Thursday,
November 2, 2006
Today we went to a local farming village.
I knew that Miyah
was most likely born in a village like this one (almost
certainly not in a hospital) but I found out today that her
foster care home was like this as well. For some reason I was
under the impression that the foster mothers received housing
subsidies as part of the “compensation” for taking care of the
children – I then thought of a more urban type of subsidized
apartment. This is not the case. Miyah’s reality was pretty
different than I’d assumed. We took many, many pictures of the
local village, the children, the farmers and the interior of a
few houses. In lieu of posting these pictures on a forum such as
this, we will keep these photos a little more private – we will
be happy to show family, however, once we are home.
There is
nothing that can prepare you for the sharp contrast in the way
that these people live. That being said, we were greeted warmly
by both the younger children and the older farmers in the
village and we could tell how proud they were to welcome us into
their homes. They had no prior knowledge of our visit to the
village, yet seemed thrilled that we were there.
I can tell you
that our visit explained a lot relative to all of the babies in
our group and their development to date – not necessarily all in
a bad way. For instance, it is obvious that Miyah can only fall
asleep when in a certain position – being rocked in someone’s
arms. Developmentally, she has already made huge progress in the
short amount of time she has been with us – I think she will be
on target within six months or so.
After the visit
to the village, we were taken to “Porcelain Street”. Our guide,
Sally, is wonderful but due to her heavy Chinese accent,
background noise on the bus, and the poor sound system, she is
often hard to hear and/or understand. For the last two days when
she would discuss the itinerary I thought she was telling us we
were going to go to PARSLEY Street. I couldn’t understand what
the big deal was. I mean, how much parsley can they sell? Did
they seriously have a whole street just for this once
spice? What did they do for the more high-profile spices like
cinnamon and nutmeg? Did they have their own little malls? At
any rate, when we pulled up in front of the porcelain “factory”
that had many wares to sell out front it didn’t take me too long
to realize what we were doing there.
We came back to
the hotel for some much needed down time. As it turns out, Miyah
felt we didn’t need “down time” and wanted to play all day. I
swear this kid can survive on like four hours of sleep a
day! (Actually that’s a huge exaggeration. We actually got six
continuous hours of sweet, sweet slumber last night!! First time
for me in about two weeks!)
At any rate, we
played for the majority of the afternoon, had a meeting to go
over some paperwork for her passport, and then went as a group
to walk through the pedestrian shopping area (e.g., place where
McDonalds and KFC are located – turns out the whole group is a
little homesick for American food). We got a few more stares
tonight walking as a group of 30 Americans with Chinese
children.
Speaking of
homesick, we have officially begun the countdown clock for
home. Today is T minus six days and counting!!! While we are
enjoying our time here in Miyah’s hometown, we cannot wait to
introduce her to her Nanny, Papa, Grampa, Brendie, Grandma, and
all the aunts, uncles and cousins.
Thanks for
looking in on us. We are falling deeper and deeper in love with
this little girl every minute and cannot wait to share her with
you all!. |
Outfit for the day
Porcelain "Factory"
DJ wants a new hat!
Out for a stroll
Some local children with their cat
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