FYI....

If anyone out there is actually following along and would like to comment or contact us, we have access to email but not to Facebook or even the blog itself.  I am updating it by sending emails.

 

Feel free to contact me via email stacie_ham@yahoo.com

Green Tea latte during the wait

When we adopted Ella, we had to wait until 1:00pm to get her.  During theat long morning we went to Starbucks and German decided to try a green tea latte which was a hot, frothy bright green creation that we both found so weird we had to tak a picture of it.  Here we are today, the day we get Zoe, having to wait until 2pm.  As we past the Starbucks in the lobby of our hotel we were reminded of this and I suddenly felt like things would not go smoothly with this adoption like they did with Ella unless he got one again and that for supersittion sake, German MUST get one.  So, he did and enjoyed as a little as he did last time :)

 

30 minutes until we head out to meet her!!

 

 

Sun, 11/4: More Guangzhou Adventures

Today we ventured out using the Guangzhou subway.  We used a machine to pay our fare and received 2 green plastic coins (not tickets).  We walked to the turnstiles expecting some kind of slot to put them in and there was none.  Hmmm, so we watched.  Most people had a monthly pass and they tapped it on a metal pad and the turnstile would open, double hmmm.  After a few moments watching, luckily a little girl walked up with a green coin and touched it to the metal like the pass and the turnstil opened, yeah, we did the same and got through.  Upon exiting there is a slot you drop the coin in to get out.  Actually pretty cool since they can be reused.

Our destination was a pedestrian shopping street.  It was about a 15 minute walk from the station we got of at.  During the walk we passed a section of about 3 large citiy blacks with hundreds of small shops that only sold shoes.  Mens shoes, womens shoes, kids shoes, slippers.  It was kind of crazy.  Think the kind of shoes you buy at Walmart and mulkiply it by 100,000. 

Beyond the shoes we must have come to the random parts district.  Again for blocks there were small shops that's main item seemed to be bags of nails and screws. There was also metal chains, some drill presses, you get the idea.  But there were hundreds of them and they all had the same things and no one was buying anything, talk about excess inventory.

We finally reached the pedestrian shopping street and we think all 10 million people that live in Guangzhou were there.  It was packed.  Not a thing I would buy there.  Mainly clothes, but defintiely the place everybody goes to.

After that we got back on the subway and ventured across town to what was supposed to be some kind of computer marketplace.  It turned out to be quite a bust but we did see a fight break out between a police man and a street vendor.

It was back to the subway which was insanely packed, we almost missed our stop getting through people.  It was a definitely a day hanging with the locals, I didn't see another non-asian from the time we got on the subway.

The day ended meeting the other couple from our agency for a drink at the hotel bar, now eating some dinner and then off to bed.  Tomorrow afternoon we meet our baby girl!!!!!!

Pictures

Here is some pics from yesterday that I had trouble uploading yesterday

 

The first one is of the tea house we ate lunch at and the second is the Goat Statue

We have arrived! Long flight followed by even longer day in Guangzhou

We left Sacramento Airport at about 7pm Thurs night and then endured a painful 2 ½ hour layover at LAX that included 2 bus rides, claiming and rechecking our luggage, walking outside from one terminal to another and waiting in an hour long security line.  We were very happy we grabbed something for dinner in Sac because we had no time at LAX.

The 15 hour flight from LAX to Guangzhou wasn't bad, just long, but we did have our own video on demand systems so I watched 4 movies, tried, but didn't get much sleep.  We arrived in Guangzhou bright and early at about 5am local time.  We met up with another family from our agency and were taken to our hotel.  Luckily we were able to get our room, took showers and even Facetimed with the kids and my parents at home.

Then, the longest day in the world began.  I think it is much better to arrive later so you can sleep sooner.  Our hotel, Marriott China Hotel, is in the middle of the busy city, but we are lucky to have 2 parks across the street ( accessed by underground walkways). 

We explored Liu Hua Park in the morning (after grabbing coffee at Starbucks, which was about $5 for a grande latte versus a 20oz TsingTau beer which is less then a dollar).  We loved this park. Not sure if it was because the time of day, the fact we still had energy or because it really is nicer.  It has a lake, was flat and we were able to watch all sorts of groups of people coming together to participate in various activities from tai chi, singing as a group, dancing together, to badminton and ping pong.  Definitely very community oriented even in the middle of a big city (~10 million people).  We had lunch at a tea house at the park and German was able to order tea and get us some yummy veggie dumplings (as well as a few other things he liked).  We then decided there was no way we were making it to a realistic bedtime (it was only  11am when we got back to the hotel) so we decided on a 2 hour nap.

Then we decided to venture out to the 2^nd nearby park, Yue Xie Park.  It was pretty, but very hilly, it was much warmer and more humid by now and we walked around looking for some 5 goat statue that the signs kept pointing us in different directions to.  Pout of stubbornness we stuck it out until we found it (not so exciting) and then headed to the 7-11 by our hotel to grab a beer (discovering beer is cheaper than coffee) and pour now enjoying our TsingTau in our room and figuring out what to get for dinner.

We will get Zoe at the Civil Affairs Office on Monday afternoon, so until then our goal is to get over any jet lag and make sure we have everything ready for her.

Excited to sleep and hope to not be awake half the night (it is currently still only 5:30pm, will this day ever end??)!!

Ready to go!!!!

Our bags are packed and we are ready to go!!  testingout to see if this will post ok.

Zoe Song Ham

Back in Jan, German and I decided that we wanted a sister for Ella (and Lucas and Noah) and started the process to adopt another little girl from China.  I promised myself that I would start blogging about it once we received a referral, that happened in May and as you can see the blog updating never happened.

Surprisingly, the first question most people asked when I told them we were adopting another daughter was if I was going to blog again when we traveled to China to get her.  I think they really wanted to ask if we were crazy to become a family of 6 (yes 4 kids is a lot, heck, 3 has been challenging, but sometimes crazy feels right).

So, we have our travel approval from China, flights booked and we'll be leaving on Thur, 11/1!  We will meet Zoe on Mon, 11/5 and return home to California on Fri, 11/16.

Here is some info on Ms. Zoe.  She was born on 6/13/11 which will make her 16 months when we meet her.  She is 2 years younger than Ella and 5 years younger than Lucas and Noah.  She was abandoned at the Civil Affairs Bureau of Jiancheng District of Yangjiang City in Guangdong Province on June 15, 2011.  Based on her umbilical cord, her DOB was estimated at June 13, 2011.  She has lived at Jiangcheng Orphanage since then.  She is not small, the measurements we got of her at 12 months were about 26lbs and 31 inches tall.

Since she is from Guangdong Province, where the US Consulate is located, our whole 2 week trip will be in Guangzhou, the capital of that province.

She does have a special need, it is a genetic blood disorder called thalassemia which is very common in southern China and will hopefully just need monitoring.

I will do my best to continue to post updates from now and throughout our trip.

Here are 2 ics of her at 12 months: