Trust in the Lord with all of your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and he will make your paths straight.
We’re on our way! So, here we are, flying over the Pacific Ocean on the first leg of our journey to Anna Mei. We are joined on our journey by Sarah Tucker. Her family is adopting a little boy from the Guangdong province. We will be together in Beijing and then again when we get to Guangzhou (in Guangdong province). Sarah flew into Portland last night from Virginia. I am so enjoying her energy, accent and love for the Lord. I think we talked for a couple hours straight at the start of the flight. Peter finally suggested I move across the aisle to the empty seat next to her for a while. We were truly thankful that we were blessed with straight paths today. We were nervous about some things like our luggage making our tight connection in Tokyo, having to check ‘yes’ on the health form to enter china on the box that said, “have you been in close contact with poultry in the past seven days?” and finding our guide at the airport. Our traveling really could not have gone any more smoothly. On the way to the hotel, our facilitator told us that we would be getting our little girl on Monday when we arrive in Urumqi, rather than Tuesday as we had previously been told.
Sunday, July 30, 2006 – A Journey of a 1000 miles starts with a step
There were some major steps today! It is hard to believe all that we saw and did in one day. We met our guide, Sim, this morning at 8:00 a.m. after having an amazing breakfast buffet. Our first stop was Tiananmen Square. We learned that Tiananmen means Gate of Heavenly Peace. We quickly noticed that we were being noticed by a lot of the people. When we were taking a picture in front of the gate, someone asked if they could take a picture of their children with the girls. We said alright and within seconds there were several children lined up with them to have a picture. Our guide suggested we get going or there would be no end to the requests for pictures. We had several other “new friends” throughout the day request pictures with us. One group of high school students that asked for a picture seemed to want to practice their English with us and conversed with Pete and I for quite a while. They told us they were visiting Beijing from Hunan Province and had never seen a foreigner before. The school children here are all required to take English classes, so most younger people have at least some ability to communicate in English. Most are difficult to understand, but having had practice with various exchange students the past two summers has helped tune our ears, I think. Our guide told us that many of the domestic tourists that come to visit Beijing from other provinces have had little exposure to foreigners, so I guess meeting foreigners and taking pictures is all part of their Beijing experience.
We toured the incredible Forbidden City which is rich with incredible history. We left the Forbidden City and went to visit a Jade Factory. There were almost no other people there when we visited and about 20 employees all wanting to help us find something we couldn’t leave China without. We passed on the beautiful, but expensive jade bangle, but did buy a Jadite (hard Jade) pendant for Anna that we will save until she is older. From there we went to lunch at a Chinese restaurant that seemed to be set up for tourists and tour buses. It adjoined a Cloisonné Factory and government run Friendship Store. I bought a vase to give to Anna’s foster mother. Our next stop was The Great Wall! What a climb that was! It was very hot and humid (think African Rain Forest exhibit at the zoo with sun.) We had set out to climb to the highest point in view, but some of us were truly on the verge of collapse and decided to stop at the gate just before it. It was high enough to take good pictures (although it was hazy all day) and to qualify for a “climbed the great wall” certificate. After that we visited a pearl factory and then headed back to the hotel. We early tomorrow to fly to Urumqi in the Xinjiang Autonomous Region. We didn’t talk directly with our facilitator today, so haven’t confirmed yet whether we will receive our little one tomorrow or Tuesday. We are thoroughly enjoying our time here. It is amazing to think we are so close to finally getting to meet this member of our family. We miss our boys, but understand they have been having too much fun with Grandpa to miss us yet. We are very thankful that they are doing so well and very thankful for the many friends and family that are encouraging us with their thoughts, words, deeds and prayers.
