COMING HOME!

Boy are we ready to come home. No one more so than Kaia the way she is telling everyone. It is always bittersweet for the adopted child in my mind. On one hand she is coming home to a pretty good life, on the other hand, she is leaving the only life she has known up to this point.

We never made it to the orphanage either, kinda bummed about that. Hope everyone enjoyed my stab at doing a blog....my first.

She you soon!

US Consulate Day

Greetings! Our guide called us yesterday morning from the US Consulate to tell us our paperwork was in order and that: "by the way, your oath appointment has been moved up to this afternoon instead of tomorrow!"

So we walked to the White Swan where we met up with a TON of families heading over. We ended up with 3 large bus full of kiddo's, Mama's, Baba's, Grandma's, Grandpa's, aunties, etc. etc.

It was quite the site, but since no cameras were allowed...no pics :(

Today is our last full day here. Kaia is so excited to be coming to America. She is telling all the maids, servers, bellboys, etc that she is "heading back to the States" in one day. They all laugh knowing she has never been there. Our favorite server at Lucy's, Joy, says Kaia is doing much better than most newly adopted older children. She says Kaia is "Happy in her Heart" to be going home with us. She is quite the jabber-jaw when she talks to various Chinese speaking people.

We can't wait to get home!

Some Local Pictures

We are in the room this morning waiting for the "all clear" from our guide who is at the US Consulate applying for Kaia's VISA. Once she calls, we can get out and do some walking around the island.

I took some pictures of the sites on our way to the Safari Park yesterday and thought they might be of interest.

Safari Park Day

We went to the Safari Park today which is pretty cool. They let you get MUCH CLOSER to the animals than any zoo back in the States. We got to throw raw chicken meat to White Tigers, Darlene was in 7th Heaven as they had many Giant Pandas of which you could get pretty close to. Made for some tired girls. Kaia went on Kiddie Rides, a first for her. She almost broke her face from smiling so much. It made me, a grown man, want to cry to think such a simple thing makes her so incredibly happy. Just wait until she gets home.

We tried the Chinese/Thai restaurant down the street. Interesting, since the wait staff speaks no English, you just point to pictures and hope for the best. I had a rice dish with a lot of tentacles in it. Kaia eats like every meal is her last which is sad. She will eat so fast and so much that she will vomit at times. We have even found food in her sweater pockets. We are really liking her little personality. We can't wait to see how she reacts to her new home, bedroom, etc.

Only a couple more days!

Chill Out Day

Didn't do a whole lot today. Lee (Li), our guide came to our room this morning so we could fill out all of the forms for the US Visa. Tomorrow, we are going to a Safari Park about an hour away that many families have raved about. Sounds like fun. Can't wait to get out of the room.

Kaia is in the best mood we have seen her in. Not wanting to even be touched up until now, she is all of a sudden coming up to us and hugging us and now gives a kiss on the cheek! You can see a twinkle in her eye for sure. She is a total flirt with the doormen. Counting the days until we leave, although it is 20 degrees back home and calling for heavy lake effect snow!

Mountain Trip

Our guide took us to the Baiyun Cableway which takes you up to the top of a mountain with an incredible view of Guangzhou. We keep forgetting that everthing Kaia is doing is a first for her. Like taking the Tram! She was scared to death! She was a pro on the way down.

Kaia and Hannah got into a little altercation and Kaia put the knuckles to Hannah's face. Didn't leave to bad of a mark :) It will definately take some adjustment time.

There are quite a few families around also adopting which makes it nice since we are here alone this time. Very nice people.

Hanging Out

We are still hanging out in and around our hotel. It was gorgeous weather today, about 80 degrees. Many of the locals were in the park enjoying their day off. Kaia still has shown no signs of separation issues. We asked a English speaking local to ask Kaia if she knew what was going on and she told her she was adopted and going to America to live with her new Mama and Baba. Kaia told her they don't eat rice in America but only Big Mac's! That was pretty funny. She loves fruit and some veggies. We eat at Lucy's at least once a day as their food is pretty good. They make a great Long Island Ice Tea too!

We are really looking forward to some siteseeing in the next few days.

Doing Great

Kaia continues to do quite well. She really is well behaved and it appears the nannies did a good job with her. We question her age as she is a full 3" shorter than Hannah although supposedly a year older. Hannah is also Zhuang Chinese and a little taller than Han Chinese so maybe that is part of it.

Kaia had her first piece of pizza tonight and it was comical because she didn't know how to attack it. Stayed away from the "Danger Zone" of across the river today :)~

We have the weekend off as our guide says weekends are too busy to go to the zoo? Oh well.

We are enjoying just getting to know our new addition. Oh, she can write 1 to 20 in English so they must be teaching some of that at the orphanage.

That's it for now!

Good Day Bad Day

The Good News is that we finalized the Chinese portion of the adoption making her legally ours from the Chinese standpoint.

After leaving the Civil Affairs office, our guide took us to a shopping area which was very busy. Nothing like you have ever seen in the States. Anyway, I kept telling Darlene "lets get out of here", as I just felt uncomfortable being so crowded, especially since I had a large amount of US Dollars on me for official fees. I carried it in my front right pocket which is deep rather than in my wallet or backback as suggested by the guide. In an instant, someone stuck a lit cigarette on my left arm, which made me not only distracted but made me take my right hand out of my pocket to rub the burn. I was then bumped from behind not knowing immediately I was just robbed of about $2100.00 US cash. All but one dollar we had left for remaining fees and food for the trip. So to say the least, it was a bittersweet day.

The most important thing is that the girls are safe. We will figure out the money thing somehow. I feel like quite the idiot that this could happen to me.

