Day 3 – (continued) March 14th Crowne Plaza Hotel, Jinan, Shandong
We arrived at our hotel at about 4 PM. We were blessed with a free room upgrade because we signed up for the IHG (Crown Plaza hotel group) credit card before we traveled. When we arrived we decided with the guide to meet Katie in our hotel room. There were several guests in the lobby area when we arrived and we felt it would be more private to do the meeting in our room. We got to our room and barely had time to take in how nice it was because we knew Katie would be arriving any minute. We had about 15 minutes to brush our teeth and attempt to look our best after such a long amount of time traveling.
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| Madeline anxiously awaiting the arrival of Wen / Katie |
The doorbell rang and the screams of excitement from Madeline and Zachary
instantly began – “She’s here! She’s here!” was yelled several times. Madeline beat us to the door and there she
was – beautiful as can be – but teary eyed and cheeks flushed red from
crying. It was sad to see her so
emotional before the meeting even began, but we were prepared for it. We always pray for the best, yet prepare for
the worst. Anyone who has adopted knows
that there are very few “fairy tale” adoption days when you meet your child for
the first time. This was not what we had
hoped for, but it was what we expected.
We all settled into our room and began the introductions. We were in for blessing number one right away
and it explained much of the intense emotions being seen on the faces of Katie
and the two women that brought her to Jinan.
The one young lady that brought her was her foster sister. Her parents raised Katie from the age of 10
months to 7 years old. She is about 16
years older than Katie so she remembers a lot about Katie’s childhood. Katie had to move to the orphanage at age 7
so that she could attend school (we asked why and they said it was an orphanage
rule). Even though she lived at the
orphanage and attended public school, she was blessed to be able to spend all
of her school breaks (winter & summer, plus special holidays) with this
foster family that lives in a rural village about 2 hours away from the
orphanage. We were now being blessed by being able to meet a member of that
family and for her to tell us firsthand about Katie and her childhood. To know she was so well cared for and loved
by a family and for such a long time is a wonderful feeling. It is going to make it harder to leave, but
because she knows what a family is and what the love of a family looks like,
she will most likely be able to transition more smoothly into our family.
The blessings then kept coming – we received two large photo
albums full of photos of Katie growing up and photos of her friends and
teachers at the school and at the orphanage.
These albums will be treasured by our family and Katie and we cannot
thank them enough for these gifts. We
also got a thumb drive and a USB drive full of photos as well. We had sent the thumb drive to the orphanage
about 2 months ago. Adoptive families
often do this, but there are never any guarantees that you will receive new
photos or information about your child that you had not already seen in their
file or that you will even get the thumb drive returned to you. When we adopted Andrew and Lily, sending
thumb drives was a not yet a common practice.
We sent disposable cameras and basically received photos of them that were
all taken on the same day shortly before we arrived to adopt them. The fact that we got the thumb drive back,
plus an unexpected USB drive from her school, was amazing. We downloaded the information from the two
drives onto our computer and couldn’t believe what we saw – we had photos of
her from 4 years old and on! In her
adoption file, we had only ever seen photos of her at about age 10 years old
and older. The school drive had tons of
photos of her classmates and friends from school. Such a blessing for her to have these photos
to help preserve her memories from her life in China. We know that some days these photos will
probably bring tears when she looks at them and some days they may bring smiles
as she remembers all of these special people that were part of her life while
she lived in China. The blessings didn’t
stop there – we had sent a journal for Katie’s friends and teachers to use to
write messages to her before she left to be adopted. In the journal, there are messages and well
wishes from friends and teachers as well as several phone numbers and contact
info numbers so that she can keep in touch with them at a later time. Technology these days is amazing and the fact
that she can keep in touch with these special people is truly astounding.
During the meeting, we learned that the other woman that brought her works at the orphanage. She also happens to be the aunt of Katie’s foster sister that was there, too. She said that when we return to visit Katie’s orphanage in the future, she will drive us out to the countryside to meet the rest of the foster family. This young girl was truly loved and cared for by these two ladies that brought her to Jinan. It was such a blessing to meet them and hear about our daughter firsthand from them. Often children are brought to the capital by one of the orphanage directors/staff and one nanny that may or may not have cared for them personally. We got the privilege to meet two women who knew Katie so well and who we could tell would miss her dearly.
During the meeting, we learned that the other woman that brought her works at the orphanage. She also happens to be the aunt of Katie’s foster sister that was there, too. She said that when we return to visit Katie’s orphanage in the future, she will drive us out to the countryside to meet the rest of the foster family. This young girl was truly loved and cared for by these two ladies that brought her to Jinan. It was such a blessing to meet them and hear about our daughter firsthand from them. Often children are brought to the capital by one of the orphanage directors/staff and one nanny that may or may not have cared for them personally. We got the privilege to meet two women who knew Katie so well and who we could tell would miss her dearly.
