Thursday, November 19, 2009

We Have Arrived!

Hey Ya'll, we have arrived in Beijing.  I won't give you all of the dry details of the trip, but here is a brief synopsis.  We left the house at 4:45 AM Nashville time on Wednesday.  Our first flight was on time and after a couple of hours layover we prepared to leave Newark on a Boeing 777.  After boarding the plane, we sat on the runway for approximately 2 hours as a maintenance problem was checked out.   Luckily, we were seated with and within a couple of rows of several other adoptive families.  2 other moms and I got up and "visited" the empty business section and chatted while the dads and kids vegged out in front of the seatback entertainment systems (every Waldorf child's dream - movies and games on demand!).

After 2 hours we were told the fuel pump needed to be changed (not exactly reassuring) but they allowed us all to disembark and gave us vouchers for lunch.  The fellow adoptive families regrouped after lunch and hung out until we boarded once again.  The flight itself was uneventful (what we want in a flight).  13+ hours later (6 hours late) and we were met in Beijing by a representative of our agency and taken to the hotel.

The hotel (the Radisson SAS) is an older but very nice hotel.  We had a very late dinner and hit the bed and are now back up (only 5 hours later) to prepare for a day of sightseeing. Nathan and I are very tired but ready to go.  Noah slept for at least 6 hours on the plane so he was not that interested in going to bed.  Now that we are here we hope we can get back on a good schedule of eating and sleeping.

It has been years since I have traveled on a long flight such as this one and now I remember why.  Noah and Nathan did very well but my severe motion sickness kicked in.  I snacked, wore sea bands for acupressure relief, took Bonine and ginger pills and still was extremely ill.  We have two short plane hops to take while in China and the plane ride home is 2 hours longer than the one here.  So, happy thoughts are appreciated for our trip home if you want to send them my way.

I have talked about this before and will tell you that the adoption program in China is slowing down and it will not surprise me if it comes to a complete halt within the next 5 years.  My personal thoughts are this is a good thing.  For China to no longer have the need to find homes for its children outside of its own walls means that it has reached a good place economically and more people can either afford to pay the fines associated with additional children - thus bringing the abandonment numbers down; it means more as well, but I will not write about that in this post. The reason I am saying this is all of the families we met are travelling for a special needs placement.  With the slow down of healthy China referrals the placement of SN children has increased and I cannot tell you how positive I believe this is on so many levels.  

Well, we are off now to breakfast, the Temple of Heaven and a Chinese acrobatic show.  I hope you can see the photo I posted of the Croys at the Nashville airport getting ready to leave.  Nathan's sister stayed with us and took us to the airport and we are so appreciative of her.

I'll try to post each day a little something.  We have 3 days before we will be given Arwyn and we are looking forward to that day but trying to stay in the moment and appreciate the time we have in Beijing.  Hugs to all and we miss you.

Dana
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Go confidently in the direction of your dreams! Live the life you've imagined. As you simplify your life, the laws of the universe will be simpler.
-Henry David Thoreau

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