Day three

Two steps forward, one step back.

Kiyomi had a great sleep last night - about 9 hours and her fever was down this morning, and seemed back to normal this afternoon. She had a good breakfast, although we're still struggling with the liquid intake. Can a kid survive on watermelon alone? All in all, she had a good day, and was making some progress with grasping at things and babbling ("dada" and "aya" seem to be the biggest part of her babbling repretoire). We were thrilled to see her grow particularly attached to a piece of paper, although she also has a soft spot for "Sheepy" - a stuffed toy from her grandma. She even spent some time down in the playroom with a few of the other kids. She loves being around other kids, and seems espeically responsive to some of the older girls who are here with their families.

Now, however, she's having a minor meltdown. While we have no way of knowing, we think she's probably going through a period of missing her foster family. She wails when she looks at us. Kohji is currently walking back and forth with her, so that she can't look up and he's turning so she doesn't see me. It seems to be working, so keep your fingers crossed.

This morning, we headed to the country side to visit an 1000 year old village, Loutian, about an hour drive from Nanchang. It did seem to be a place forgotten in the past (although some of the homes seemed to have electricity), and we've been told the government aims to keep it that way for tourism. Even though many tour groups like ours have probably been run through the place, the girls attracted a fair bit of attention when we got off the bus. With a high of 36 today, there was a mass scramble to get hats and sunscreen in place. The locals (or peasants as our guide kept refering to them) were interested in the girls, and in these ridiculous tourists who brought a small army of strollers to an 1000 year old village! Needless to say, most of the babies were taken out of the strollers when we all realised that the walkways were what one would expect from an 1000 year old village - large uneven stones (note the empty stroller being dragged backwards).

The locals were much amused, and patient with us. While the town looks like a museum, for all intents and purposes, it is a functional town who's inhabitants are primarily farmers. It was hard to truely appreciate our surroundings, what with our proccupation with the heat and the babies. However, it was a pretty amazing place to see. The homes are sparsely furnished and the people seem to live fairly simply. They were all very friendly, and a little curious about us, and were happy to humour our feeble attempts at "ni hao" (hello in Chinese).
















The highlight of the tour was an enormous camphor tree that sits in the middle of the village, and is said to be 1000 years old. It is huge and magnificent, and offered a cooler repose after wandering through the rather stiffling alleys that make up the village.

In the afternoon, mommy headed to Walmart, while daddy and Kiyomi snoozed and headed to the play room. Walmart was... well, pretty much like any Walmart you'd find anywhere, only they sold a number of things I couldn't recognize. I wanted to pick up a few household items for Kiyomi to see as she gets older, and Walmart seemed the perfect place, so I joined a couple of other families making the trip.

Kiyomi had a dandy time hanging out with some of her buddies in the playroom here (although she was a little embarassed that she and Chloe had on the exact same outfit!)











She had mostly watermelon for dinner. We're a little anxious about it, but as we keep getting told - they'll eat if they're hungry. It's easy for us to forget that there girls are still going through a traumatic time, and we need to give them time to get comfortable, so we shouldn't be suprised if their appetites seem a little off.

Kiyomi finished the day with what was probably her first real bath. She seemed a little unsure at first, but once she realized she could splash, the bath seemed like an ok place. There are pictures, of course, but posting them here will make her hate me when she's 16, so I'll resist the temptation. Instead, I'll close with what we hope will become a bedtime ritual - the reading of a good book (thanks to Aunty Miyo, Uncle Martin and cousin Mika for the copy of "About Cats" - as you can see, it was a real page turner).


If would seem daddy's little trick worked, as the little nipper is snorfling behind me... oh, and Kiyomi is too. Good night all.

Forgot to mention

Oh ya, I also wanted to mention that we are getting the comments that everyone has been leaving on the blog site. This Anonymouse.org thing works great (a huge thank you to Jerry and Julie for that one), so we can view our blog and get your comments. Thanks to everyone who's been writing with good wishes. We make sure to pass them on to the nipper!

