Free Day (China Day 7)

That's right, no appointments, no official meetings, nothing.  Today was a day to relax with the part of our family that's on this side of the world.  Following our usual breakfast at the hotel, we met our friend Jordon again for another tour of this city, this time with another adopting family.  It was a great morning, taking in all kinds of local culture.  We visited a lot of places, including Dr. Sun Yat-Sen's Memorial Hall, Chen Academy, Six Banyan Pagoda, and a local "middle-class neighborhood".  We won't take the time to type up all of the history lessons here, but there will be pictures at the end of this post.


Jordon took us to a local restaurant for lunch.  He said it's one of his father's favorite places, and "you know it's good because it's where all the old people go to eat".  They definitely don't see Westerners in this place very often, because we got some major stares.  He told us one of the servers asked him how he was able to communicate with us.  When he said he was our tour guide, they seemed shocked that "tourists" would be in that part of town.  The food was outstanding.  Jordon is such a great guy!  He loves these children and said "I'm their Uncle Jordan".  He is a man that loves God and it shows.  He loves helping out adopting families from America, and he's been a true blessing to us this week.  You'll see some pictures of Jordon with Helen below.

Following a bus ride and metro/subway ride back to our hotel, we put Helen down for a nap and just vegged out in our room until dinnertime.  We hitched a taxi across town to meet up with a different adopting family for dinner.  "Cow and Bridge" was the restaurant of choice, which was Chinese/Thai cuisine.  The food was again outstanding.

Helen was a trooper all day, especially while we were out and about.  We've seen more glimpses into her real personality today, and feisty is an understatement.  This is especially true at mealtime.  She definitely has the persona of a typical toddler.  Feet on the table, dropping things on the floor on purpose, hitting objects with other loud objects, etc.  We're learning it doesn't matter where in the world a child is born, naughtiness is a universal language (don't get us wrong, it's also very darned cute).

After the taxi ride back to the hotel, we put Helen down for the night, and we're ready to get to sleep ourselves.  Our travel journey is about halfway done, and we're extremely ready to get back home!  When people at Steve's work heard he would be gone for two weeks, he heard comments like "oh, two weeks of vacation, that'll be nice".  Let us tell you, this process is far from a vacation.  Yes, we get to see some of the sights, but it's mostly a lot of stress and appointments and waiting around and missing loved ones back home.  We love the culture and the people here, but we're ready to be back where we belong as a family of five in Iowa.


We'll leave you today with photos from our 7th day in China: