Sydney Elizabeth

Day 4
1/03/06

Well the big day is finally here, the day we have been working towards for 1 year, 4 months and 3 days! It started very early in the morning for us, we had to be ready to leave Beijing to fly to Chongqing at 6:45 AM. After talking to Lori on Monday night (Monday morning for most of you!), I went to bed about 11:45. I woke at 3:50, but it wasn’t time to get ready, so I went back to sleep. I woke at 4:46, but it wasn’t time to get ready, so I went back to sleep. I woke at 5:13, etc. I finally just got up and showered at 5:20. I was done and ready to go at 6:00, so I got Brandon up and went down to the lobby. Most of our group was already waiting, so I wasn’t the only one that couldn’t sleep! We took the bus to the airport, our flight left at 8:30. For the most part the procedure at the airport was the same as in the US. The only thing different was the security people opened all of our bottles of liquid and sniffed them. It must be a way people smuggle drugs. I also set the metal detector off, so a small Chinese woman had to check me over with the wand and squeeze the bundle of cash I had hidden under my shirt. I guess she didn’t think that was strange since I passed through without any more trouble. The flight to Chongqing was about two and a half hours long.

The city is completely covered in fog so I can’t see more than two blocks at any time. We landed, got our bags and took a bus to the hotel. The hotel is beautiful, right in the middle of a downtown area with many shops and restaurants nearby. Our local guide had given us the schedule of the day’s events on the bus. We had about an hour and a half to eat lunch and prepare for our appointment with the Civil Affairs office where we would get our babies. For us this meant getting our paperwork ready and our gifts for the orphanage director and the caregivers put together. At 2:00 the group was meeting in a hotel conference room to fill out the remaining paperwork for the affairs office. Our appointment would be at 3:00. We got settled in our rooms and a bunch of us met for lunch.

The hotel staff told us there was a “western” buffet on the seventh floor of our hotel, so we gave it a try. I’m not sure I would call “braised rabbit” or “eel in sauce” western food, I’ve never seen it at Golden Corral (or they label it different ;-), but we all found something to eat anyway.

After lunch we put together our gift bags. Brandon helped Kevin, the other single Dad on the trip, put together his bags and we made to the conference room. For the most part the paperwork was already filled out for us, we just had to do some signing. We did have to write and small essay on why we wanted a baby. It was still the new years holiday for the government in China, so the employees of the Civil Affairs office came in special for us. There is usually an interview at the appointment, but they were skipping that for today. Finally it we went down to the bus for the ride to the Civil Affairs office.

The office was about 30 minutes away and I got the impression if the fog and smog cleared this would be a beautiful city. We passed places where we were high above the Yangse river and crossing over beautiful arched bridges. The river is not very wide right now, lots of mud, in the summer it is much higher. Through the meeting to fill out the paper work and on the ride over, I was starting to get very emotional. We were so close to holding the babies and I wouldn’t have to look at old pictures or 2 second grainy video to see what Sydney looked like anymore. As we climbed the stairs to the fourth floor where the office was, my emotions only got worse. When we entered the office just to the left of us were some people with a bunch of babies. Our group all broke down at once, crying and trying to figure out which baby was ours. Brandon was snapping picture like crazy. One of the little fears I’ve had through the whole process was that I wouldn’t recognize Sydney or they would switch her for a different baby. The fear was coming true for our whole group, none of us could figure out which baby was which. Finally our guide told us those weren’t our babies, I don’t think I’d laughed so hard in a while. Ours were in a back room and they started bringing them out one at a time. You had to show your passport to get your baby. Now everyone was crying again and sure enough when they brought Sydney out Brandon and I both knew it was her. Some of the babies were crying when they came out, some started crying when they looked at their new parents, but some like Sydney were very content. As I write this it’s 6:24 AM on Wednesday morning and Sydney still has not cried. She was a delight all evening playing with her stacking cups and anything else she could grab.

After we got the babies, we had to wait for the paperwork to be finished, so we spent about a hour in the office holding our babies. The final step was to put mine and Sydney’s fingerprint on the paperwork and we went back to the hotel. I did get to do my first diaper right in the office. They like to bundle the babies in China up and Sydney managed to soak through about an inch of clothing! I felt bad because one of the things that was suggested to us was to not take them out of the clothes they were brought in since they had familiar smells on them and would comfort them. I had to pull most of Sydney’s stuff off since it was wet, but she really didn’t seem to care.

The rest of the evening was spent playing with our babies in our room and visiting their “sisters” in other rooms. Woody went to the store for everyone and bought water and other supplies (Sydney didn’t fit into the size three diapers too good, so we’ve moved up to fours). Woody even went to Pizza Hut and delivered pizza to all of us for dinner, we definitely own him a dinner. Rachael, Woody’s wife, is a nurse and checked out the babies for us. Sydney seems to be free of scabies which a lot of the kids have, but she does have an upper respitory infection. She is not running a fever, but definitely has a croupy cough. The orphanage gave me some medicine for it, so I’m hoping is clears soon. A lot of the babies seem to have the same cough. It is definitely something to pray for Sydney about.

After playing and visiting, Sydney did seem to get a little cranky and tired. We came back to the room and I put her down in the crib at about 9 PM.

1/04/06 She is just now waking up and cooing in her crib, playing with her stacking cups (It’s 6:45 AM). Overall, I feel incredibly blessed and love her so much already.

I have to write a little bit about Brandon on this trip. Brandon has been a huge help not only to me but to other families as well. He was a great photographer at the Civil Affairs office for me and quite a few other people. He has run laundry for people to the guides so we can get some clean clothes. I’m so glad he has been here to share this trip with and boy DOES HE LOVE HIS SISTER! It is so hard to gauge the feelings of a 14 year old boy. I know he was excited about the trip and his sister, but I didn’t know how he would act towards her. He has been hugging her up and very happy to take her from me when I need to do something. He just woke up to his new alarm and is at the edge of crib kissing and talking to her. I couldn’t have asked for the day to go any better!

Steven