Also, we both seem to have email access, and are starting to crave news from home, so feel free to write to let us know what's going on in your lives. With the blog and a journal I'm keeping for Kiyomi, we may not be able to write you all back, but it's great to hear from the outside world!

Day two

I had thought that we got off pretty easy yesterday, and sure enough it was a bit of a tougher day today (and not just because both of us have biceps of jello right now, as it turns out Kiyomi likes to be held all the time).

Kiyomi slept well enough last night - from about 9 p.m. to after 6 a.m. She snorfled and whined at about 5:30, but was coaxed back to sleep with a little bum pat. In fact, she slept longer than I did!
However, once she did wake up, she seemed to have developed a wee bit of a cough. She didn't eat much at breakfast and its been hard to get liquids into her. We haven't yet figured out the right substance or receptical (sippy cup vs. bottle), and she seems resistant to whatever we try. Luckily, she loves watermelon, so we've been loading her up with that as much as possible. By the afternoon, the runny nose had appeared, and we knew she wasn't quite right as she seemed to be sleeping an awful lot, and has been a wee bit fussy. Sure enough, poor little nipper is running a low fever. So, she's spent much of her day sleeping, as evidenced by most of today's pictures.

We were shuttled to a local department store, where we experienced a little more shopping (I think we've already had our fill of shopping). We had to get a stroller and a few other baby essentials, so we negotiated our way around the place, primarily through hand gestures. Unlike the markets, there is no bargaining in department stores, so that made it easier in some ways. Of course, very little English is spoken by the attendents (and there are dozens of them), so it makes trying to figure things out a bit of a challenge and made me wish I had worked harder at learning just a few more Mandarin words. With 15 Canadian families (all of whom are caucasian except for Kohji) wandering the store with Chinese babies, it's safe to say, we drew attention.

It's a little embarassing to admit it, but we haven't ventured out of the hotel much. We would be more inclined to at least take a walk, but for the 36 celsius temperature and blistering uv. So we've pretty much cowered in the hotel, and tried to get to know the little nipper a little more. Of course, today, she slept most of the time, so daddy decided to join her.


Dinner tonight was in the hotel restaurant again. It had a special significance, but not necessarily a happy one for the nearby patrons. Only through this strange process is the topic of your kid's bowel movements something you would think to bring up to the strangers at the table next to you. I actually caught Kohji talking to a lady from the States with her two kids (also adopting) at the next table about how we had just fed Kiyomi some prunes as she hadn't yet 'gone', and that it didn't seem to take that long for the prunes to work their magic - ahh parenthood!

I'll leave you with two final shots - one of the river here in Nanchang and the other of Kiyomi's 'dinner' (yup, that's watermelon stuck to her cheek because she's snoozing).

















Tomorrow, we're going to see the country side and visit an 1000 year old city (assuming Kiyomi is up for the long bus ride). Right now, she and daddy are wandering the halls. Since she's been sleeping all day, she's a little resistant to it right now, so Kohji's taken her for a walk. Here's hoping it works.

Day one

Our first full day as parents, and it doesn't quite seem real. Even though the little nipper is snorfling behind me. Snorfling, by the way, is how I've described her part snore, part whimper. She does it when she's falling asleep, and while sleeping.

To our surprise, Kiyomi slept most of the night. She was asleep by 8:30ish last night, and didn't wake until around 5 am. In fact, most of the girls managed to sleep through the night, so I'm guessing that they were all pretty tired. She woke up still a little unhappy to see us, but less unhappy than she was the night before by the sounds of her crying, and was fairly easy to comfort (as long as we were prepared to walk around holding her). We've found the 'miracle hold' - the way she likes to be held best, so she relaxes. Basically she likes sitting in the crux of our arms, so she can see everything that's going on.

She took a full bottle and she drank from a cup of water (after signalling an interest in my juice), although she wasn't interested in any of the solid food when we went downstairs for breakfast. The best part of the morning though was seeing her first smile. She was in a great mood at breakfast, active, smiling, playing peek-a-boo, and other games with some toy rings. Her smile is beautiful. And it only got better over the course of the day, even though it was a chaotic one.

