Family vacation on Cape Cod

.


We went to Cape Cod for one week for a family vacation! Much of my family was there and Shuya had a blast playing with her cousins. We had a great time playing on the beach, playing in the ocean, and walking on the beach. We went to the harbor one morning when it was foggy and teh fish hatchery were Shuya fed the fish. We went out for seafood a couple of times and Wenguo cooked tons of food for the whole family! They loved it! (You might say they just ate it up! ;)





Here is Shuya sitting in front of the cute little cottage we rented.



Wenguo posted a bunch of these pictures on Flckr:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/danwenguo/

.

Shuya smelling the purple sage!

.

My wife is becoming a real good photographer! I love this photo...

Dan

.

Shuya in the playroom at the White Swan

I found this clip from when we adopted Shuya and wanted to show everybody how much she's changed! This is taken in the playroom for the adopted children in the White Swan hotel in Guangzhou.

She's growing up fast...

Summary of our trip

I wrote an email to my brother Jon about our trip and realized that it did a great job of summarizing our trip.


It was a great trip. Wenguo really did a great job getting us into nice hotels cheap. Her brother got us 50% off on airfare on our family flights in China. It was hot and humid everywhere we went, but not so bad that we couldn’t stand it, just a little bit uncomfortable at times. I did a lot of work during the entire trip via email and I posted to our blog; http://danwenguo.blogspot.com including a short video!

Shuya and I spent almost a whole day in the Beijing Zoo. We got some great pictures and jpg video of the pandas. One panda came right up to the window next to Shuya! It was great - and real affordable. We went to The Great Wall (where I hiked for a couple of hours up and down the hills on top of the wall) and Tiananmen Square (were Wenguo bought a really cool kite cheap – we’ll bring it to Cape Cod). I met with a customer and a Rep firm there one day while Wenguo met with family and friends there. The air pollution in Beijing was unbelievable that day. I was told it was probably dust from a dust storm on the desert to the west. It cleared up a lot the next 2 days but it was still pretty bad.

Then we went to visit Wenguo's brother and his family in Changchun in Manchuria, just north of Korea. It was really nice, mostly green farmland, gently rolling, fairly flat countryside with Rice and wheat fields. The air was pretty clear, just hazy from some humidity. Wenguo’s family got us into a great little 4-star hotel at a low rate, but her sister-in-law took care of the bill! We didn’t pay anything. The best part was a children's park that I went to with Wenguo's brother and his son Halei. Shuya rode the rides which were only a few RMB each, and we saw animals like monkeys, giraffe, elephants, and such. She was exhausted when we left and fell asleep in her stroller as we were walking out. It was great!

Then we went to Wenguo's parents house in Shaoxing for a couple of days. Wenguo borrowed her mother's cell phone and I was able to call her to keep in touch when we weren't together. It was cool. Wenguo, mama and I took Shuya to the Children’s park in Shaoxing one morning and Shuya had a blast riding all the rides. There were only a handful of people there so we never had to wait for any rides. Shuya loved it! I took her on the bumper car ride and I loved that one! Wenguo did a lot of shopping in and around Shaoxing, mostly for silk products (ties and scarves) and baby clothes. We got a lot of gifts from her family and friends while we were there. They are very generous.
I took a trip to Shenzhen by myself to meet with customers, reps, and potential partners. I stayed in a very nice 4-star hotel, the Jinhu Jasper hotel, recommended by our reps. The reps picked me up at the airport and I had transportation arranged everywhere by the people I was visiting. I learned a lot - it was valuable time. Wenguo did most of her shopping in Shaoxing while I was in Shenzhen.

I returned to Shaoxing and we moved to the 5-star Shaoxing International Hotel. It was very nice and Wenguo got the room really cheap. 300RMB with breakfast included! And it was a great breakfast buffet. We found a leather goods store going out of business and I bought a pair of dress shoes for $10. Wenguo bought a couple of pairs of shoes for $10 each, and I got a small leather computer bag for just about $20. We brought mama and baba there and got them each a pair of new shoes. (Nu shu means son-in-law in Chinese!)

