ONE ADVENTURE ENDS, ANOTHER BEGINS
12/7: We started our day walking around and watching the people out begining their day with various activities. It is just amazing to watch how public spaces are not used for individual endeavors, but as places of community. A couple of us then went to a pearl market. Then Rich and I went walking through an outdoor food market. Rich found another market today where he finally saw people using chopsticks to pick out live scorpions -- I think he feels that his trip is now complete. We then took our "red couch" pictures which was as chaotic as all of the pictures I have seen of that moment!
By the way, before I get to the important part of the day, let me say that in our entire time here I have not seen one fortune cookie or take-out container! However, the buffet breakfasts are quite amazing and we will have our work cut-out for us in finding enough variety and quantity of food in our house to feed Eleanor the eater!
In the afternoon we went to the U.S. Consulate to "swear or affirm that the paperwork we had submitted was true and correct." Yep, that was it and when Eleanor lands in Chicago, she will be a U.S. citizen. You cannot take any cameras or equipment into the consulate so my description will have to suffice. Essentially we were in a big room with about 50 other adoptive families. When we first arrived we were handed some paperwork and on ours was a congratulatory note from Rich's cousin Nicole who works in the U.S. Consulate in Moldova -- that was very special! Once we had confirmed that the paperwork was accurate we stepped up to a window, showed the woman a photocopy of Eleanor's Chinese passport, she said okay and we stepped away from the window. No idea what that was about, but then again, I have no idea about why we have been required to do about helf the things we have done to date, but we follow along sure that there must be some reason. After all, working for the Federal government myself I know there is always a good reason for bureaucracy -- HA!
Anyway, then we waited. Finally a woman came out and got on a microphone and told us that the Guangzhou office processes around 7,000 adoptions a year which makes it the busiest adoption unit in the world. This seems a good time to mention that while there are 7,000 U.S. adoptions of Chinese babies, in China there are over 80,000 domestic adoptions. In addition, often a child is unofficially adopted by a family member. We also saw a fair number of little boys being adopted today and they did not appear to be special needs children.
Anyway, she then told us that the babies visa will make them U.S. citizens when they arrive on U.S. soil and get their Chinese passport stamped. Then we all had to stand, raise our right hands and swear that the submitted paperwork was correct and that was it! Even though it was short, it was very emotional and many of us had tears in our eyes - of course, you know that Rich cried!
We had a last supper with our group and now we are packing as we get ready to come home. How did it all go so fast? This trip has been such a blur and I wish so much that we could stay longer and just enjoy the country without all of the appointments, factory tours and paperwork that took up much of this trip. And then again, I realize that all of that was so we could have the privilege of bringing Eleanor into our family.
This is an amazing country -- incredibly complex and nuanced. A place of great contrasts, but so beautiful. I am sad already that I will never be able to give Eleanor all of those nuances and all of that beauty no matter what I do. She will grow up loving peanut-butter and jelly and hamburgers and while I know that is okay, I hope that at some point she is able to visit here and get some sense of how much children are loved here. In fact, we will never be able to repay the debt of gratitude that I feel we owe to the Chinese government and the Shaoyang orphanage. Perhaps that seems weird because it is a governmental policy that has created the need for adoptions and yet, thank goodness that given that, they DO make it possible to adopt. And, of course, we think about Eleanor's birthparents and the decisions that they had to make. The life she will have with us will be very different from the life she was born into and all we can promise it that we will do the best we can.
My father says that parenthood is a "great adventure." There will be ups and downs and I already miss my sleep and some of my freedom. But I feel so fortunate that we created our family in this way. A little over 14 months ago we got the letter that said "Congratulations, your application to adopt has been accepted." And now here we are, half a world a way, with a daughter who has already demonstrated the strength of her spirit and who will remind us on a daily basis of this wonderful place. Let the adventure begin. |
