Good, Bad, Sad

First, the good news. Our representatives went to the US consulate appointment for us today and everything cleared. Helena is officially our child. Yeah! We will do our swearing in at the consulate (as a group) tomorrow, but this is a small formality and after this we are free to leave the Peoples Republic of China. We have confirmed our airline reservation and we will be leaving Friday evening for Los Angeles.

Now the bad news. We may have mentioned it in a previous email, but there are a few children at this hotel with confirmed cases of chickenpox. At first there was one child, who we have actually seen. Now we hear there are at least two. These two families and the rest of the people in their travel group are now quarantined and can not visit the consulate for their swearing in until February 9th. We were told by our representative this afternoon that if anyone of our kids breaks out with the virus, we (the entire group will be quarantined as well). After this announcement Val ran around telling everyone if your kid gets the pox, keep your mouth shut! I rode up with a guy in the elevator earlier and I guess the situation has been escalated and the CDC is involved and a ruling is expected, etc. So, once again, keep your fingers crossed and remember us in your prayers. We are not home yet.

Now for the sad...
Yesterday was a memorable one for me, although unlike most of the memories I have gathered since arriving in China, this one wont leave me with a pleasant aftertaste.
I traveled with one of the families in our group to the city of Yangxi, about 180 K to the southwest of Guangzhou. Yangxi is where their little boy was abandoned and placed in the care of the local orphanage. We traveled by van through the country and arrived in town and spent about an hour visiting with the orphanage vice-director, touring a part of the orphanage, where their baby slept, and meeting some of the nannies that cared for him. Part of the tour included us walking through one of the rooms, with infants in their cribs. I have seen pictures and heard the stories of how the cribs are arranged in little islands for six to eight, but it is hard to be prepared for actually seeing this with your own eyes. Needless to say, it was not a good scene. The place was very sterile (but not in a clean way) and the poor little faces had very little if any expression on their faces. These were the same faces on our groups' children the day we received them and we have watched transform into happy little children over the last week and a half.
I will say that it appeared the nannies cared for the children (in their own way), but they obviously lacked much in way of personal contact. There were also some special needs children in the room and it was obvious that they needed more specialized care and support than what these poor women could provide.
The play area was basically void of toys and also very institutional-like. The kitchen where the bottles were prepared was also not great. I was told by our representative that this orphanage was not "the best", but not bad compared to where our little Helena spent the first 13 months of her life. I was so troubled by this scene as well as the scene I imagined my daughter endured while waiting for us. The mother of their new little boy (who has two beautiful daughters from previous trips to China), remarked to me "you see, this is why we came back for another one!"
I will say that there were a couple happy little souls, following us around and babbling to their nannies and no one looked malnourished. Also, the nannies were very happy to see their old "boarder" and they called out to him from the balcony (the boy and his father stayed down on the playground, so as not to traumatize him- but he was pretty cool about the whole ordeal). We were told by the vice director that they have had fewer and fewer babies available for adoption for the last three years. And most of the children they cared for would be adopted. We did not see older kids or any other people, other than this little group on our tour. China is changing very rapidly for the children these changes appear to be good for the children. There are more in-country adoptions, fewer people having kids, and with a middle class larger than the entire US population more couples can afford the roughly $30K fine to have more than one child. There also remains a strong demand for these little darlings- from Copenhagen to Kansas City.

Enough babble, we know you all tune in for the photos.
-Today was Red Couch picture day. This is a tradition at the White Swan. All of the newly adopted children sit on a red velvet couch in traditional Chinese dress for a photo. With 15 babies this is easier said than done.
-Val has already started teaching Helena about good oral hygiene (no dragon-breath in our family!)
-Helena with our "minders" Kathy and Jason (both very caring, gracious people)