We got on a bus to Hangzhou one morning and after a 45 minute ride grabbed a taxi and had them drop us off at the Shangri-la hotel next to West Lake. It was a beautiful hotel. We talked about staying there for 1 or 2 nights someday. Wenguo used to spend a lot of time in that hotel as a tour guide when she lived in Hangzhou. We took a boat ride on West Lake. I was bummed that the lotus flowers weren’t in bloom. I haven’t seen them bloom yet. The boat ride is cool. The boat takes you out to an island and you can get off and walk around, and then you can take another boat to another island or to some other destination on the shore - you can do this all day for the price of admission. We saw lots of beautiful things on the lake and on the islands. There are a few pagodas near the lake and you can see them from various vantage points. We met one of her friends for lunch - she took us to an extravagant restaurant and we ate well (as usual in China). Then another friend of hers came and we went to Starbucks on the south side of the lake and they talked while Shuya slept and I walked along the boardwalk on the lake feeling the breeze and taking pictures. It was a great day. Hangzhou was really clean and looked like a modern city. It’s quite a bit bigger (7-9M) than Shaoxing (1M) and very expensive to live in. It’s one of the premier tourist cities in China. We took a bus back at 6PM and went to a little restaurant next to our hotel for dinner. We had a good meal there. Delicious duck! It was Wenguo’s birthday and it was a great day.

I got my hair cut in Shaoxing. It included a head massage, and if I had wanted it, I could have had my ears cleaned too. The guy that cut my hair did a great job. He cut the sides and back shorter than I’m used to but it’ll be great for summer. I like it so much I think I’ll get it cut the same way next time. Wenguo was able to spend a lot of time with her family and so did Shuya. I’m very grateful for that.

The trip was great and Shuya did very well on both flights to and from China, and all through the trip she was well behaved. She had some fits of stubbornness and temper tantrums but most of the time she was great. We suffered very little from jet lag on the way over but on the way back Wenguo had a lot of trouble adjusting. Shuya and I did better but it was difficult sleeping the first 2 nights. One day Shuya was acting up a lot – having temper tantrums, but she seems back to her usual self now.

We got back last Wednesday at Midnight. There was a heavy downpour on the ride home. I had to drive really slowly because there was so much water on the road that the car started hydroplaning. That’s very rare in Colorado! It stopped by the time we got home, which is typical in Colorado. We didn’t get to bed until 1:30 AM and Shuya and I had trouble going to sleep. When I got into our bed I realized how hard the beds were in China! Wenguo was exhausted so she went to sleep pretty quickly.

When we got up, everything was green and the grass was a foot high! My wisteria finally bloomed for the first time in about 5 years and they smell great! The snowball verbena was in full bloom with huge white flower balls! Plus I think they grew another foot taller. It was so cool!

Home!

We got home about midnight last night. After about 24 hours of travel. We didn't get to bed until 1:30 and at first it was hard to sleep. I am sure we will have to deal with jet lag for a few days now.

Huangzhou

We went to Huangzhou for the day on Monday. It was great. We took a bus ride up in the morning for 22RMB. So cheap. In 45 minutes your in Huangzhou. A short taxi ride brought us to West Lake. I was hoping that the Lotus flowers would be blooming but we were too early. They will probably bloom in June this year.

It was a bit warm and muggy but it was nice on the lake with the breeze. It was Wenguo's birthday and we had lunch with one of her friends that she used to work with at CITS, and coffee at Starbucks on the lake with another. We took the bus back at 6 and had a nice little dinner at a restaurant near our hotel. Shuya was good all day and took a nap while Wenguo talked to her friend in Starbucks and I went for a walk along the shore of West Lake to take pictures of the lake.

I heard that Marco Polo once said that Huangzhou was the most beautiful place on earth. I can see why someone might say that. It was very beautiful and the city was impressive - very clean and modern. One of the cleanest cities I've been to in China.

