Touring Day 2 (Friday)

Today was a great mix of re-doing things we had really enjoyed on previous visits to Beijing and trying some other things for the first time.

We left our hotel this morning and headed to the northwest corner of the city to visit the Summer Palace. But, when we got there we discovered that the torch relay for the Paralympics (which is also being held here in Beijing at the sites of the Olympics) was going to pass thru the area later this morning, and the Summer Palace was closed to visitors until about 2PM. So, we did a little schedule juggling and switched our morning and afternoon activities.


We traveled to an area near the drum and bell towers in the center of Beijing for a tour of the "hutongs". This area is what much of Beijing looked like in the early to mid twentieth century - rows of courtyard homes along narrow alleyways. The best way to see the area is shown in this picture of Natalie and Marissa (with a friend they've made from another family touring with us). The hutongs are generally too narrow to be navigated with a car or van, and so bicycles (or in this case rickshaws) are the way to go.

After riding around for a while, we stopped at the home of a family that lives in the hutong for lunch. (This was a favorite part of our previous trip to Beijing and we weren't disappointed this time, either.) The surroundings were very simple, but the food was plentiful and delicious. After the meal, the family showed us around their home. Then, we rode our rickshaws back to our starting point with a much better understanding of just how blessed our lives really are.











Our next stop was at a tea house for a "tea ceremony" where we learned a lot about several different teas popular in this area of China and were give the opportunity to purchase some of the teas we had sampled (yes, we gave in and made some purchases :).




By then, it was time for us to return to the Summer Palace. This is a large park on the edge of a large lake with a number of beautiful buildings that were used in the past by several emperors and empresses as a summer "get-away". One of the most famous "buildings" on the grounds is the "marble boat" you can see in the background of this pic. We finished our visit with a boat trip across the lake, which we hadn't been able to do on our previous visit because the lake had been frozen solid (it was in February that time).

After a quick stop at a "pearl factory" (Marissa got a necklace and earrings and Natalie said she isn't "much into jewelery"), we headed back to the hutongs for our last stop of the day. On our two previous visits, we had missed the chance to try a delicacy named after this great city - Beijing roast duck (Peking duck).  This time, we decided it was something we would experience for ourselves. We had read online that one of the best places to get this dish was at "Li Qun roast duck restaurant", actually housed in the place where the chef lives. Once again the setting was extremely simple and the food was marvelous. Every plate they brought to our table, including the thinly-sliced-right-there-at-the-table roast duck, disappeared quickly.



A short ride back though the lights of Beijing and we were at our hotel to rest up for another day of touring tomorrow.

We made it !!!

When we last posted, we were getting ready to board our LONG flight from Chicago to Beijing. Well, everything went well with that flight. We left on time and arrived in Beijing about 12 and a half hours later (by our watches it was a bit over 12 hours, but it was 12:30PM Chicago time on Tuesday when we left, and it was 2:30PM Wednesday, Beijing time, when we arrived). None of us had been able to get much sleep on the flight, and since we had been traveling for about 20 hours by the time we got to China, we were all feeling pretty rough.















So, we had the guide that had met us at the airport take us to our hotel to drop off our luggage. She then took us to a nearby restaurant for a quick dinner, and then we returned to the hotel to try and get caught up on our missed sleep.




Thursday morning we started a few days of touring to get over our jet lag and to let Natalie and Marissa see some of the famous sites in Beijing that they had not gotten to see before (or were too young to remember when they had been there before).

We started by taking a quick look at the new Beijing performing arts center. Then we walked to the nearby Tiananmen Square (the largest public square in the world). Here's a pic of the whole crew in front of the Great Hall of the People, where China's government officials meet. (On the west edge of Tiananmen Square.)





From Tiananmen Square we walked to the Forbidden City and spent several hours touring that amazing complex where China's emperors had lived over 600 years ago.

After lunch we toured a "silk factory" where they showed us how silk was made by silkworms and then tried to sell us everything you can imagine made from silk.

By late afternoon we were all feeling very tired, so we returned to the hotel for a little food and a lot of rest. Tomorrow, we'll be back at it again.

In the meantime, we need a little help. We're really trying to be good tourists as we visit China, but our jet-lagged brains just can't seem to understand what it is we are suppose to do. Any ideas ???

On our way....

Well, this is what happens when you give a traveling geek a computer, a WiFi hotspot and TOO MUCH time in an airport!!!

