy one for us. They served the meal and we had something to eat. It was kind of difficult because Lexi was not in a good mood. She fussed quite a bit. After we ate I told Cathy that I would take Lexi back to the hotel room. Cathy said she would go back too. Donna mentioned something about going to the restroom. Xixi said that it might be possible for us to stay at the hotel the next day. That was good to hear. John Sapp was also going to stay at the hotel due to his bad back. We picked up our stuff and headed back to the hotel. The show had not begun at this time. We crossed the road where the construction was located. No one was working there at this time. It was getting dark as we crossed the road. As we crossed the road I turned my head and noticed that Donna was behind us and was tripping as she crossed the road. I was quite startled to see her since I didn't realize that she had followed us. Cathy was unaware of this too. As I saw her trip I told Cathy to help her mother. I was holding Lexi and some other stuff. Cathy just stood there at first so I yelled at her again to help her mother. It looked like Donna had hurt her ankle. Cathy stood next to Donna so that Donna could lean on her. We walked to the side of the road. The road didn't get much traffic at this location which was good. We stood there for a minute unsure as to whether Donna would be able to walk back to the hotel. After a short wait we started to walk back to the hotel. Donna followed us back because she wanted to use the restroom in her hotel room. It was cleaner than the restrooms at the dinner theater. We walked her to her room and then we went to our room. After a short wait Donna came to our room and decided to go back to the show. I walked her back to the dinner theater. She seemed a bit more relaxed now. As we approached the theater the small kids with their roses crowded around us. There were quite a few of them selling roses. After I returned to the hotel we gave Lexi 1/2 a bottle of formula. Her mood improved. At some point Xixi stopped by with a small thermos she bought us. This was a big load off of my mind since we really needed it for Lexi's formula for tomorrow. I was kind of kicking myself because I had a small slender metal thermos at home that would have been perfect for the type of traveling we are doing here in Guilin. We brought so many things with us that I thought that this was one item we could do without. I was grateful for the one Xixi got us, but it was wider, shorter and more difficult to pack in our back pack. This was my mistake though, not Xixi's. I phoned the Stella's room and told Steve about the thermos. I assumed that they would want one too, but he said he didn't think they would need it. It was at this point that I realized that Lexi was a bit more temperamental about the temperature of her formula than the other babies. That was good for their parents.

Day 10, Sunday July 8: Top We knew this was going to be a long day. Lexi slept through the entire night again. So far, she's slept through the night since the day we got her. We woke up and did a bit of packing. We were told to eat breakfast at the buffet the hotel had provided. I walked to the little store next to the hotel to buy some bottled water. They weren't open yet so I went back to the hotel and we went to the buffet. We took a bottle of formula for Lexi. She usually only drinks half a bottle so that was all we would prepare. Now, we fix a full bottle and if she doesn't take it all we reheat it or sometimes she would drink some of it cold. We had to have our luggage outside the hotel room by 9:00AM. We were to check out of the hotel at 9:30AM. We checked out and got on the bus.

We went to a park in Guilin called Elephant Trunk Hill. Lili was our guide and she told us a bit about the park as we rode on the bus. Lili said there is a legend of Elephant Trunk Hill. She said the legend says that originally, the elephant was in heaven and came down to the river to get a drink. The elephant thought this place was so beautiful that it turned to stone so that it could stay here forever. We got off the bus and started to look around the park. The park was well cared for and had shrubs or bushes that were manicured into certain shapes. Some of them looked like animals. We walked across a small bridge and down a sidewalk. We saw a rather large hole in the rocks across the bay. After a few minutes I realized that this was the elephant. You had to use your imagination a bit, but it did look a bit like an elephant. There were several vendors pushing trinkets on us. We bought some t-shirts and something to drink. It was real hot and sunny. We brought a couple of umbrellas with us to shade us from the sun. We especially wanted to keep the sun off of Lexi. Donna bought a toy soldier for Ryan at one of the small shops. You turn it on and it crawls across the ground. My mother bought a small toy to give Lexi as a Christmas gift. It was a small plastic monkey. When you turn it on it would do summer-salts and roll in different directions. Some Chinese women came over to see Lexi and the other babies. One woman took the cap off of bottle of water, filled it with water and gave Lexi a drink. They also wanted to pose with us to have their picture taken. There was one vendor who had a rack of brightly colored Chinese clothes next to the water. You could rent the clothes and have your picture taken with Elephant Trunk Hill in the background. One other older Chinese man had a small bamboo raft and a piece of bamboo with two large birds. You could pay him some money to hold the bamboo with the birds and have your picture taken. If you felt up to it you could also stand on the bamboo raft.

We got back on the bus and headed to an art gallery. On the way there Lili gave us a bit of information about the area. She said prior to World War II there were some very old (over 1 thousand of years) Chinese palaces in this location. However, they were all destroyed by the Japanese in World War II. Nothing remains there now. We walked into the art gallery and was pleased to find it air conditioned. There were paintings of all sizes. Most of them were painted on some kind of material that rolled up like a scroll. Most of them had wooden or maybe bamboo on the top and bottom. One of the artists gave us a demonstration. We looked them over for a while and we bought a painting of some panda bears. I think most everyone bought something. The Kings bought some rather large and expensive ones. They were beautiful though and a nice memento for their daughter when she grows up.

We left the art gallery and stopped at a tea shop. Some of the people in our group had already been to this shop, but I had not. It wasn't very big, but they did have a variety of teas and tea pots. I&mementoink my mother bought a tea set when she came here the day before. After we left the tea shop we went back to the hotel to get John Sapp. He stayed at the hotel because of his bad back. He didn't have anyone to help with his baby. His wife had stayed home to take care of their other child.

We next went to a buffet. There was quite a variety of food. This buffet also had steamed fish heads with chili. Since I had my camera with me this time I took a picture of this dish. At this buffet, like most public places we visited there were several Chinese people who wanted to see our babies. It was a pleasant experience. After lunch we went to a pearl market. They took us into a room where we watched a short film on the pearl industry in southern China and how they produce the pearls. The show room was very similar to a jewelry store, except almost everything was associated with pearls. We bought two pearl pendants and two pairs of ear rings. I believe most of the people in our group bought something.

After we left the pearl factory we went to Xixi's house. Her father lived there too so it might have actually been his house. I'm not sure. It was a nice house or condo. There were several other homes just like it on her block. The house was 3 or 3 1/2 floors high. It had a nice patio and garden area in the back. Xixi had a dog that kind of looked like a German shepherd. Xixi's father was home at the time he and Xixi gave us some watermelon. Xixi showed us the interior of her house and then Jim asked her to give us a demonstration of her exercise routine. Xixi performed her routine on the patio. At first she performed some stretching exercises and then she took out a sword. She performed her routine while she swung or whipped the sword around. It was rather impressive if for no other reason that it was rather hot to excersize sun was very bright. She must have been quite hot in the clothes she was wearing.

After we left Xixi's house we stopped at a restaurant. I wasn't very hungry, but we ate anyway. It was probably a better idea to eat now than when we got back to Guangzhou. This restaurant had a gift shop. They also had some Chinese paintings hanging on the walls. The Kings bought 4 large Chinese paintings from the restaurant. They were quite nice, but rather expensive. The paintings depicted Chinese women in ceremonial dress.

After eating the meal we boarded the bus to head to the airport. Along the way we drove past some water buffalo that were standing next to the road. Ruth (Steve Weatherall's mother-in-law) wanted to have her picture taken with a water buffalo so the bus driver stopped the bus. Most of us got off the bus to take some pictures of the water buffalo. They are large, but gentle animals and just tend to slink away when they are approached. There were also 4 or 5 rural Chinese people who were kind of huddled together off the road. They wore round hats. When I approached them I could see that they were playing a card game. The cards they were using were different than the cards we're used to in the U.S. These cards were more slender than rectangular. I assumed that this made them easier to stick in a pocket or a bag of some sort. From the way they were dressed I assumed that they were farmers. They smiled and were happy that we were adopting the babies. When we got back on the bus one of the older Chinese women came up to the bus saying something in Chinese. Jim asked Xixi to speak to her since she was quite curious about something. Xixi told us that she told these people that we were Americans adopting babies from China. They told Xixi that they had heard of babies being abandoned or orphaned. They didn't know what happened to those babies. They were very happy to hear that we had adopted these babies.

We continued on our way to the airport. When we entered the airport and sat down near some vendors. Some Chinese people seemed rather curious and began to gather around. They wanted to see our babies. Some of them wanted to have their pictures taken with the Americans and their Chinese babies. One of the people was able to speak a bit of English so he told the others that we were going to adopt these babies. They were very happy for us. These Chinese people were of various ages. Some looked to me to be high school students, some were in their 30's or 40's and some looked to me to be grandmothers. After a while we walked to the gate and we again met some more Chinese people who were happy to see us and the babies. This may sound like a tiring experience, but I never felt that way. Dealing with the heat and hauling all our luggage around might have been tiring, but I never tired of showing off our new baby. While we were waiting at the gate Jim decided to hold a little contest. He asked each of us to write our name on a piece of paper and take a guess at Lili's age. I don't remember who won the contest, but Lili was quite a bit older than I thought she was. I believe I guessed that she was 17 years old. I think she was closer to 27 or 30. The flight back to Guangzhou was rather uneventful. Lexi cried a bit, but calmed down after we gave her a bottle. It seemed like a long journey back to the hotel, but we made it okay and Lexi slept the entire way.

Day 11, Monday July 9: Top
It seemed like we really had to hustle this morning to get ready to go to the American Consulate. We all met in the Swan Room by the ticketing office. Xixi called the lobby area that was near the back of the hotel the ticketing office. There was an office in this lobby that sold boarding passes. We were to meet here until it was time to go. The Swan Room had a large wooden play pen. We sat the babies in this play pen to try it out. Lexi was a bit cranky, but not too bad. When it was time to go we all (all 6 babies and their parents) left the hotel and walked down the street. The American Consulate is a short walking distance down the street form the hotel. When we arrived at the consulate we could see that it was quite busy. There was a line of Chinese people waiting to enter the consulate through a small door. I thought we might have quite a wait. However, that was not the case. Since we were applying for visas for babies we were allowed to enter the consulate through a different door. Chinese officials guard the consulate. They didn't carry weapons, but they were dressed in uniforms. As we entered the small building that led into the consulate we were asked to walk through a metal detector. Our bags were also searched. We were told that we could not bring any knives, cameras and not even a fingernail file. I noticed a small container that had finger nail clippers in it that had been removed from other people who entered the building. Xixi also told us not to bring strollers due to the limited space of these offices and cameras were not a good idea. The consulate is closed for all American and Chinese holidays so the workers try to get a lot done when they are open. We entered the building and walked into a small waiting room. We sat in this room waiting for someone to call our name. After a short wait they called our name. Cathy, Lexi and I walked down a hallway and entered another room. There were three young Chinese women sitting behind a long table and they were facing us. On the other side of the table (the side we were on) there were three chairs. One of the adoptive parents would sit in one of these chairs to answer questions and sign papers. There were a few rows of chairs in this small room for us to sit on until they were ready to speak to us. We were told to take a seat in waiting chairs. There were some other adoptive parents in this room that we did not know. One of the Chinese babies to be adopted was missing a hand. The little girls had two arms, but one of her hands was missing. I believe she was born that way since her arm was otherwise fine. She was a cute little girl. After a short wait they called our name and we decided that Cathy would hold Lexi and I would take a seat next to the table. There was also a middle-aged American looking woman and man in the room. Each Chinese woman would speak to one of the adoptive parents so that three visas could be processed at a time. The young Chinese woman who spoke to me was very nice. She started to look at our paperwork and then she kind of bowed her head down a little and said, "May I ask you a personal question?". I said, "Yes, of course". Before I go any further I should mention that going to the consulate to get the visa is not a real stressful situation. However, it is a very necessary step in bringing our baby home. Going to the consulate, which is protected by Chinese guards and being told that the paperwork we have filled out has no room for error is a bit unnerving. We were not real nervous, but very aware that we wanted to do everything right. As I was sitting at the table I am in a very receptive mood. The Chinese woman asked me something in a very soft quiet voice. I couldn't quite hear what she was saying, but it had something to do with hair on arms. I asked her to repeat it and I still couldn't quite hear what she was saying. I then thought she must have been asking me a question about Lexi. I asked her if she was referring to Lexi. She responded by saying in a stronger tone, "No, I mean you". She then asked me in a voice that I could hear, "After you take a shower how do you dry the hair on your arms?". I kind of laughed and told her that I just use a towel. She quickly went back to the paperwork. I looked at her arms and noticed that there was almost no hair on her arms. I didn't find that to be very odd though. I then looked at the American guy sitting next to me at the table. He was a big guy and had a great deal of hair on his arms. Later, we noticed that Chinese men, at least those in this part of China don't have much hair on their chests or arms. I later told Jim this story and he said that this experience was not what he would normally expect from a Chinese person. Neither he or I were offended in any way and thought the experience was humorous, but Jim said most Chinese people would not ask a question that might offend someone. I thought it was a pretty neat story to tell.

Xixi referred to the people who worked in the American Consulate as "the golden eyes". She said they process these forms every day and are very good at identifying any discrepancies. For instance, if you wrote your address on one document as, "123 North Main Street" then you couldn't write it as "123 N. Main Street" on another document. Xixi said they were very cautious because the paperwork had to be correct so there would be no problems when we arrived in the U.S. It would be very difficult to rectify at that time. The Chinese woman made a couple of small changes to our paperwork. I then signed the document and we were dome with that portion of the process. I then sat back in the chairs. We waited for them to call our name for the interview. After a few minutes they called our name. This time we met with an American man. He seemed to be a nice person. He looked over some of our paperwork and asked us some questions about Lexi's mouth (the doctors at the medical review had commented on her mouth). At first he referred to this as nerve damage and a deformity. He changed one of our answers to a "yes" instead of a "no". It was a reference to the physical shape of Lexi. He wrote a short explanation and at first called it a deformity. He then said, "Well, I won't call it a deformity". This was not a big deal. He then asked us to raise our right hands and swear an oath to take care of Lexi and not to abandon her. That was it. We walked back to the hotel, found our mothers and walked down to the deli. I had a chicken salad sandwich. It was really good. The deli had a meat case with some rather interesting stuff. One of the items was a fish head wrapped in plastic. They did have a few sandwiches. They had one roast beef sandwich, one chicken salad sandwich and one club sandwich. The rest of the stuff was more Chinese oriented. They also had baked goods. A couple of times I bought a loaf of banana bread that was sliced rather thick. It was good. They also sold Haggen Daas ice cream. If you wanted an ice cream cone you just dipped it out yourself. Cathy said she'd take a small cone. I got her and myself two small ice cream cones. We were sitting in the chairs outside the deli eating the ice cream when the woman behind the counter came out smiling at us. She had another small cone in her hand. I guess I made the ice cream cones too small and she felt we were being cheated so she brought us another cone although I only paid for two. Cathy thought this was pretty funny.