Our first task was a round of paperwork - the first of three today. That took about an hour, Kiyomi pretty much napped in the room while daddy took care of that. While I was there, two representatives from the orphanage stopped by, so we were able to ask them some questions. It turns out that Kiyomi, and in fact, all the girls from Wanzai, have been in foster care for the last 5 months or so. Her foster parents are a retired older couple who live with their eldest son. This may explain why she seemed to be looking around for someone last night, and wailing when she saw Kohji or I instead - she may have been looking for her foster family. Here she is with the representatives from the orphanage (note the use of the 'miracle hold':




After that round of paperwork, we had lunch (where Kiyomi ate a wee bit of rice cereal and some rice), and it was off to the Civic Affairs Office for round II. This was a tad more chaotic, as every family had to go through a short interview, get a family picture, and a passport picture for the babies. It was on the 26th floor of a government office, and given that the outside temperature was 35 celsius, it was pretty warm despite the air conditioning. It took us about 2 hours there, and Kiyomi was a real trouper through all of it. While she isn't extremely interactive yet, she likes being around people and is at her happiest in a crowd.

While we were waiting, a couple of Chinese women walking by stopped to touch Kiyomi and spoke to each other. While I had no idea what they were saying, it was obviously about her. Our guide later told us that they were commenting on how beautiful she is, and even asked "why is she so beautiful?" Marui explained that Kiyomi has facial features that are considered very beautiful by the Chinese. Well, we were proud parents after that I tell ya. I mean, we always thought she was beautiful, but we're a tad biased.

















We walked out of that Civil Affairs office as the legal parents of Kiyomi Jin-Dian Miller.

After that, it was a quick trip the the notary to get the final round over with, where we had another short interview, strangely answering the same questions that have been on about a dozen or so forms. Kiyomi adopted a pretty standard approach to the whole rigamarole, pretty much conkin out on the bus, and not even stirring when we had to go into the notary building. It would seem the information about her being a deep sleeper was bang on.















Once we finally got back to the hotel, Kiyomi had her first real decent meal. She hadn't really been willing to take anything other than a bottle until tonight, when she chowed down on congee, noodles, cherios and baby mum-mums. We were much relieved to see her eating, and saw a lot of smile during the meal. Hmm, seems food makes her happy, just like mommy and daddy.

Well, Kohji and Kiyomi are now both snorfling behind me, so I think I'll join them. Tomorrow, a department store trip to get some baby essentials.

We are now three

Kiyomi has officially entered our lives, and we are now a family of three. Although, I don't think Kiyomi is at all certain about this new arrangement yet (and rightly so!)

When you're preparing for this little adventure, you read and listen to peoples' accounts of the day that they got their daughters. You think you know what to expect, but nothing can prepare you for the actual experience. The range of emotions is indescribable. You are elated to see this precious little face that you've thought about for months, but you're also sad for the trauma the girls are going through, and at a loss of how to comfort her.

We headed down a little before 6. They had set aside a room on the 2nd floor restaurant for us, and we were ushered in by one of the waitresses. As we got closer, we could hear the babies crying, and were a little shocked to walk into a room already full of nannies and little girls. Some families, in fact, already had their babies in hand. There was much chaos and crying, and it wasn't at all clear how the process was supposed to go. When our turn came, Kohji was video taping for another family, and it wasn't until our guide said to me, "oh she's so beautiful" that I even realized that I was looking right at our daughter.

She seemed pretty unsure of what was going on and looked uncertainly around, although she wasn't crying. Almost as soon as they put her in my arms though, she looked up at my face and started to ball. She was pretty much unconsolable for the next 2 hours.





After significant chaos, we managed to head back to the room, but were a little shaken when we got on the elevator with 3 other families and Kiyomi started to wail at the top of her lungs. During very brief respites of wailing, we managed to get her to take about a 3rd of a bottle, but she wasn't in the mood to be forced, and she was making sure we fully understood that.

After much floor walking, she finally tired herself out (poor little monkey) and fell asleep in my arms.