Baba takes a business trip to Shenzhen

I left my wife and daughter in Shaoxing and went to Shenzhen for 3 days for business.

My wife and her mom told me that the day I left, Shuya checked in every car that went by to see if I was in it.

That is so touching I can't find words to describe how it makes me feel.

Shuya has fun in Shaoxing!

Shuya is having a blast in Shaoxing. Here is a film of her and mama on a little ride at the local amusement park for children. We went there this morning before it got too hot. It was already hot and humid of course. We have a bunch of photos and videos from the Children's amusement park here in Shaoxing. The rides are old but she loved them. There was hardly anyone here and so we didn't have to wait in any lines and it only cost 5 or 10 yuan per ride, plus a small admission fee. Bumber cars worked very well and she and I had a blast because there were 2 other cars going and we bumped each other. There is also a little stationary monkey ride at the local grocery store that she's been on twice that she just loves and it's only 1 yuan per ride. I spent a lot of time with her today and just love it! Mama went out to get a faicial and to get her hair done so I took Shuya for a walk to the local open air market to see all the vegetables, fowl, and fish. She was great and it was so much fun to spend this time with her! We got a lot of looks because I'm probably one of only a handful of caucasians in Shaoxing, and she is so cute.

Shaoxing

We are in Shaoxing now after a flight from Changchun into Hangzhou and a short 1 hour trip by car from there.

Everything went smoothly on this trip. My wife's brother has "guanxi" and a friend of his got us checked in at the VIP line and we went through the VIP security line, and got seats near the front of the plane. And we didn't have to pay extra for our overwieght luggage! It was awesome. Of course we got a snack on the plane - hot dog, small cake, and cherry tomatoes.

It's hot and humid here in Shaoxing. Mama had lunch ready for us and Baba poured a glass of Moutai for me. They also turned on the AC for me. It's uncomfortable without it. After lunch we all took a short nap! Well, it is Memorial Day back home, so I took a break!

Shuya has been pretty good all day, sleeping on the plane, sitting on my lap and looking out the window of the car on the ride to Shaoxing, we took turns spotting trucks of different colors "red truck", "yellow truck" and "blue truck", and motorcycles. She acted out a little with grandma and grandpa but I suspect she just had a lot of energy stored up.

Beijing - The Great Wall and Tianamen Square

This post is out of order. Before we went to Changchun we went to the Great Wall and Tianamen Square. On Wednesday we rented a car and driver and left for the Badaling section of The Great Wall. This is the most famous section and there is a fancy hotel at this location. I left my wife and her friend with Shuya at the base and hiked all the way to the end of the south side. Well, not all the way to the end - I went as far as they allow you to hike. It's blocked off after about a mile or less.

It's an incredible scene from up on the top of the hill. The wall stretches over hilltops dissappearing and reappearing in many places in the steep, rugged hills. It's hard to tell which piece connects to which other piece and there appear to be forks in the wall in some places. I was thinking about the labor that went into building this even just for the sections I could see from where I was, knowing that this thing stretches for four thousand miles, and it's just mind boggling. Wikipedia says that an estimated 2 to 3 million men died building it and it has been built, rebuilt, and maintained for over 3,000 years, with many various incarnations over time.

I went back to check on my 3 companions and then headed up the North section. This section was heavily traveled with lots of tourists. I didn't have much time and my legs were getting fatigued so although I was pretty close to the top, I didn't get to the highest point on the North side. It was a very nice day to be out hiking up and down the wall.

Driving through Beijing near the emporer's home, there were many parks and historical buildings. Tree lined streets with heavy traffic including all kinds of vehicles and small historical buildings. It looked like it was a great place to live if you were the emperor's family or in the upper echelon. Although, I know how hot and humid it gets in the summer, and how bitter cold it gets in the winter.

We stopped briefly at Tianamen Square. We bought a big kit from a vendor for 50 Yuan. (My wife bargained him down from 200 Yuan) I can't wait to fly it - it's a big Chinese warlord face all red-faced.