Most important is the fact that Kaia is doing better than we ever could have hoped for. We will update soon.

Tim

We Got Her!

We went to the Civil Affairs office yesterday about 3:30pm as we got stuck in traffic like I've never seen before. Cars, People, Bikes and Mopeds all vying for the same space. Then low and behold, a car will drive right up on the sidewalk!

Kaia is fantastik. So appreciative and well behaved. She has a pretty good chest & head cold. She is coloring right now with Hannah. She eats anything which is good. The little Mandarin I learned turns out to be of no use to her as she speaks Cantonese! Jokes onme :)

We go to the Civil Affairs office this morning to finalize the Chinese portion of the adoption.

We are going to head down for breakfast so we will update soon.

The Metz's

In China Now

Well, the flight is as long as we remembered! But all in all everything went well. Even Hannah did well dispite having Bronchitis right now. She only asked "are we there yet" 2 hours into the trip.

We hung out around our hotel (the Victory) today and then walked over to the White Swan Hotel where we stayed last time. We get Kaia tomorrow at 3:00pm (Tuesday) We have seen two families that adopted older children and their reactions are total opposites. One child is very distraught (and who could blame her) and the other child was doing pretty good.

Hannah wants to say hello to all her friends and says she misses you.

Talk to everyone soon.

Travel Dates Are In!

After several hectic days where the U.S. Consulate in Guangzhou misplaced our I-171H which they HAD TO HAVE in order to make our appointment, we finally have all our travel dates. It all worked out.
We are leaving on Saturday November 11th at 10:10AM from Chicago, go to Detroit on Northwest Airlines. We fly from Detroit to Tokyo nonstop. From Tokyo, we fly into Guangzhou, China. On the 22nd we just reverse the process.

We have an appoinment to meet Kaia on November 11th at 11:00am China Time. Since they are 13 hours ahead at that time, ( Non DST for us) that will actually be the 10th at 10:00PM here at home (EST)

Now all the things that need to be done before we leave is crazy. Oh Well!

TA CALL

We received a call from Jouneys of the heart on Friday, Oct 24th that the Travel Approval had been mailed from China. It just so happens the 24th was our anniversary so that was a great present!
Our SW, Gabriel said to be ready to travel in 7-10 days. We have waited for 14 months and now we have a short time to get everything together to travel, including running to the Chinese Consulate in Chicago to get VISA's for our passports.
Now the real fun begins :)

LOA Arrived Today

Our agency used DHL to next day air our LOA. We were told someone would have to be home to sign for the package. We waited and waited but no letter. I went out to get the mail and there sits our package on the porch. The driver never rang the bell! So much for having to sign for it.

Anyway, we immediately signed the LOA officially accepting Kaia as our Daughter and took it to the USPS to next day air it back to our agency in Portland, OR.

Now we have to wait for for the TA (Travel Approval) that says we can travel to China.

Everthing should go fast now!

LOA (Letter of Approval)

We received word from Gabriel at our Adoption Agency that they received our LOA from the CCAA in Beijing this afternoon. They are next daying it to us via DHL for us to sign and then get right back to them.
Once they get it back, they will verify everthing is correct and get back to Beijing. Then we wait about 2 weeks for TA (Travel Approval) from CCAA. We should travel 3-4 weeks after that.
We were getting to wonder if we were ever going!!!!

The Long & Winding Road

It is day 25 since our Dossier was logged in at the CCAA in Beijing. We got a call today from our agency in Oregon that the CCAA was missing 2 important documents that our Social Worker here in South Bend had to fax to them so they could sign and then they would have to fax to China. Confused? Don't be. In a matter of 30 minutes, the documents were being faxed to CCAA!
Amazing what modern technology can do.

Gabriel, our coordinator at Journeys of the Heart said that our file is being reviewed already (thats why they knew we were missing the 2 docs) and we could possibly receive our LOA or Letter Seeking Approval from Adoptees (us) in another week or so. Therefore it is quite possible that we could travel sometime in mid to late September. We need to travel before the Canton Trade Fair which lasts 3 weeks in October to avoid the 400% increase in hotel rooms.

We will keep you posted!

Waiting Family

While we know all our family will be excited to have Kaia home, no one is more excited than the "Grandmas" (Well maybe Hannah is more excited)

Where We Are At In The Process

Our chase for Kaia is being done almost completely backwards when compared to our chase for Hannah. With Hannah, all of our paperwork (dossier) had to be done and sent to China before we were matched with her.

With Kaia being special needs, we were "matched" with her before we started our paperwork. Our dossier was sent to China on June 5th, 2008 where it was translated into Chinese and then deilvered to the CCAA. It was officially logged into their system on June 30th, 2008.

We are now waiting for our LOA (Letter of Approval) from the CCAA and that could take anywhere from 1 to 3 months.

We were worried about the Olympics but that isn't a factor anymore since the CCAA slowed down a bit. Now we find out that Guangzhou is home to the largest Trade Fair in the world during October. So now we are just hoping and praying we travel before then.

How it all started

We started this process back in September, 2007 when we talked to a family who had adopted their daughter thru Journeys of the Heart. We had not conclusively decided on a sister for Hannah, but we knew that if we were going to do it, we would have to pursure a daughter thru the Special Needs or Waiting Children program since the healthy child program is taking upwards of 2-3 years. Plus we knew we wanted an older child.
Journeys of the Heart presented us with Tian Yue Rui's file which was due to be returned to China in about a week. If no one selected her and her file went back, she would most likely never be adopted out and she would remain in the orphanage until she was old enough to be turned out into the streets.
We couldn't let that happen!
We let JOH know that we wanted to proceed with the paperwork to bring "Kaia" home.