A few things we've learned from the orphanage director: She weighs about 17 lbs, has 2 naps a day, and 4 meals a day, is fairly outgoing and likes to sleep on her back or side. Things we've found out for ourselves:.. She seems pretty stong - she can push herself over from her stomach to her back, and when really aggravated, she does a yoga bridge pose. She likes new scenes, and can be distracted by taking her to a room she hasn't seen before (unfortunately, not too easy when you're in a hotel room). She makes little snorfling sounds when she's trying to decide whether to wail. She makes little sucking sounds as she's falling asleep and has tiny little snore while sleeping. Oh ya, and that she's this cute when she's sleeping:



A dinner of instant noodles awaits me, so gotta go. More tomorrow.

Waiting in our Nanchang hotel room. One long hour to go...

A little bit more information

We got a little more information this evening from our guide Marui. It seems we finally get to meet our daughters at 6 p.m. Nanchang time. That should be 6 a.m. Ottawa time on Sunday, July 2. So when you wake up on Sunday morning, Kiyomi will officially be part of the Miller-Suzuki clan! Poor kid...

Last slow day

Not too much to report today. It's been a quiet, relaxing day.

Headed down to the Silk Market, where I successfully negotiated for a few souvenirs, including a couple of traditional Chinese dresses for Kiyomi. I've decided that bartering here is part business, part performance art. I found myself saying things, like "Come on, 5 yuan difference, I'm on a budget." My favourite was the woman who I had come to a price with yesterday, but walked away from the deal. I went back today, and said I'd take it for the original 200 yuan we'd agreed on the day before. She said: "Can't do it for that price today. Be nice. I hungry!" So, I offered her 200 yuan and a granola bar. I got my price in the end, although she didn't want the granola bar. Go figure!

Kohji considered a knock-off Ipod for awhile, but eventually decided against it when the vendor refused to put songs on it from her computer to see if it actually worked. It was an interesting conversation with her trying to argue that the one in teh box (which was identitical to the one in Kohji's hand) was in fact, a real Ipod, but the one he was holding was a fake. Man, foreigners must have a reputation for being stupid! In the end, it wasn't worth it, even if he could have walked away having paid $30 Cdn for it.

For those of you who may be heading here in the next little while, I've discovered a few tricks. Know whether you want it before you start bartering and make sure you know how much you're willing to pay for it in yuan before you start the back-and-forth. Trying to do the exchange in your head on the fly is a challenge, and the vendors know that. Once you know what you'd be prepared to pay, offer something well below that. Don't worry about insulting the vendors - they won't sell unless they can make a profit and they are very good at the game. And be ready to walk away if they don't come down low enough - it's almost guranteed that they will grab you, and offer a better price. Oh, of course, they'll be tell you "you killing me", "this is a very special price, just for you", and there will be hand wringing and theatrics, but it's part of the show!

After a couple hours in there, we had had enough. With the bartering, each transaction can take 20 minutes, so you're exhausted afterwards. On the way back to the hotel, we stopped in at a restaurant for our first real Chinese meal. It was excellent - and cheap. Enough food to feed 4 people easily, and with drinks it cost us less than $10 Cdn.

The rest of the families come in today, so our whole group is scheduled to meet the guide at 5 this afternoon to get our instructions for the trip to Nanchang tomorrow and make sure we have all the needed paperwork. This time tomorrow, we should be with Kiyomi! Send your thoughts to her, she's in for a rough day tomorrow. She has a 3 and a half hour bus ride, and then gets thrust into our hands. Poor little monkey.

Shopping ... Beijing Style

Well, we seem to have moved a little backwards sleepwise, but have managed to find our way to the Silk Market. I found myself awake at 3 am this morning, waiting for dawn. Kohji slept a little better, but still not as well as our first night when we both slept the sleep of the dead for a good 7 hours.