Manchuria - Changchun

We arrived in Changchun in Manchuria yesterday afternoon. We are here to visit my wif'e's brother's family. Our experience in the Beijing airport with China Southern was pretty bad. We got to the airport early in order to make sure everything went smoothly, however, things went poorly because China Southern's service is terrible. First of all, our daughter's ticket "wasn't found" in the electronic kiosk, so we waited in line to get her ticket and check our bags. The guy at the ticket counter was a jerk and we couldn't check our baggage because we were too early. I couldn't believe it. We had to wait a half an hour before we got back in line again to check our baggage. I had our cart unloaded (2nd time now) and a bag on the conveyor belt when the 2nd attendant told us our flight was cancelled. He isn't able to issue a ticket for us and sent us on a wild goose chase to find the right place to get approval to issue a new ticket on the next available flight. It was insane. My wife went to 3 different places before we found the right one, which wasn't in the same room as all the other customer service windows. Then while she was at the window getting things set up some crazy guy walked up behind her and started giving her crap. He started yelling at her really loudly so I walked up and got between them but I couldn't tell him what I would have liked to because he couldn't speak English. I said some things to him which I m sure he didn't understand, but he did back up anyway because he knew she wasn't alone. I had been standing a few feet away with our luggage and with Shuya. One of the other passengers at a nearby window tried to calm him down and finally he went away to another window. Anyway, then we had to go get in another line and get our tickets. All this time we were under the impression that we had to check the stroller because the manager that we spoke to earlier told us we couldn't bring it through security. The manager was the biggest jerk of them all. So we tried to check it and the lady said it had to be wrapped. What a joke. They told us a bunch of lies. We asked another guy and he said we could bring it through, so we wound up bringing it to the gate. On the plane they even put the stroller in a closet on board instead of stowing it with the luggage. It was really painful! Thanks for letting us vent! If there was a Better Business Bureau in China... On board the plane was cool - on a short flight we even got hot food. Service, food and drinks were good and the plane was fairly new and comfortable. The flight left on time, about an hour later than our original flight.