After lunch we had the option of going to the silk market and to the electronics market. I was looking forward to going to the electronics market because Jim said you could buy just about anything electronic at a good price. I wanted to get a memory stick for my digital camera. Mom and I decided to go to these markets with Jim and whomever else wanted to go. Cathy, Lexi and Cathy's mother decided to check out some of the stores near the hotel. When we arrived at the silk market it looked like a department store. However, when we walked inside it was organized into many small booths kind of like a craft show. There were two or three floors of silk and other materials. I walked around and looked at some of the materials. I don't do any sewing, but many of the materials were quite beautiful. We all had to stay somewhat together or at least we couldn't wander off to other stores since we had no idea how to get back to the hotel. After a while I was kind of tired of looking at the material, but some of the other people were still looking. Realizing that we would more than likely never come back here I realized that some of the people in our group wanted to make sure they got what they wanted. For a while I stood near the entrance and talked to Steve Weatherall who was one of the fathers in our group. I told him about our experience of going to the children's hospital. He told me a bit about his job back in the U.S. After a while it was time to head to the electronics market. That market was just a few blocks down the street so we walked to it. The electronics market was rather impressive. It was also arranged similarly to a craft show with many small stores in one building. Many of the stores in this building were probably about 15 to 20 feet square. There were three floors of stores. You could buy cameras, home stereos, walkmans, phones, all kinds of music, movies or games. I checked out several camera stores to see if they had Sony memory sticks for a good price. I wanted to buy a larger capacity stick for my digital camera. Robert Richter also wanted to buy a memory stick for his camera. However, his camera was not a Sony. I checked in a couple of stores and the prices were higher than what I could buy back home off the Internet. We had a little trouble dickering because I only spoke English and the store owners only spoke Chinese. We managed it though. I would hold up my memory stick and they would show me what they had. They would enter usually a price into a calculator and allow me to convert it into a U.S. dollar amount. I would enter in what I wanted to pay, which was the price I could get back home or a little less. They would always shake their heads indicating "no". In one store the person was shocked when I entered the Internet price. After a while I gave up. I believe the Sony memory sticks were still a bit too new to have reached a worth while price drop. I did look at a wide angle lense for my digital camera, but decided it was too expensive. It was pretty hot so after a while I went outside and walked down the street to a small shop that sold all kinds of drinks. Cold bottled water sounded pretty good so I bought a bottle. After a while we all met at the front entrance and headed back to the bus and then to the hotel.

This evening we were scheduled to eat at the Hard Rock cafe. I enjoyed eating the Chinese food while we were in China, but I'm sure everyone was looking forward to eating some American food. The Hard Rock cafe in Guangzhou is in the basement of a very nice hotel. Inside it looked just like the other Hard Rock Cafe's we've been to in the U.S. We ordered our food. I ordered a hamburger and fries. Cathy wasn't feeling well so I held and took care of Lexi. Lexi was also having a difficult time. She was quite cranky. Cathy thought Lexi's front teeth were coming in, but that might not have been the case. We all ordered some American food except for Xixi. She ordered a baked chicken. Xixi said it tastes better if the chicken has the head on it. When our food arrived Lexi was quite agitated. I walked her around the restaurant for a while. If I stopped walking to look at something she would become upset again. After a while, I went back to the table. Lexi's grandmothers watched Lexi while I ate my hamburger. The meal was really good. After we ate we went to the store in the Hard Rock where you can buy t-shirts and other similar stuff. Cathy and I bought several t-shirts for her sister, Laurie. Laurie wanted to give them to people for Christmas. We had quite a stack of shirts. We also bought some shirts and my mother bought some too. Cathy's mother also bought some shirts to give as gifts. We had to kind of laugh because after Cathy's mother bought some shirts she couldn't decide whether or not to buy some more. She went ahead and bought some more. Cathy's mother had quite a bit of extra space in one of her suitcases so she carried most of the shirts we bought home.

There was another group of adoptive parents who looked like they were probably from the U.S. sitting in the Hard Rock near us. We didn't know any of them, but it was kind of nice to see them anyway. When the band started playing some of the fathers from the other group of adoptive parents took their babies out onto the dance floor and danced with their daughters.

Since Lexi was becoming quite agitated Cathy and I decided to take her back to the hotel. We took a cab and Xixi told the cab driver where we wanted to go. The cabs in Guangzhou are all small cars. I sat in the front seat while Cathy and Lexi sat in the back. Apparently, there is some kind of a seat belt law in Guangzhou. We approached one corner where a policeman was standing. The cab driver motioned for me to hold the seat belt across my chest. I didn't understand what he wanted me to do at first, but I eventually figured it out. Later, I told Jim about the seat belt situation. He said he wasn't aware of any law concerning seat belts in Guangzhou.

