Deanna and I both woke up at 4:30 AM again. Micah slept through the night and woke up around 5:30AM. What a blessing! We also were able to Skype with big brother Nathan (pronounced guh guh), little sister Claire (pronounced may may), and Grandma Tammy. We also Skyped with Carly, Dan, and Lainey. Micah enjoyed meeting the family, but he also seemed excited to start his day playing.
Today was adoption day.
We are officially parents … again … but this time with a boy from
Shanghai! Our morning started with a 45
minute drive to some government building that reminded me of a DMV/Secretary of
State back in the States. There, we
waited in line for an elevator for a while.
When it was our turn, we piled into an elevator along with 10-15 other
people. I was worried we would exceed
the weight limit, but somehow we managed to make it up to the third floor.
That floor was apparently dedicated to international marriages
and adoptions. We started our time by
getting a family picture taken, and then we got to be interviewed again. The interviewer asked us the same questions
we responded to yesterday. She must not
have understood much of what we said, though, because she had to copy our answers
from page 1 to page XX after we answered each question. The one difference was that we apparently did
not talk enough about our “plan” for raising Micah. Telling them that we would put him in school
in the fall and take him to see a doctor when we got back was not enough. Our Holt escort stepped in for us and assured
the official that we would support him in the university, that we have no
financial issues, that we would not abandon or abuse him, etc.
Apparently that did the trick because the next thing we knew
were getting Micah’s fingerprint on a piece of paper and then going next door
for the “ceremony”. This consisted of
standing behind a podium and having our picture taken … no more, no less.
The next place we went was the “Notary” office. On the way, Micah had to pee. The driver informed us that there was
absolutely no place to pull over and then promptly whipped out a small plastic
sack that resembled a grocery store vegetable bag. Our escort informed us that Micah could relieve
himself in that. So, Matt climbed in the
back seat him, held the bag in the proper position, and tried to brace him the
best he could as the van bounced down the street. Can anyone say urine sample? Matt was very thankful that the bag was
leakproof and that Micah’s bladder is still relatively small. Deanna and I were both amused and a bit
disgusted. Our escort later told us that
the driver was very confused why we were laughing during this whole
ordeal. We tried to explain to her that
we would never have done that in the States.
We finally arrived at the “Notary” office after another 15
minutes or so. For some reason, I think
the “Notary” term is a bit different over here than back home. This office building was much nicer than the
first. In fact it looked more like a
bank with marble floors and conference rooms accessed only with a badge. Our conference room consisted of an oval
table with 6 chairs, a security camera in the corner, and a glass wall that was
probably 2-way glass. Here we were met
by the “Notary” would was dressed like an FBI agent or a police detective. She had a nice suit on and a lanyard around
her neck to hold her identification.
We’re not even quite sure what we were doing there. She asked us if we knew Micah’s Chinese name,
Micah’s English name, if we would never abandon or abuse him, and if we would
treat him the same as our biological children.
Apparently, this meeting had to happen to order to get his passport and
his birth certificate. We were assured
that those documents would be ready on Friday before we leave.
On the way to the first stop, we were told that the
orphanage director said we could not come to visit the orphanage. This was a bit defeating. On the bright side, though, we were able to
go visit the place where he was found.
Traci asked if we wanted to take a group shot in front of the
building. We didn’t know if we should
smile or have sad faces. This was
probably the hardest place to visit emotionally so far on this trip. Especially hard to see was the very poor
living conditions of the nearby neighborhood surrounded by lush private estates
and high rise apartment buildings.
In the afternoon, we decided to go shopping and then off to
a park. Apparently they don’t sell underwear
in Micah’s size in China. Who knew? At the park we played with a light-up ball
that Deanna had picked out ahead of time.
We also played with bubbles. He
absolutely loved that! We even got to
play with a few of the other children passing by. On the downside, we felt that just about everyone walking by was staring
at us. Once the crowd grew to 6 or 10
people circled around us we decided it was time to leave.
We didn’t like having that much attention. More to come in this area, both here and back home, we’re sure.
Our last stop of the night was dinner at McDonald’s. Micah got to have his very first Happy Meal:
chicken nuggets, dipping sauce, fries, milk, and a toy. He absolutely loved it. Afterwards we stopped and got him an ice
cream cone as well. Why not? Feeding our new son
McDonald’s junk food for his first official meal as a family member was definitely not one of our proudest parenting moments,
but we were happy Micah enjoyed himself. We were also happy to be eating food that tasted something like back home.
Tomorrow we plan to visit a historical Chinese garden with
our escort and maybe do a little more shopping.
Please pray that we all get a good night’s sleep and that we can stay
safe tomorrow being around a busy tourist place. Pray that our passport and birth certificate paperwork all get processed in a timely fashion so that our travel to Guangzhou is not delayed. Pray that Deanna and I can continue to
learn a bit more Chinese and communicate with him a bit more each day. Also, please pray for our escort Traci. She has been such a blessing to us and is missing her husband and 12-year old son back home.
No comments:
Post a Comment