Fu Yan Cong is Officially a Bouton!

For some reason, we all can't seem to wake up any later than 3 or 4 am each morning but we're having a fun time making good use of  those early morning hours by enjoying Meili and coaxing her out of her little shell.  Some developments today are better eye contact.  She is very clingy but will still go to either Matt or I.  It's hard to try to interact with her when she is glued to your body.  I keep trying to sit her on the bed across from me so I can try to feed her or play 'pass the toy' and she won't have much to do with it for very long. Still no smiles but she at times seems like she is thinking about it.  She will now look in a mirror without screaming.  Yep, we're celelebrating the small steps!

 

Her first bath this morning was a royal failure.  There is a baby bathtub under the sink but the sink and countertop aren't big enough to place it on without the potential for a tipover.  There is no full sized tub-only a shower so I opted to put her directly into the sink.  The only problem was that she would not bend her body into a sitting position to get into it.  So I held her upright with one arm and tried to clean her up with the other while she howled.  Her referral docs say that bathtime is her favorite activity.  I no longer believe anything that is contained in any of the reports that we have received.  :)  I dressed her in a size 6-9 month outfit and the length is good but she still has room to spare in the waist.  She is so petite!  She is the youngest in our travel group by only a few days but looks to me that she is the smallest by at least a few pounds.

 

We are now staying at the Jin Feng Hotel in Nanchang.  It's a 5 star hotel in the middle of 'real China.' We are certainly not in Beijing any more.  Most of the surrounding buildings look like they could crumble to the ground at any minute.  The people here speak Gan which is a minority dialect of Mandarin not intelligible to most people who speak the standard dialect.   

 

Breakfast this morning was 'interesting.'  I would love to be able to say that I tried a bit of everything in China but spicy Chinese food just doesn't seem appetizing at 7 am.  I think I had half of a banana and a Gatorade for breakfast.  I mashed up the other half of the banana for Meili but she wasn't a fan.  She would rather have congee or egg.  I guess it's good for us to see what she will feel like in a couple of weeks when all the food around her won't exactly be what she had in mind.

 

After breakfast, we headed to the Civil Affairs office to register the adoption.  We had our family picture taken, reviewed some paperwork and then we were interviewed by an official.  She asked us questions like, 'What is your occupation?'  'What year were you married?'  'How to you plan to raise and educate your child?' along with 'Are you happy with your child?'  and 'Do you promise to never abuse or abandon her?'  Well, duh.  Of course we are and of course we won't. 

 

After that, we were able to meet with the director and ask him a few questions. I had grandiose plans to eek out a Mandarin conversation but wasn't able to get past, 'Hen gao xing ren shi ni.' (Very nice to meet you)  He did tell us that Meili has always been in the orphanage and out of the 15 families in our travel group, only Meili and one other child were in the orphanage the whole time.  He also told us that they were both involved in the Half the Sky program. (Lisa, I think Meili and Ava were definitely orphanage buddies!) I asked if there was a memory book and he said yes!  I bawled like a baby when I heard the news.  I haven't seen it yet but our guide, Grace, has it and is translating it.  She says it is taking her a while because it has many pages!  He said that she has been sick for about 3 days.  He also said that he would like for her to learn to speak Chinese and come back to the orphanage to visit.  He seemed like a very kind man and said that he understood that we had been waiting for a long time and why I was so emotional.  Later we took a picture with him and he said, 'Wow, the mom is really tall!'

 

So, in the eyes of the Chinese government, Meili is officially ours!!!

 

We came back to the hotel and Meili and I had a nap while Matt, Taylor and Audrey went to the market for some snacks and then went for a swim in the hotel pool.  They also ventured across the street (Frogger style) and dropped off the disposable camera that was sent with Meili.  I hope there are some good pics of what her life was like in the orphanage.  We'll pick up the pictures tomorrow.  We're meeting our group for dinner at 6 which should be another culinary adventure and then we hope to get a good nights sleep.  Tomorrow, we're going to Walmart.  Taylor is hoping to get some video games and I'm hoping to pick up some Chinese music and children's books.  Will check in again tomorrow!