It may have been the anticipation of heading out to the Silk Market - a 6 floor shopping plaza where the name of the game is bartering to the extreme. There are people calling out "hey pretty lady, you want ...?" over miles of aisles. Everything from luggage to pearls to designer clothes can be found in small stalls that line each row. Bartering is a sport here, and your best advantage is to be willing to walk away. If you can do that, you will invariably be chased down with the price dropping with every step. It's mostly women working the stalls, but don't think that means they are less aggressive. They can get a vise grip on your arm and draw you into a web of goods that you simply "must buy" according to them. The bartering is 90% game playing - and Kohji and I seem to be the only ones in our group who came away emtpy handed, although I did successfully negotiate the sale of a polo shirt and a wallet for others in our group.

A few others from our travel group have arrived over the last couple days, so I think we are about 6 or 7 families now. Our guide, Mary, arranged for those of us who were here to take in a Chinese acrobat show. We had to take a taxi to the theatre, and so we got a first hand view of traffic China-style. Crazy weaving in and out of traffic with what appear to be near misses as cars seem to squeeze into what appears to be un-open spaces. And of course, there is a certain level of gridlock. Our driver decided to take advantage of the downtime, and bought himself a paper from a street vendor wandering among the traffic while we were in the car, and proceeded to read it, and work on the crossword puzzle while he drove us to the theater!

The show itself was interesting, although the music did sound like it had been pulled from a Communist propoganda film. Contortionists and tumblers with jelly spines. Definitely the source of any Cirque de Soleil production. Well worth taking out lives into our hands via taxi cab.

Got our first real taste of heat today as temperatures were blistering in the mid-day sun. Thankfully, not really humid yet. It's supposed to be even hotter and more humid in Nanchang. Ah boy...

We haven't been too adventurous with food thus far, sticking mainly to the hotel restaurants. There is a real concern about traveller's sickness, so we're all trying to avoid contact with local water and bugs, and we are all armed with our little bottles of purel. No one wants to risk getting sick just before we get our daughters.

I'm actually falling asleep as I write this, so I'm off to bed now. Only two more sleeps ...

Day one in Beijing

Well, day one in Beijing has been pretty fascinating so far.

Managed to sleep in until 5 a.m, and Kohji until 6! Not bad considering that we went to bed at about 8 am Ottawa time. Woke to fog, grey skies and heavy rain.

The constrution site which is right out our window was one massive puddle. Interesting watching the goings on down there - few hard hats, no steel toe boots to be seen and much of the work seems to be done by hand. Amazing considering that it's a masive pit, the length of a city block at least. There also seem to be only a handful of men working on the site, so we're guessing progress is rather slow.

After an amazing Chinese and American breakfast here at the hotel buffet (we had our first taste of congee, the Chinese breakfast staple), we planned to check out the silk market with two of the other families who are traveling with us. It's about a 30 minute walk away. Luckily, the rain had stopped, but it was still overcast. This turned out to be a blessing because once the sun came out in the afternoon, we fully understood what the word "muggy" means.

En route to the market, we were side tracked by a young student, who is studying English and, according to him, transcultural relations and traditional painting. His English was excellent and he invited us to his teacher's studio which was just nearby so that he could write our daughters names for us in traditional calligraphy. Not exactly sure what we were getting ourselves into, we decided to follow him to the studio, figuring with 6 of us, it'd be ok, even though we did painfully look like your classic group of tourists.

The studio was located in a non-descript building off a main throroughfare. It was a small, and very warm, single room plastered with paintings floor to ceiling. Our student friend, who's name was Han Bing (although he said his English name was Jason), told us the meanings and stories behind some of the paintings. While we were there, Jason's teacher, Sang She, came it, and it was he who did the calligraphy of our girl's names, while Jason gave us a tour of the paintings. We were suitably charmed, and maybe to a certain extent suckered, as we all walked out of there with our calligraphy and other paintings. Kohji and I bought a lovely water colour of a rooster, as Kiyomi's birth year is the year of the rooster, and 4 landscapes showing 4 seasons. All of ours were painted by Jason (at right, is Sang She doing the calligraphy).

After that little adventure, we set off once again for the Silk Market, only to be side tracked yet again, by a rather well known department store called the Friendship Store. Originally, the Friendship store was the place where foreigners shopped - no locals were aloud to make purchases from the store. It carries a variety of traditional Chinese arts and crafts and souvernirs, and also houses a rather large grocery store of primarily western products. The prices are considerably higher than anything in the markets, so we were mainly window shopping.