We're sitting here at gate C16 at beautiful Chicago O'Hare Field. We've been here for about 3 hours and we still have a little more than an hour to wait before we get on our plane for Beijing. All of us were too excited to sleep much last night, so we're all feeling pretty tired already. Hopefully, that will make it easier to sleep during our 14 hour flight. Anyway.....here's a little proof that we are really here in Chicago.

More later when time/internet access allow.

And here we go....

It's a little after 9PM. We're getting up early to catch a 5:50AM flight out of Springfield tomorrow morning on the first leg of what will be about 22-24 hours of traveling before we finally reach Beijing. But we're all excited about the trip and what it will mean for our family, so there's no telling how much sleep any of us will get. Just wanted to post this pic to show that we really are taking less this time around (REALLY!).

When you next hear from us, we'll be "reporting" from Beijing.

Time to get REALLY serious.....

It's taken a little bit longer than we would have liked to get this post up here, but.....we now have our travel approval, an appointment at the U.S. Consulate in Guangzhou, and an "outline" of an itinerary. And it all happened a little faster than we expected.

The details.....

On Friday, August 15, we received notice from our adoption agency that we had approval from the Chinese government to travel to China. We had been told that once we had approval, we would probably travel about 4-6 weeks later. But the agency requested a Consulate appointment on September 15, 16, or 17...and since that appointment is one of the LAST things on the itinerary, it meant we'd  need to leave with only about 2 weeks to get ready.

On Saturday, August 16, we sent (Express Mail) our passports to a courier service to get the visas we need to enter China. (We are supposed to get them back this coming week.)

Then, this past week we worked with our adoption agency, a local travel agent (for flights from Springfield to Beijing and back), and a travel agency in China (for all of the in-China arrangements....hotel rooms, touring, etc.) and the details of our latest Chinese adventure have become a little clearer.

If we get our visas back in time (and we have been assured we will ), we leave Springfield on September 2 and arrive in Beijing on September 3. We get to meet JinXin on September 7 or 8. And we return to Springfield on September 19. We'll get our more detailed itinerary this week.

To say we are excited would be an understatement. In 2 weeks, we will have another beautiful daughter. But first we have to think about packing.

Much Closer Now....

All of a sudden, our latest adoption journey has been put "on the front burner".

We had been waiting for a document to arrive from the China Center for Adoption Affairs (CCAA), called a "Letter Seeking Confirmation". (This document essentially says that the CCAA has reviewed all the papers we sent and everything is good with them.) Our dossier had been "logged in" at the CCAA on 5/20/08 and most familes had been receving their "Letter Seeking Confirmation" somewhere between 2 and 3 months after their dossiers had been accepted. Well...on 7/24/08, our adoption agency received our LSC from the CCAA. It was sent "overnight" to us, we signed it (telling them that we really, really did want to adopt Jin Xin :) and "overnighted" it back.

Now, we wait to get travel approval (usually about 4 weeks) and then we can make official travel plans. So...mid-September is a definite possibility and suddenly we are once again contemplating our international travel "packing lists".

The Days Can't Go Fast Enough

We have no details about this picture. It was sent to us by a woman in China who has access to many of the kids. We are ready to go to China, NOW!!!!!

Simply AMAZING !!!

After only one week from the time our dossier was sent to China, we were notified today that our papers had been "logged in" at the China Center for Adoption Affairs (CCAA). We had been told that it would probably take about 2 weeks, so to say we were pleasantly surprised is an understatement. Our goal had been to reach this point before my birthday (June 12) and so that has been accomplished, too.

Now, just give us permission to go to China and get JinXin!!! (Still on course for September or October.)

Now the REAL Waiting Begins

Yesterday (May 14), we were notified by our agency that our dossier was on it's way (via overnight mail) to the China Center for Adoption Affairs (CCAA). Supposedly, it is currently taking about 2 weeks to get the papers "logged in" once they get to China. So, that is our next milestone to reach. (Our goal was to have this done before June 12, which means we're still "on schedule".)

Then, once we're notified that we've been logged in, we have another wait of 2-3 months to get official approval to adopt. And THEN, we wait another month or so to get permission to travel. That sounds like a long time, but the months between January (when we began this process in earnest) and now have gone very quickly, so hopefully the next 4-5 months will, also.

While We're Waiting

While we're waiting for our papers to get finally sent to China...here are a few pics of Tianjin(found online), where we hope to be visiting SOON.



(This video was created in just a few minutes by using the amazing website "Animoto". For more information, click here.)