Wednesday,
October
27, 2010
Gemma seems to be getting more comfortable with us. She's doing
an extraordinary job of communicating without words and must be
the world's best charades player since she always seems to get
across what she needs. Thankfully, she also seems to be a fairly
compliant kid. She's really good at entertaining herself during
the lulls if we're not drawing with her or playing games. She
can entertain herself for hours just by doing her doll's hair or
clothes. Through the Jibbigo translator, she's told April that
she would like to have long hair herself, just like her dolls.
She and Gavin are getting along great. They play games together
and tease each other a lot. Sometimes they even push and shove,
just like proper siblings. They always race each other to the
room when we go back to see who can put the key in first.
Whenever we leave the room, we play a little game at the
elevator bank. Of the 6 elevators, everybody chooses one to see
if their's will be the one we end up taking. We listen closely
at the doors and adjust as needed to get the right one. Usually
we don't end up picking the right one, but it makes us all laugh
in any case. Once on the elevator Gemma always plugs her ears.
We're not sure if it's related to a pressure change or what but
we'll find out sometime. Unfortunately the translator only
translates Mandarin and not Cantonese. It works one way really
well because she can read the characters, but she cannot get her
words to translate back to us.
The only official business today was to go to the Public
Security Bureau (PSB) to apply for the kids' passports. We
didn't have to leave until 2:45 so we had time to relax in the
morning and maybe explore a bit. About mid-morning we met the
Perrys at their room and headed out to explore the Chinese
medicine market across the street from the island. To get there
you walk to the north side of the island, cross the false river,
and then cross Liu Er San Road by way of a pedestrian bridge.
You come down on the other side right in the market.
The market is where the Chinese have found uses for pretty much
every sort of organic matter on Earth. If it crawls, walks,
swims, or photosynthesizes, it will be here - dried and
sellable. It's a busy and bustling place, with the men
constantly loading and unloading heavy sacks of materials, and
the women doing the buying and selling. Every hundred feet or so
the facade gives way to a small opening that opens into a long
corridor of more storefronts that fades back into the ancient
hutongs behind. While it's tempting to walk deep within and
explore, it is not exactly inviting and seems like the kind of
place where one could simply disappear forever. We opted to
stick to the more beaten path.
We walked to the western end first and then back past the
pedestrian bridge to the far eastern end. From here we carefully
crossed Liu Er San Road on its surface and made our way back
onto the island at its eastern end. They tell you to move with
the locals whenever you walk around. They know the rhythms of
the traffic and its important to follow that advice. On the
island it's not that big of a deal, but once outside it's
protection you have to be hyper-aware of what goes on around
you.
We stopped in at Shamian Park (People's Park) on the way back to
the hotel to let the girls play on the playground equipment for
a while. They ran around screaming and giggling with delight for
the better part of an hour, mostly just running up one slide and
sliding down another. Gemma and Gavin played on the teeter
totter for a while as well and Gavin had fun taking video
footage of them goofing off.
By now it was getting to be time for lunch so we headed back up
to the room. We had bought some instant noodle bowls for Gemma
at Carrefour and she devours them for lunch. For the Chinese,
lunch is usually their biggest meal, but for ourselves, we've
just been sticking to a protein bar and a few nuts or something
for our lunches.
We took turns drawing with Gemma and watching a little TV. She
has been drawing Ava's name in flawless English and then writes
the Chinese symbols for "mei mei". I think She's excited to meet
her!
A little later as were were packing up to head out to the PSB, I
heard some faint humming of a recognizable tune. It took me a
few seconds but I recognized it as Jingle Bells. The crazy thing
is that it was coming from Gemma! Apparently Holt has been
preparing them with all kinds of Western practices and customs.
April told me that Faith had been singing Old MacDonald the day
previous so I sang a little verse to see if Gemma would follow.
Sure enough, she chimed in with E-I-E-I-O and we all cracked up.
We met downstairs to head out to the PSB. Catherine Han was
there to chat with the girls a little bit. Gemma took great
delight in calling us out in front of everybody about the fact
that she hadn't yet had a proper bath. We had given her a bath,
but it was really just a lice bath. Apparently she hadn't had
her luxurious 5-star hotel bath yet, and made sure to get the
correct pronunciation of the english word "bath" from Catherine.
There was no way she was not going to get a back tonight!
Catherine is great with the girls and really teases them a lot.
They respond in kind and tease her back.