When we got back to the hotel we put Lexi in her crib. She played for a while. All of a sudden she started to cry like something was hurting her. I walked her around a bit and then decided to change her diaper. She was trying to poop and was having a hard time. She didn't like it at all. She had been eating steamed eggs. The restaurants we ate at almost always prepared a bowl of steamed eggs for the babies. She was finally able to pass it and then she settled down. Later that night (2:45 AM Tuesday morning) Lexi woke up and wanted to play. I got up with her. I fixed her a bottle and afterwards she almost drifted off to sleep. However, we were up for about 1 to 1 1/2 hours.

Day 12, Monday July 10: Top
When we woke up this morning we decided to eat at the buffet downstairs near the main floor. All five of us were going to eat together at 7:45 AM. Lexi was still having difficulty pooping so the three of us didn't come downstairs until 8:00 AM. Mom (Darlene) was going to go shopping with Ruth so she finished eating rather early. We didn't normally eat at the buffet because it cost $11.00 per person. The buffet was quite elaborate with a wide selection of food. It wasn't what I would call Chinese food. It seemed to me to be more traditional American type breakfast foods. The waiters sat all of us adoptive parents at one end of the buffet. There were quite a few of us adoptive families located at this end of the room. Shortly after we sat down Susan, the doctor Xixi knew sat down near us. Susan is a small young Chinese woman. She was very nice and Lexi seemed to like her too. We asked Susan if we could take a picture of her with Lexi. She was happy to comply and we got a nice picture of her standing next to Lexi. The buffet is located very close to ground level. Along one wall there are large windows that overlook the Pearl River. The Pearl River is a fairly large river that has quite a bit of river traffic from a variety of boats.

When we got back to the hotel room I went through some of the pictures I had taken. I couldn't find the pictures I had taken of the Pearl River and the other shots I had taken from the room window. It was kind of hazy, but I went ahead and took some more pictures of the river. I knew they wouldn't be as good as the first pictures I took, but at least we'd have something. I then decided to run a few errands. I went to Jennifer's Place to get our laundry. Jennifer's Place is a small shop near the hotel that we liked to visit. A few young Chinese women ran the shop. They are very nice and they also washed laundry. When we get our laundry back it is all individually wrapped in plastic. They also staples a small tag onto each item, which probably helps them keep everything organized. However, it means we have to remove all of these stapled from our clothes. I also went to the convenience store. There are a couple of convenience stores close to the hotel. The 7-Eleven is right across the street from the hotel, but it is rather small. A larger store was about a block away. It was more like a small grocery store. I went to that store to get some more baby powder for Lexi and some more bottled water. Bottled water is readily available and inexpensive so we just buy it to drink instead of boiling the hotel water.

Xixi told us all to meet in the hotel lobby near the pond at 12:00 to have our group picture taken. It took a while to get everyone organized for the photo. There is a photography shop across the street from the White Swan hotel. The woman who runs that business took our group photo. She was very nice and allowed us to set our own cameras near her so she could also take the group picture with our cameras. After the group photo was taken mom told me that she had an interesting morning. She, Cathy's mother, Ruth and Steve Weatherall went shopping. They were going to go to a department store. They crossed the canal and ran into a Chinese student. This student was studying the English language so he was glad to meet all of them. He was supposed to be going to school, but decided that he'd learn more speaking to some Americans than he would if he went to school. Mom said he was very helpful. They told him they were looking for a toy store. He said he knew where a toy store was located, it wasn't far away and he'd show them where it was located. Mom said they walked and walked. They probably walked about 10 blocks. Steve Weatherall said he wasn't too worried because he kept seeing cabs drive by. As long as there were cabs it would be easy to get back to the hotel if they got lost. The hotel gave us small cards that said, "Take me to the White Swan hotel" in English and in Chinese. Mom said they passed a small restaurant that served puppy. Mom said they also passed a man who held a small screen with something white on it. She said it looked like maggots. The man told her that eating these things were good for cataracts. At some point mom or Ruth took out a Wet One to clean her hands. The Chinese student saw that and was very interested. They said he held it up and looked at it. He'd never seen one before. They tried to give him one, but he said he wouldn't take it. They said he acted as though it was rather expensive or valuable. They told him they had an entire box of them back at the hotel so he took one. He said he was going to show it to his mother.

I decided to see if we could get another stone etching made before we left China. We already had one made by the women at Jennifer's Place. We were quite happy with the quality of the first etching. I had a picture of the 5 of us on the river boat cruise in Guilin. I took it to Jennifer's Place, but they said they couldn't do it in one day. I took the picture across the street to another small shop and they said they could do it. It was going to cost more than the other one though because this one would be larger.