Shuya is doing well and everybody comments about how beautiful she is. I don't think she understands Mandarin as well as I thought. She doesn't respond to many things that people say to her. Only occasionally. We'll keep trying to immerse her but it's hard because my wife and I are always speaking English when we talk to each other. I can't read the blog, I can only post. Apparently Big Brother is preventing me from reading our blog. I have had trouble reading my Yahoo email. I've been able to access it twice since I've been here. I am always able to check my Outlook email at work though and that's much more important. Changchun is a major city in the north but it's only about 3 million people per Wikipedia. The airport appeared to be small and is several miles outside the city (about 18 km) in farmland that is fairly flat, with gentle rolling hills and trees in some places breaking up the fields. It was very green when we arrived on this trip with lots of humidity. It was about 23C so it was a little uncomfortable but not too bad. The hotel room was uncomfortable because the central AC was turned off. Apparently it wasn't hot enough yet to turn it on. My wife says they grow the best rice and wheat here in this region. Also, Changchun is the "Detroit" of China, meaning it's the auto industry city (not the crime capital!).
We had an incredible dinner at a restaurant that uses recipes from the Qin dynasty (when the Terra cotta warriors were built and buried with the empore in Xian). The food was so good I couldn't believe it. And the restaurant was really well decorated. Better than any we had been in in Beijing. And I ate way too much, as usual. Dumplings, deep fried chicken served on a skewer and prepared with flavorings reminiscent of sausage, beef with peppers served in a pot full of oil boiling with the flame underneath it (so good), fried stuffed eggplant with a meat-based stuffing, fried pumpkin and sweet potatoe, and an incredible soup with mushrooms and chicken and wintermelon, and all with some local beer. The beer was like Tsing Tao beer, light beer good for a warm evening.
We are staying in a 4 star hotel called Qiang Jing and it's pretty nice (other than the AC not working). It looks great and we got a great rate through my wife's family connections. It has a translucent glass half wall in the bathroom so when a light is on in the bathroom it lights up the bedroom so I had trouble going to sleep last night while my wife was preparing to go to bed. It looks great but that bit is not well thought out. The shower is a walk-in shower with a glass wall and it worked fine, except this morning the water was barely luke-warm. I don't think the boiler was on. The Chinese seem to all take showers in the evening, but I need a shower in the morning to help me wake up (the cold shower did that this morning!) and to fix my hair! If I go without a shower my hair would look terrible, one way or the other, all day long. It sounds like the window in our room is open. We can hear the road noise (lots of horns honking for instance) just as if a window was open. There is a big window but when I checked, it wasn't open. It must be thin single pane glass so noise and heat pass right through. Still the room is very nice, the internet connection is fast, and the bed is comfortable. There is a little fridge, and a pot to boil water so I can make my own coffee. We both got a pretty good night’s sleep. Breakfast was a little weird this morning - all Chinese food. No alternatives. There was something that might have been scrambled eggs but it looked more like custard so I didn't bother with it. The coffee looked like muddy river water so I didn't even try it. It looked scary. I suppose they already put milk and sugar in it but it looked so weird I didn't even want to try it. Besides they had some black tea that was great. The orange juice was really strange but it was ok. It tasted a lot like Tang! Anyway I found enough things to eat and only the tofu I put on my plate was undesirable. Everything else was ok. Driving in China is hazardous. I have already experienced passing a car going the wrong way - forcing us into the other lane to get by, and that's just a sample. It is crazy. I don't understand why there isn't an accident at every intersection. They pass on the inside taking a corner, cut each other off, beep the horn just about every time they pass someone, and like I said before, they go the wrong way in the lane. It's nuts. I am really surprised that I have only seen one accident since I've been here. It's remarkable. At least the cab drivers in Beijing were all sane and my wife's brother and his son drive really cautiously. Today we went to the film studio theme park, like Universal Studios, only different. I mean if you were to compare them, with Universal Studios being a 10, this one would be about a 1. If that. I was so disappointed; I couldn't believe how bad it was! It was lame. And it cost 240Yuan each to get in. It was so weird - the park was just about empty on a Saturday morning and all run down even though it just opened in like 2003. Everything I saw was so cheesy it was almost hysterical, except that it was so sad. We found a couple of rides (that we had to pay extra for) that Shuya liked. I was grateful for that, after all, that's the only reason we are here - for Shuya! I couldn't wait to get out of there. It was actually depressing. And we left just before noon to go get some good Korean food for lunch! When we pulled up to the restaurant my wife translated the sign for me; "South Korean Dog Meat Restaurant". She asked her brother not to order dog. She said she has a pet dog at home. I told her that was good because I wasn't ready to try dog. The food we had was very good. We had fish, rice in a hot stone pot with all kinds of goodies (egg, vegetable and BEEF I am sure!), some black rice served with something like ketchup, and something like cooked kim chee with potatoes that was very flavorful.

Beijing Zoo

I spent most of the day in the Beijing Zoo with Shuya. It was a lovely day, just a little bit of "overcast" (air pollution) compared to yesterday, it was clear. This morning we spent at least 45 minutes with the pandas and I got some great photos of Shuya when the panda came up to the window and leaned on the window sill right next to her! It was great! Then we spent some time looking at the big cats and some other large mammals.

We left to have lunch with a bunch of Shuya's aunts. We had a great meal. They are all very nice!

We returned to the zoo in the afternoon and a couple of nice families started playing with her while we were resting by the pond that makes up a bird sanctuary. One of the parents had a bubble gun that made bubbles and Shuya just loves bubbles! They even let her "shoot" the gun and make her own bubbles. I got a little jpg movie on the digital camera. She had a blast!

We had such a nice time with these families even though we each knew only a few words each in each other's language. They are wonderful people here. I met very nice people everywhere we went.

Back to China

We returned to China yesterday. We are in Beijing. We just about missed our connection in San Francisco - thanks for all the stress United! But we already walked around the neighborhood near our Hotel in Beijing in the evening and had a very good dinner at a little restaurant around the corner. My wife didn't like the restaurant but I loved the food.

