Hello Guangzhou!

There was a welcome familiarity as we drove into the driveway of the White Swan – we spent two weeks here in 2004 when we adopted Jenna. Even though I was excited about coming here again, I was a bit surprised at just how nice and comforting it was. The weather here is nice, warm, and humid. Harbin was so dry it was very soothing to get some moisture back into the lungs, the nasal cavities, the skin, etc… you get the idea. I immediately shed the shoes, the long sleeve shirt, and am seriously regretting not bringing shorts.

Today was actually a pretty hard day for everyone, but especially us and Carli. Last night, as we were packing up, she decided to start having problems going to bed and cried a lot when put down. We were packing up and I think she probably sensed something was going on and got pretty insecure. We were unsure how to handle it and so just tried holding and consoling her, but there was no consoling. She did go down for a bit, but seemed to have some discomfort because she kept whining and thrashing about. About 2am she was up again and stayed for a while in our bed, but then had to transfer to hers. By 5:30am it was time for breakfast so it was a bit of a short night for us all.

It was about a 5+ hour flight from Harbin to Guangzhou. She slept a bit on the first hop, but was up the second (we had a short stop along the way). To make a very long story short, she threw two major fits on the way – one at the layover airport and one in the airplane coming into Guangzhou. The one in the airplane was probably the biggest fit I’ve ever seen a kid throw and of course, everyone is coming over, watching, trying to talk to her (which didn’t help), and crowding around. I think at one point there was at least 20 people watching. She was inconsolable, loud, and there was nothing we could do to quiet her… it was awful.

She is an incredible sweet, funny child but when she starts crying, it is not a short-lived affair. At this point, I am dreading the plane trip home and am just hoping there is some breakthrough in these next 4 days here that will help us communicate with her. I do think part of it is the grieving process, insecurity, and disruption in schedule. However, our guide today told us this is the first adoption Hope for Children has done from Northern China, and in general there aren’t a lot of them. This province doesn’t abandon many children (which explains all the young girls we saw in Harbin). So, the children that do enter the orphanage system are very well cared for and given lots of attention. Couple that with the fact that she was the only girl with a lot of boys, and we have one spoiled little three year old. All of you reading this can say a little prayer for us. I am totally confident of Carli’s long-term development… I don’t think we could have asked for a more perfect little girl. I am just really concerned about the trip home. Guess we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.

Jenna was a bit of a challenge today, as well, but in general I think is doing better with Carli. She’s trying to interact and play with her more. I think her being able to walk around here, the playroom, and everything will be really helpful for Jenna. We also have another family joining us… they come in tonight so hopefully we’ll meet them tomorrow morning.