12/15 Arrived safely in Guangzhou

Kristy and I have arrived safely in Guangzhou, China. We are approximately 2 hours west of Hong Kong in the province of Guangdong. Guangzhou (formerly known as Canton city) is the ancestral home of many Chinese-Americans who immigrated to the US in the last century. This province is the home of the Cantonese people and culture. Our beautiful hotel sits right on the Pearl River which flows past us down to the sea and Zhuhai...our daughter's home on the sea.

We are so thankful for your love and prayers that have carried us thus far. One clear example of that happened on the flight from LA to Guangzhou. In the middle of the night, Kristy began to feel very ill from something she ate on the plane. Because we chose to fly a Chinese airline, our communication with the stewardesses was limited and we were riding in the economy section with mostly Chinese passengers. We felt alone and the only thing I knew was to put my hand on Kristy's shoulder and pray. And as I did so, I asked God to remember the prayers of so many of you and have compassion on her. The sickness passed and we made it safely off the plane and to our hotel. She is feeling better although has caught a cold. Hopefully that will pass as well.

How do you describe another world in a few short paragraphs?? This morning we ate breakfast at our hotel in a dining room overlooking the river. We watched other parents pass with their new children and thought about meeting our daughter in just a few short days. The whole experience is surreal...we feel like actors in a strange drama that is unfolding before us. On Monday, a child whom we have never met will walk through the door to begin her new life with us. We feel so insufficient for the task which lies before us but are certain we have been called to this. We are so excited and nervous as well.

A very nice store near our hotel is letting us post this today. We hope to post again before we meet her on Monday 12/17.

12/10 Into the wind

As a child, my father often told us about his years in the Navy...how he sailed to far away places. He told us of being at sea at night and watching the glow of the phosphorus in the wake. He told us about the Mediterranean and the places he sailed to. But one thing I especially remember was the stories about those carrier planes. The courage and daring of the young pilots taking off and landing on a ship at sea. In the days of prop planes and steam catapults, the ship had to maneuver to provide the planes maximum lift for takeoff. And so when it was time to launch, the order went out to bring the planes up the elevators, ready the flight deck and turn the ship into the wind.
And so here we sit, strapped in and ready on the catapult...ready to fly off into the great unknown of parenthood. We don't know what to expect but we are trusting that all will be well.
Adoption is a great thing and the new life that awaits Jen surrounded by the love of her family will be worth whatever lies ahead.

We are off to China...

12/7 The great paper chase is almost through

If you have ever adopted internationally, you know what a mountain of paperwork the whole process requires. There are documents for your adoption agency, your state, the Federal government and the country you are adopting from. Fingerprints and fingerprints again, forms, visits to the notary, seals, fees, certifications and authentications. Doctor visits, shots, financial statements and clearances of all kinds. There were trips to the consulate, documents sent to Chicago and Washington and Houston. Long hours of preparing documents phrased just so to communicate exactly the right thought. The matrix grows ever larger with time. At times we felt like we were fishing with lots of lines in the water...just waiting for something to bite. Fedex, UPS, USPS and by personal courier, our documents crossed America. All along the way, we met and talked to people who spoke a kind word of encouragement. Touched by some aspect of our story -- knowing that a child would be coming home. Then there were the late nights, the hours spent peering into every nook and cranny of the Internet looking for some glimpse of our daughter.

In the Internet age, I got the crazy notion that somewhere out there we would find her... and we did. 5 years ago someone snapped a picture of a little girl sitting in a chair

with one foot pointed out...watching her friends play musical chairs. The picture sat on a long forgotten web site just waiting for us to find it. We'll never have those years back but it gives us a window into her world and where she's been all this time. It is further confirmation that she has been loved and cared for. We are so grateful for that. It is almost time to transfer the flag of her life -- from her caregivers to us. We are so thankful that a camera shutter caught our little sweetheart. It is a window into her world on a happy day long before this all began.

12/5 We've a got a ticket to ride

Our tickets arrived tonight!!!! We're flying out on Dec 12 -- just a little over 1 year since the whole process began. In black letters her Chinese name is printed on that ticket from Guangzhou to Los Angeles. It is hard to believe. Last March 2nd, an email arrived on what was just a regular Friday evening. It was the waiting child list from our agency with her picture. I got up from the computer, went to our bedside and cried. In the intervening months, there have been lots of tears. Now the tears are tears of joy...for her and for us. The wait is almost over.

For Thanksgiving, we went to the beach to mark the holiday and make a final memory together before Jen's arrival. We drew a big heart in the sand with her Chinese name and the words in pinyin "wo men ai ni" which is "we love you". The tide washed away those words but nothing will ever wash away the love we feel for this child across the sea. To our precious Jen Hope: we love you so very much and hope that someday you will understand that God moved heaven and earth to bring us together

12/4 Whale song

I marvel how the bonds of love have grown so strong as we wait with a great ocean between us. Like whales in the deep, our song has gone out...wafting its way into the depths and across the wide Pacific...calling to a calf far, far from us. And in the quiet moments, we hear the faint echo of our child's song...coming from across the sea. We are swimming hard now, with all our might, to close the distance, to meet her in the shallows of the South China Sea. With anticipation and joy that can't be expressed, we look forward to that happy moment when we will be united

12/2 Love needs no translation

We are leaving for Guangzhou in 10 days and can't wait. We bought our tickets and just finished up the little remodeling project we've had going since August. Her room is finally ready.

As we were buying an electronic translator in Chinatown on Friday, we told our saleslady that it was for an adoption. When she didn't understand the word "adoption", we typed in "adopt a girl" into the translator. When she saw the translation, a big smile came across her face and she reached across the counter and hugged us both. And in that moment, we were reminded that love is universal -- it transcends nations, languages and cultures. There at an ordinary store in our little corner of the world, we shared together the joy of knowing that a child who was once an orphan had become a daughter. We shared the joy of knowing that love needs no translation.

10/11 The excruciating wait

The leaves are falling in our yard these days. When we first saw her picture the spring flowers were blooming. The wait has gone from "this is OK" to..."this is hard"...to "this is excruciating". I know how many days it has been. I have counted them again and again. This many days from referral to LOI..this many days to PA...to LID. I do my daily projections...if we find out today, it will take this long for the next step, this long for the arrangements, this long to fly. I have a matrix in my mind of how long it has taken for others -- I compare and contrast...figure in the variables and make my forecast.

And then it dawned on me...we have waited and waited for what seems to be a long time. A time of silence, a time of not knowing, a time of what ifs and uncertainty.
We are so close but it seems like so much farther away than that.
And what dawned on me is that our daughter has waited. Not just a few days...not just a few months or seasons. She has waited a lifetime. A lifetime of wondering or maybe not even wondering anymore. I counted the days for her. # of years x 365 days = more days than any child should ever wait. Hundreds and thousands of days. Our wait is excruciating. Hers has been...I don't even want to say...I know we cannot understand what that kind of waiting and that kind of longing and that kind of hoping has been like.

There is a certain aspect of waiting that is like grief. You cry, you agonize, you hope only to have those hopes squelched by another day that passes. You long and that longing goes unfulfilled. Life goes on and you find ways to move forward.

This is all to say that I think this waiting is good. Not that I would have chosen it but maybe it has been necessary. In some small way we can say to our daughter that we know what waiting is like too. We longed and hoped and waited and hopefully this present sorrow will help us to connect with her on some deeper level. To know that we have waited for each other...with an ocean between us.