Shuya is doing very well and she was very good on the flights. She cried briefly a couple of times - mostly because she couldn't do what she wanted. She didn't like having to wear a seat belt. I'm glad we got her a seat of her own. Neither one of us slept much as it was.

We are in the DeBao hotel, a 4-star hotel. We will have breakfast in the hotel restaurant this morning. I will have a business meeting this morning.

Adoption Decree

Today we got the Decree Validating Foreign Adoption for our daughter at the local courthouse. We were first on the docket. When the judge entered the courtroom he asked if the family for the adoption case was here, and I put my hand up and said that we were. Then I was shocked when he asked everybody to leave the courtroom except the family adopting the child! I felt a bit embarrassed, because it seemed like such a big deal that all these other people, whose issues certainly aren't trivial, had to leave the courtroom. I felt uncomfortable as people filed past because we are not special. He mentioned that it was a closed hearing and waited until everyone had left the room before continuing.

The judge carried out the questioning that would lead to the approval of our petition to adopt.

Then the judge said a lot of nice things to us about how we were doing such a good thing. He was really nice and was knowledgeable about the situation in China and talked about it. He felt that we had really saved this child from a horrible future as a female orphan in China. He understood that in China the female is a second class citizen, or less, and that she would have had few opportunities if she had stayed in China. He also talked about how the one-child rule in China exacerbated the situation for female children. I was surprised, and impressed that he knew this much about these issues in China.

The judge commended us for "stepping up" and doing our part in contributing to the general welfare. I was thinking how lucky we feel that we adopted her, and how much our lives have been enriched by the experience. He congratulated us for being so lucky as to have adopted such a sweet, beautiful daughter. And my wife and I think we are the lucky ones. We all win in this situation and that's really remarkable. There are so many difficulties in the world right now (war and ignorant hatred, high gas prices (and exorbitant gas company profits), housing foreclosures, religious extremism and intolerance, shaky stock markets, et cetera) that it can be a little overwhelming, yet in this small family, in this modest house, there is so much happiness right now that it just amazes me. I can’t think of anything else we need, and that must be the definition of fulfillment.

I thanked the judge for his kind words and for making time in his busy courtroom to give us his undivided attention. He responded that this was the most important hearing on his docket. That really got my attention; I knew he meant it sincerely. For us it seems like such a small thing to do, and is even self-serving in some ways, and yet it really is incredibly important that we gave this one child a chance to have a full life, with all of the potential accomplishments to go with it.

I have been looking forward to this day for a long time, thinking that this would be an unemotional perfunctory exercise. I thought we would just go through the motions to get this last final piece of paperwork completed. I was wrong. This turned out to be a very important day, and for me, it was a day with a very powerful emotional impact. I have to thank the judge for opening my eyes to the significance of what we've done, and for the awareness of what we've become; a happy family.

This completes the adoption paperwork, and the knowledge that all of the tasks have been completed and that all of the details have been taken care of is very fulfilling. I am filled with a sense of calm that I haven’t felt since we started the adoption process. I have a sense of closure.

I'm extremely grateful for our good fortune. We are all so happy together as a family and I just want to share that with the rest of the world.

I hope that other people who read this blog, and other blogs that document similar experiences, will pursue adoption because the reward is absolutely incomparable to anything I've ever experienced.

The one year anniversary of our Gotcha Day (April 26th) is coming up soon. The time has gone by very quickly and Shuya has grown fast, and learned a lot of things. We are astonished and amazed by her ability to learn, and proud of what she’s accomplished. We've all grown together as a family, and developed very strong bonds, which is thoroughly gratifying. The time we spend together is precious, and tremendously rewarding.

We are very fortunate, we know it and we appreciate it, and we are very grateful for this experience. And we are thankful for the many good friends we've made who are sharing this experience with us, especially our Chinese Children support group! Aren't we all so lucky?