The PSB experience was a little different this time. It was in a
building that looked exactly the same but I think it was
actually a different building. It was located in a much nicer
part of town, over in the financial district. That part of town
is clean and pristine just as if you were in any large American
city. Inside it was different as well. Last time we went to a
place that was laid out a lot like a DMV, with a waiting area
full of chairs and a counter with the representatives. This time
we were in a ground floor lobby and there were just a few
representatives at a makeshift desk. We waited for about 30
minutes while other adoption families took their turns and then
we walked up for ours. The whole process took about 2 minutes -
they just needed to quickly photograph Gemma for the passport.
The Civil Affairs official was there as well and we were able to
see our adoption decrees and check them for accuracy. Joyce held
onto them for later though.
Heading back to the hotel we made plans for the evening and for
the following day. We were going to venture out to Shangxia Jiu
Lu Shopping Street that night for some "American Food", which
with any luck would be Pizza Hut. At the hotel we met back in
the Holt office again because Abbie had come back from another
province. Chris was also in the office so it was good to see him
again. Between the two, they had done a very good job of
preparing our girls to be adopted into an American family. It
was nice to be able to say thanks personally. We also learned
that of the two girls, it sounds like Gemma might be more of the
pragmatist while Faith is a little more impetuous. Faith was
asking Catherine about being able to go play and say goodbye to
her orphanage friends. Catherine had told her that she would
allow 2 hours for this, upon which Faith immediately began to
negotiate up. "Two and a half?", she said. Gemma then told her
"at least it's something!". We all got a good chuckle out of
that.
We took the last shuttle from the White Swan. Along the way the
girls sat in the back playing little games in Chinese and
practicing English with each other. They were saying things like
"Good Morning Mr. Sun" and counting numbers. I managed to get
some of this on video and it's ultra-cute. We arrived at
Shangxia Jiu Lu, which is pretty much the Times Square of
Guangzhou. This is also where Guangzhou Liwan Plaza and the Jade
Market are located. Liwan Plaza is a mall like no other - 7
stories high with 6 spokes off a central hub. You can buy
precious gems in bulk here as well as all kinds of clothing and
other things you'd find in a mall. Pizza Hut was actually
located inside but for some reason they had the mall temporarily
locked down. We settled instead for McDonalds across the way and
just had some fish sandwiches and bottled water. Supposedly you
can drink fountain drinks at the major chains but we didn't risk
it.
We think the trip is starting to wear on Gavin a little bit.
He's starting to get pretty homesick. Being in this sea of
non-English speaking people and then inside kind of a dingy
McDonalds seemed to have a negative effect on Gavin. He couldn't
wait to get back to the hotel and he really wanted to Skype with
everybody back home. If that wasn't bad enough, he was getting
an earache. The poor kid has had ear tubes since he was very
little and one of them came out the other day. It's gotten
plugged while being here so everything sounds a little muffled
to him. We're going to need to get him to the Western doctor
soon and have it looked at, but he probably won't get good
relief from it until we get home. In any event, the combination
of all this made for a pretty rotten evening for Gav once we got
back to the hotel and he ended up in bed with us.
We took a cab back from Shangxia Jiu Lu by flashing the "take me
back to the White Swan" card. 5 minutes and 7 Yuan later we were
at the lobby door again. It turns out you can actually see
Shangxia Jiu Lu from our room; we just never knew what we were
looking at before. In fact, it's just a few blocks and you can
walk the whole distance if you want.
Gemma got her bath. In fact, we'd used the bath gel and mad a
mountain of bubbles about 3 feet high! She loved it and was able
to get nice and clean. We were able to stay up a little later,
finally going to bed at about 10:00. Gemma had complained about
the soft air mattress the night before so we had her on the
floor last night, sleeping on top of a sheet. Now she wanted to
go back to the air mattress. Both the kids were complaining
about it being too cold, and it really is. They have only one
setting on the White Swan air conditioners - cold. We had a
portable heater brought in which made the room nice and toasty.
Off to sleep... |
The herbal medicine market
One of the corridors deeper into the market
At the playground in Shamian Park
Playing on the teeter totter
All giggles
Priceless moment!
Big brother spends time drawing with little sister
Perfectly written English for her sister's name and "mei mei" in
Chinese characters
Catherine talking to Gemma about her bath
(or lack thereof)
The bus ride to the PSB
(Gemma told us that bus rides make her ill)
Sacked out once again. It's an Asian thing. All our exchange
students sleep whenever they're in a vehicle.
Shangxia Jiu Lu
Moonrise over Guangzhou
Meeting Abbie and Chris in the Holt office
April and Gemma with Catherine |