After the group picture we walked over to the Rose Garden cafe. They served us several plates of food, which was the normal way we ate our meals. However, this time I didn't find much that I liked. We ate inside the cafe this time. We saw that they had a fish tank with some interesting looking gold fish. They were very thin and appeared to all move in a group. When we walked close to the tank they would come close to the side of the tank. They must have thought we were going to feed them.

Xixi told us to be in our hotel room around 3:00. She would bring us Lexi's visa information. We had some time to kill so we walked around the shops in the hotel. That took a while, but we didn't really have anything else to do so it was okay. Xixi brought us the documents at 3:15 PM. We looked them over. Xixi told us not to open one of the large envelops. The immigration personnel at LAX would open it. Xixi told us to get our plane tickets at the ticketing office. At 4:00 PM mom, Donna and I walked down to the ticketing office to get the boarding passes. I couldn't remember if we were supposed to go down there at 4:30 or 6:00. It took forever to get through the line. However, it might have been worth the wait because I was able to reserve a bassinet on the jet for the trip home. Cathy was mad at me when I came back to the room because she sat there with Lexi in the hotel room while we got the boarding passes and she didn't know when we'd be back.

We were supposed to eat at the Rose Cafe for dinner. The four of us decided that we didn't want to eat dinner at the Rose Cafe again. we talked about ordering a pizza or something, but then decided to just go to the deli. Before eating at the deli we decided to walk down to the American Consulate to take some pictures. It was starting to get dark and we thought it would be a good idea to wait until the end of the day to take some pictures at the consulate. However, there were still some Chinese guards outside the consulate when we arrived. The guards looked like they were quite serious so I asked one of them if we could take a picture. I don't know if they understood English or not, but he waved me away. I asked him again and he made it clear that we should leave. He wasn't rude, but was serious about his job. We walked back to the deli to get something to eat.

Xixi told us to have our bags packed and ready to leave by 1:00 PM the next day. We decided to pack almost everything this evening before we went to bed. That way we wouldn't have to worry about it the next day.

Day 13, Monday July 11: Top
We did a bit more packing this morning. After that, we decided to walk down to see the swimming pool and whatever else might be near that area. We stopped by Lexi's grandmother's room. They weren't in the room though. Cathy, Lexi and I walked out onto the patio next to the first swimming pool. It is rectangular and was nice, but pretty much just a basic swimming pool. Mom had told us something about walking past a rose garden to get to the second pool. We walked a bit and found the second pool. This pool was shaped like a natural body of water. It also had a waterfall that kind of looked like water pouring from some rocks. We walked around the outside of the hotel a bit and near the river. We went back inside and found Lexi's grandmothers near some of the hotel shops. Mom took some more pictures of us standing in front of the hotel waterfall (this was the waterfall near the lobby that emptied into a pond that had koi fish). We walked over to Jennifer's Place for one last look around. After that we walked down to the deli to get a snack. We were basically killing time until it was time to go to the airport. We went back to the hotel room and we had a message waiting for us. The etching I requested the day before was finished. It was getting rather close to the time when we would have to leave the hotel room, but I ran over to the store to get it. I was not very happy with the result. I knew as soon as I looked at it that I'd shove this in a drawer or closet at home and wish I had never ordered it. It made us all look old and strange looking. I felt like telling them I didn't want it, but there was no time to redo it so I paid them the money. Later, I realized that they probably had to rush the job because of the short time frame they had to make it. It will give us something to laugh about.

We all met near the ticketing place and Jim asked us to all go into the Swan Room. He told us what to expect when we got to the airport. He also told us of the advantage of waiting until 2002 to complete our U.S. adoption. He told us that the federal U.S. government would consider the babies U.S. citizens as soon as we landed on U.S. soil. However, some of the state governments might require a bit more. After that discussion we took all of the babies out to the waiting area near the ticketing place. This area has two red couches. The Gromley's told us that it was a tradition to have a picture taken of all of the babies on one of the red couches. We sat all 6 babies on the couch and had to quickly snap some pictures. Most of the babies couldn't sit up by themselves so we had to work fast. It was cute though.

Once that was completed we all got on the bus and said goodbye to the White Swan. As we exited the White Swan we entered a parking lot. There was a large American made car sitting in the lot. I mentioned how I thought that was the first American made car I had seen in China. Cathy said she had seen others, but I don't believe I did. Speaking of vehicles in China, the mini vans we have in the U.S. are huge compared to the small vans they have in China. We saw many of these small vehicles. They are really small. As the bus pulled out of the White Swan parking lot we were not sure where we were going. We assumed we were going to go sit in the airport until it was time to leave. However, we didn't go straight to the airport. Instead, we stopped at a rather large old Chinese building. It had a rather ornate roof. Jim said the last time he visited this building it was really in bad shape. The building was a theater of some kind. There were a few Chinese people standing outside the building. They were happy to see our babies. We walked inside and entered the main room. It contained a rather large stage. Off to the side of the stage was a movie screen with some old black and white Chinese documentary playing. We looked around a bit and then got back on the bus. We then decided to go to McDonald's and get some ice cream. The menu was the same as we have back home. After we left McDonald's we went to a restaurant. This was the same restaurant we ate at earlier when we had a snake. We ordered another snake. This time it was a sea cobra. I ate some of the snake. This time the snake meat was kind of white, but it tasted the same as the previous one. After we left this restaurant the first time Donna said she should have tried the snake. She wanted to be able to say she tried that snake. We asked her if she was going to try some of the sea cobra and she said, "No" rather emphatically. She didn't know we would be coming back to this restaurant although I think she meant it when she said she wanted to try the snake.

We boarded the bus and headed towards the airport. It wasn't a long ride to the airport but it was kind of slow. The traffic was quite crowded and at one point Jim yelled at the driver to stop. There was someone walking or riding a bicycle next to our bus as we got onto an on ramp. The person wasn't hurt, but was kind of wedged between our bus and another vehicle. I commented to Cathy that this was the worst traffic we'd seen entire time we were in China. We made it to the airport and all of our luggage was sitting on the curb as we got off the bus. We put our luggage on 3 carts. We had quite a load of luggage. We entered the airport and we all got in a rather long line of people. I saw a window where we could exchange our Chinese money for U.S. currency. I exchanged about $100.00. I got back in line with mom, Donna, Cathy and Lexi. Cathy was a bit frantic and said, "mom can't find her plane tickets. Help her look for them". The line of people was quite long and most people had a fair amount of luggage. The line was moving fairly fast though. We started looking through her bags and Jim came by and told us not to panic. He said he'd stay with Donna if we had to wait for some reason. After we looked for a few minutes Donna found her tickets. The line of people and luggage carts continued to move. It is kind of difficult to describe the emotions or feelings we experienced at this time. The airport was rather busy and the line of people with their luggage was moving along rather quickly. Those factors and the situation with Donna's tickets kind of put us into panic mode although we knew we'd work it out if there was a problem. We soon reached the location where we would check our bags. We put everything on the conveyor belt and they x-rayed our bags. We then put everything back onto the carts. Next we went through immigration where a man reviewed our passports. We then went through another baggage check. Finally, we reached the gate where we had to wait for a while. At some point they started to let us through and we got onto a bus. The bus would take us out to the jet. We walked up some steps to get on the jet. This was the same type of jet we flew on to China.

Cathy, Lexi and I had seats at the front of the section where we were located. We had reserved one of the two available bassinets on the jet. Steve Weatherall, his baby and Ruth were across the aisle from us. They had the other bassinet. Shortly after takeoff we gave Lexi a bottle and put her in the bassinet. She fell asleep and would continue to sleep for 8 or 9 hours. The stewardesses served us a meal and then I fell asleep for about 8 hours. The flight from Guangzhou to Los Angeles took about 13 hours. Both Cathy and I were awake before Lexi woke up. The bassinet that Lexi was sleeping in was about two feet long. It was kind of like a long narrow basket, but was made out of some kind of cloth material and a metal ring or hoop. It was secured into the wall in front of us. Lexi seemed to like it and when she woke up she smiled and stuck her head up out of the bassinet to look at us. It was so cute. She looked like a little bird peaking out of a nest. Her hair stood straight up.

One of the things that kind of surprised me was the number of babies that were being adopted and taken home on our jet. I'm pretty sure that everyone in our section of the jet was in some way associated with the adoption of a Chinese baby. Mom thought she counted 50 babies, but I don't know if that is accurate or not. Regardless, there were a lot of babies. At some point I stopped by mom and Donna's seats on the jet. Mom had slept quite a bit on the ride home, but I don't think Donna got much sleep. We were talking and mom said something about how well the babies had behaved or how quiet they had been on the way home. Donna said, "Are you kidding?". Apparently, mom had slept through quite a bit. The babies did make some noise, but with the sounds of the jet engines and considering how tired I was I slept pretty soundly. Xixi was also on the jet. I took Lexi and walked back to see if I could find Xixi. I found her and she was happy to see us.

At some point after we were awake Cathy Stella came by. She said their flight home had gone pretty well. Upon our arrival they were going to spend some time in California visiting relatives before heading back to the midwest. We hope to see them again and probably will since they live fairly close to us.

As we got closer to Los Angeles more people were awake on the jet. When we touched down at LAX everyone in our section of the jet clapped. Everyone clapped because the babies became U.S. citizens when they touched U.S. soil. I'm sure many people were also glad to be back home. We got off the jet and claimed our luggage. We checked most of our luggage on through to Peoria although we had to fly to Chicago first. We went through a check point where we had to show them Lexi's paperwork. The actual paper examination didn't take long, but we had to wait in line a bit because there were so many babies on the jet. After we completed the paper examination check point we started walking towards the airport terminal. We found Xixi and gave her a thank you card and a gift or tip. We thanked her for all her help and gave her a hug. We were supposed to see her again at some other location in the airport, but we never did see her again.

We had to wait in the airport for 1 or 1 1/2 hours for our flight to Chicago to depart. We all (mom, Donna, Cathy and myself) got something to eat and sat near the gate. After a while I went into the bathroom to shave and clean up a bit. It felt pretty good. While we were waiting at the gate we wanted to lay Lexi down, but felt uncomfortable about letting her lay on the seats. Donna took one of the blue blankets from the jet we'd flown on from Guangzhou. We thought it was funny, but we laid it down so Lexi could lay on it and sleep. That blue blanket is condemned to forever be referred to as the blanket Donna stole from our airline.

There was some problem with the gate when we were asked to board the plane. From the gate area we walked down a flight of stairs onto the area of the airport where the planes were located. The jet we were going to take to Chicago had a flight of stairs extending from the rear lower section of the jet. We walked up these stairs to get onto the jet. It was lightly raining when we exited the gate. We really didn't get very wet though. The flight to Chicago was at night. After take off they turned off most of the lights so that people could sleep. Lexi wasn't tired thought because she had slept almost all of the way from Guangzhou. She was a little restless so I walked her slowly up and down the aisle. No one cared. At one point I met a stewardess at the end of the aisle. She asked me some questions about Lexi so I told her that we had just brought her home from China. She was a young woman, but seemed interested in such a way that she might want to adopt a baby at some point. Before we landed in Chicago I spoke to an elderly black woman across the aisle from where I sat. She told me she was excited because she was going to Chicago to celebrate her 89th birthday with some relatives. She said she hadn't seen some of her relatives in many years. She was also happy to hear about Lexi.

When we landed in Chicago the sun was up. We stopped at a McDonald's to buy something for breakfast. We killed some time at the gate where we were going to board the jet that would take us to Peoria. As we sat near the gate we could see a baggage handler unloading all of the bags off of some kind of truck and onto the ground. He was throwing our baggage around like his salary was based upon the number of damaged pieces of luggage he created. They had not called us to board the jet when the time arrived. We asked someone at the gate desk when we would board and they said they would be calling us soon. Eventually, they told us we'd have to take a different jet. We gathered our stuff and walked to another gate and boarded a different jet. There weren't many people on this jet and the pilot mentioned that the flight would only last 28 minutes. It was a rather small jet that had about 50 seats. We took off and the pilot made some rather sharp abrupt direction changes. After a few of these I thought the pilot probably had the jet aimed in the direction he or she wanted to fly. However, he kept making these adjustments. Cathy didn't much care for this flight and Lexi wasn't real happy about it either. It didn't bother me that much, but I thought it was rather odd and unnecessary.

We landed in Peoria and exited the jet. We walked down the gate and as we entered the airport some of Cathy's family was waiting to meet us. We walked to the end of the ramp and held Lexi out so they could get a look at her. Cathy's dad looked at Lexi, smiled and then said, "she's got something coming out of her nose". It was kind of funny, but not what I expected to hear after traveling several thousand miles to bring her home. We stood around and talked for a bit while we waited to get our luggage. Once we got our bags I went to the parking lot to get our car. I brought it to the terminal and we loaded our stuff into our car and Cathy's family's vehicles. being new to the car seat we took a few minutes to figure out how to get it situated so Lexi could use it. We put Lexi in the car seat and she hated it. We checked it over a bit and finally decided that she had just never been in a car seat before and didn't like it. We drove home and Lexi cried the whole way. My mother sat in the back seat with Lexi and tried to calm her down, but she just didn't like it. We considered ourselves pretty lucky though because we had flown from Guangzhou to Los Angeles, Los Angeles to Chicago and Chicago to Peoria and Lexi hardly made a peep.

When we arrived home we found a sign in the yard that read, "Lexi, Welcome to America". My sister had put the sign in our yard. We unloaded some of our luggage and had something to eat. Some of our relatives had brought over some food. While we were at the Peoria airport Cathy's sister asked me if I would be able to drive home. I'd been up for a long time. I said I could drive home and did without any problem. However, after we got home and had something to eat the fatigue hit me like a ton of bricks. I took a nap for a couple of hours. Fortunately, Lexi was also tired and took a nap.

Day 14, Monday July 12: Top
The trip was actually over yesterday. However, I decided to add a bit about July 12. After we got up, had breakfast and got Lexi ready we took Lexi to the office where I work. Lexi didn't like the trip to Moline (the car seat again), but it seemed like she tolerated it slightly better. The people in my office were happy to see her and we took her around to see several people. Before we went to China I showed the pictures of Lexi that we had to two women who worked in the Moline public library. We stopped by the library to introduce them to Lexi. However, the library was closed and wouldn't open for 45 minutes. So I took Lexi back another day.

We stopped by Fazoli's (fast-food Italian restaurant) to get something to eat. As we sat at our table some women who worked at a hospital across the street saw Lexi and asked us some questions about her. It seemed kind of odd, but nice to tell them that yesterday we returned home from China with Lexi. They were happy to see her.