There are always tons of people lined up outside the consulate.
Being Americans we get to walk right past all of them and go in another
entrance. It was all I could do not to bust out singing “I’m proud to be an
American, where at least I know I’m free…” Although I was singing it in my head
the whole time we were there. We stopped to take a quick picture outside before
turning our phone over to Aron since they do not allow phones inside. She gave
us directions on where to go, and then we left her there. We were the last in
our group, which is surprising since David is always trying to get to the front
of the line wherever we go! After a security check, a quick walk through the
courtyard to another building, and an elevator ride, we were met with a room
full of chaos! For Lily’s adoption it was literally us and one other family.
There had to be at least 50 people in that room today! I think because
Thanksgiving is on Thursday there were more people than usual scheduled for
each day. I’m not even sure if they are doing appointments on Wednesday, because
they would be closed for processing the visas. We proceeded to the window to
check in and get our number. We were C525. They were currently serving C511. We
were definitely in for a wait. This was confirmed a few minutes later when we
saw that family that had left the hotel an hour earlier than us was still
there! There is a small play area for the kids, but I think it was a little too
crowded for David. He was just happy to sit in the chairs with us and wait. Normally
we hide snacks and drinks from David because he wants them the second he sees
them, but we were only allowed to bring a clear bag into the consulate. About
10 minutes into our wait I caught him opening up his snack cookie. There went
our main source of distraction! Oh well. After he finished his snack he got a
little braver and took my hand and led me over to the play area. I sat with him
while he played with some of the wooden toys at the table. Finally at 10:15 (we
got there around 9:30) they called our group up for the first step of the
process – taking an oath. Since I was with David, Brian was the representative
from our family. It was cool to watch a whole group of people raise their right
hand and repeat words about caring for and protecting orphans together. Once
that step was over we waited for our individual numbers to be called. We were
the last ones from our group (except for the two extra families who joined us
on the shuttle) so we watched everyone go up one by one and turn in their
paperwork. Finally it was our turn! We handed over our envelope of important
documents, received a few things back, and then went back to our seats to wait
for the final step. At some point I went to use the bathroom, and it was an
actual clean, western bathroom complete with hand soap and toilet paper! I
almost just stayed in there marveling at the cleanliness and familiarity of the
whole thing. For the final step the man at the window calls you up by name. The
room had definitely cleared out at this point, so we could actually hear what
he was saying. When it was our turn all three of us went up to the window. I
lifted up David so he could see him (this is a required step) and the man said “Ni
Hao David!” David, being the charmer that he is, gave him a big smile and a
loud “Ni Hao!” right back. Then he continued to say ni hao over and over again
to get the man to smile at him. I finally had to put him down so the poor guy
could concentrate! He asked us to describe David’s medical condition, then
Brian was fingerprinted, and we were done! We walked back across the street to
the lobby of the medical facility to meet our group.
The original plan was to meet in the lobby at 11:30 to go to
the Chen Family Temple, but we didn’t make it back to the hotel until almost
noon! I felt really bad for all the people waiting in the lobby to leave. If we
had working phones they could have told everyone to come down 30 minutes later.
Oh well. I quickly ran upstairs to drop off our paperwork and grab Dad who had
gone back up to watch the Patriots game. To be perfectly honest, I definitely
could have done without going back to the Chen Temple again. But I wanted to
get a chop (a stamp with David’s Chinese name carved into it) and a name scroll
for two of his gifts. What we probably should have done was just have me go and
spare everyone else the 90 minutes of waiting around and dealing with tantrums.
Sadly, hindsight is 20/20 so we all went. When we got there I went to the gift
store first and ordered both of the items I wanted. Then we took a walk around
looking at the art exhibits. There are some pretty sweet ivory carvings. We
also saw pottery and sculpture, and tried to find the embroidery but were
unsuccessful. Once we had seen everything we took a seat on one of the walls
and started to give the kids a snack. Lily was upset about something and
starting to cry, so I took her on a walk to distract her. As soon as I walked
away, David went into a full blown tantrum because Brian tried to give him half
a banana and he wanted the whole thing. He did the whole head hitting, shoe
throwing, undressing thing and apparently there were all kinds of people
staring at him. And not like a subtle looking over their shoulder to see where
that noise was coming from. They literally walked over and made a circle around
him like it was a show for their own personal entertainment. My dad basically
shooed them away, and eventually they got David calmed down. I’m not even sure
how. I was happily shopping for tea and looking for another gift for David and
missed the whole thing! It was getting close to time to leave, so Brian took
the kids outside with my dad to wait at the meeting place while I went to pick
up the name scroll. I went out to find them and didn’t see them anywhere! I came
back in thinking maybe I missed something, but they weren’t there either.
Finally my mom and I started walking to see if maybe they went back to the bus,
and then we saw them sitting on benches behind bushes. They were there the
whole time, I just couldn’t see them. But, while I was off looking for them
David had another tantrum! This one was because he didn’t like the bush poking
him in the back while he was sitting on the wall. It also resulted in a audience,
complete with a woman videoing the whole thing with her phone. My dad let her
know that he was not okay with that, and she quickly ducked her head and walked
away. Yep, definitely should have left everyone at home. I don’t know what it
is about that place, but Lily had a huge tantrum there two years ago. Anyway,
we could not get out of there soon enough!
Mom wanted to go back to Liwan market to look at pearls
again, so she and Dad did that while Brian and I took the kids back to the
hotel to nap. Miko gave them directions and tried to help them get a cab but
they were all full! They finally made it there and walked all over the market.
The entire thing, floor after floor after floor, is all jewelry! I have no idea
how anyone makes a living. There are so many shops that are all the same, and
none of them seem to be busy. It totally blows my mind. Once they were done
there they had another adventure with Chinese taxi drivers on the way home. I
think my dad is a little over the culture here ;o) While they were off
adventuring, Brian and I enjoyed some time relaxing on our bed while the kids
all played nicely out in the living room. Maybe there is something to this
whole four kid thing after all! After about 30 minutes Lily started self destructing
so we decided to enforce nap time after all. Both she and Matthew have a cold
and could definitely use the extra rest. David watched the other three go in
their room to nap, and then climbed into his bed and went to sleep without
complaint! While they were sleeping I went down to run on the treadmill for a
while. I am so looking forward to being able to run outside again when I get
home!
The two little ones woke up first, and as it got closer to
dinner time we started to wake up the other two. We did wait to leave until we
watched most of the Patriots game on replay though! This was our last night in
Guangzhou and we wanted to go out somewhere. We decided against Chinese food, and
thought we would try a new pizza place that opened up nearby called Oggi’s. It
was only a short walk away, and was really good! It actually tasted a lot like
American pizza! David isn’t a huge fan of pizza yet. I’m sure that will change
when his palate is repaired, because it’s a little hard for him to eat right
now. The other three kids devoured theirs, and then we walked back to the hotel
for bed. Bedtime for David didn’t go as smoothly this time. Probably because he
had taken a nap. It went great for me though, because I fell asleep in Lily’s
bed while I was snuggling with her and stayed there until midnight! Tomorrow is
our last morning in Guangzhou before we head to Hong Kong.
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