We talked for about 45 minutes and then it was time to head
over to a local photo shop to get a photo taken with Wen/Katie. It had to include her and both of us – her
parents. We had to get several copies of this photo because it is attached to
many of the government documents. After
that quick task was done, it was time to eat dinner.
We ate dinner with our guide at a local dumpling restaurant. The guide helped us order. The food and drinks were very excellent. Wen taught Zach and Madeline how to hold chopsticks properly. After dinner, our guide said good night for the evening and we headed back to the hotel. We can only imagine what Wen was thinking as we left our guide and she was now with her new family that speak very little Chinese. You could tell she was a bit nervous, but she did really well. We are using an app called SayHi and it is helping us to communicate with her when hand gestures and charades do not cut it!
Everyone was exhausted, but we did spend some time bonding by doing bottle flipping and looking at two books - one with Chinese words and another with English words. After that, we did a quick WeChat with Lily and Andrew and then we were hoping to head to bed. Madeline and Zach quickly fell asleep. Wen was not as tired and we spent a few hours staying up with her talking (with the translation app) and learning where the tears and worried expressions throughout the day were coming from. She is mostly afraid that she will not be able to speak to her friends, teachers, and foster family after she is adopted. She really wanted to talk to her
“Chinese Mama” – foster mother. We told her it was too late to do so tonight, but that we would try the next day when we saw her foster sister. The tears are not easy to see streaming down her face, but we know that they are necessary, healthy, and totally normal given the circumstances she is going through right now. If she didn’t cry, we would be worried that she was keeping everything inside. The fact that she is opening up to us and letting us know what is making her feel sad and worried is huge! Because we know where the tears and sadness are coming from, we can better help her deal with her emotions and feelings.
While the three of us hung out before bed, she had fun putting her feet up against Baba’s size 14 feet and comparing their sizes! She likes to say “Oh, my Go!” Not sure if she would end that sentence in “sh” or “d”, but at this point, we aren’t addressing it due to the language barrier. Finally, around 10:40 PM we could barely keep our eyes open and decided to tuck her into bed. First 6 hours as her parents went as well as could be expected. Thank you to everyone that is praying for her and for us.
We ate dinner with our guide at a local dumpling restaurant. The guide helped us order. The food and drinks were very excellent. Wen taught Zach and Madeline how to hold chopsticks properly. After dinner, our guide said good night for the evening and we headed back to the hotel. We can only imagine what Wen was thinking as we left our guide and she was now with her new family that speak very little Chinese. You could tell she was a bit nervous, but she did really well. We are using an app called SayHi and it is helping us to communicate with her when hand gestures and charades do not cut it!
Everyone was exhausted, but we did spend some time bonding by doing bottle flipping and looking at two books - one with Chinese words and another with English words. After that, we did a quick WeChat with Lily and Andrew and then we were hoping to head to bed. Madeline and Zach quickly fell asleep. Wen was not as tired and we spent a few hours staying up with her talking (with the translation app) and learning where the tears and worried expressions throughout the day were coming from. She is mostly afraid that she will not be able to speak to her friends, teachers, and foster family after she is adopted. She really wanted to talk to her
“Chinese Mama” – foster mother. We told her it was too late to do so tonight, but that we would try the next day when we saw her foster sister. The tears are not easy to see streaming down her face, but we know that they are necessary, healthy, and totally normal given the circumstances she is going through right now. If she didn’t cry, we would be worried that she was keeping everything inside. The fact that she is opening up to us and letting us know what is making her feel sad and worried is huge! Because we know where the tears and sadness are coming from, we can better help her deal with her emotions and feelings.
While the three of us hung out before bed, she had fun putting her feet up against Baba’s size 14 feet and comparing their sizes! She likes to say “Oh, my Go!” Not sure if she would end that sentence in “sh” or “d”, but at this point, we aren’t addressing it due to the language barrier. Finally, around 10:40 PM we could barely keep our eyes open and decided to tuck her into bed. First 6 hours as her parents went as well as could be expected. Thank you to everyone that is praying for her and for us.
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| Crowne Plaza Hotel - Jinan, Shandong |
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| This is our hotel room and where we will meet our daughter for the very first time! |
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| Woman on the far left is Wen's foster sister. Woman in the center is a relative of the foster family and also works at the Weihai Children's Welfare Institute where Wen lived. She is in charge of international adoptions. You can see the sadness and emotion all over Wen's face. We can never forget that with every adoption, there must first come a loss. |
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| Wen teaching Zach how to properly use chopsticks. |
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| mother - daughter selfie |
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| Sisters! |
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| Super yummy dumplings! |
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| Wen taught Madeline a finger game they play in China. |
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| Madeline and Zach taught Wen how to do bottle flipping. |
| Madeline and Wen playing with SnapChat just a few minutes after meeting each other. No common language needed to enjoy SnapChat! |
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Holding hands on our way to the photo shop just an hour after meeting. The sister bonding is going well!
No common language needed to have fun learning how to bottle flip!
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