So, in the end, we didn't make it near to the Silk Market. One of the families with us has a 4 year old girl, who had been amazingly good and patient while we dragged her to the studio, but she was ready for nap, so we decided to save the Silk Market for another day.

Instead, we went with Linda and Octavio to Wanfuiing Dajie, a pedestrian shopping street about a 20 minute walk from the hotel. The main part of the strip is a mixture of western and modern looking stores, but there is an off-shoot which has food stalls and vendor after vendor selling all sorts of souvenirs.

Down this little alleyway, we came across this little delicacy that would seem to be right at home on Fear Factor (at right). Yup, those are scorpions and seahorses on a stick. Needless to say, no one was brave enough to try any (although we did try, what we think was, squirrel at lunch).

The souvenir vendors are aggressive and call out to you, but it wasn't quite as bad as we feared it would be. Alas, we didn't try our hand at haggling, but expect we'll get a chance in future.

We also stopped in at the English Language Bookstore, where I went looking for a copy of the Little Red Book for Dad. When I pressed someone there for any ideas as to where I could get a copy, she replied "nowhere" and walked away from me. Seems you can get purses with Chairman Mao's face on them, but you can't get your hands on the writings.

Well, we're about the meet Linda and Octavio for dinner, so I must sign out. Tomorrow, hopefully, the Silk Market and a performance of Chinese acrobats!

Made it to Beijing

Well, we've made it safe and sound.

We had an awfully early start, waking up at 5:00 this morning (or was it yesterday morning?), to finish packing up our giant suitcases, and then we were off to the airport.


The flight itself was thankfully uneventful - we watched a bunch of bad movies and ate all the food they kept feeding us!


It's hard to get the sense of the city just yet, as we're wandering in a bit of a jetlag daze, and it all seems a little intimidating at first. The land around Beijing is rather flat, and faintly reminiscent of the Manitoba prairies. However, once we got through the airport gates, we knew we weren't in Kansas anymore! Throngs of people waiting to greet in-coming passengers, dozens of them holding up signs.



Snaking through the crowd, scanning the horizon for any sign of our names or the Children's Bridge logo, was our first real introduction to Beijing.

The traffic is not really decipherable, although we've managed to figure our that typically, cars have the right of way. For no other reason that we can decipher, other than that they are bigger. There are bicycles everywhere, and I was even able to set off a bike alarm while wandering down the street.

The hotel is actually quite nice. It's right in the heart of Beijing, not too far from Tiananmen Square and the Forbidden City.



It also has a Mcdonald's across the street!

We went for a brief walk around the city after we settled in a bit, with our new friends Linda and Octavio who is in our adoption group and was on our flight from Toronto. During our walk we saw Peking duck for the first time...


...and also a Chinese recycling truck:


Kohji, in typical fashion, has had an ice cream and found rice crackers, so is more or less content. I, however, am currently suffering from severe tiredness. It's almost 6 a.m. Ottawa time, and we've been awake since 5 a.m. yesterday! All I really want to do right now is sleep, but am trying hard to make it to a reasonable hour to get my body on Beijing time.

Not much more to go into right now, as my fatigue-addled brain in coming up dry. Will post more soon.

adventures in packing

First off, an update on the stump. You will all be happy to learn that the stump has been vanquished. We're not exactly sure how, but we're sure it involved some intricate sorcery from the netherworld. All we know, is that we came home last Tuesday, to discover it's absence, and obvious evidence of ancient rituals in the backyward. The canoe is parked over the hole that leads to the source of the stump's power, and will hopefully, protect us from any creature of the deep that the stump's removal unleashes.

Now, on to the more intricate packing details. The last day has proven to me beyond a shadow of a doubt that Kohji is a genius when it comes to spatial relations. I know you've all heard the expression before about packing everything and the kitchen sink. Well, rest assured, that little saying is a full blown reality in our little world right now (right down to the tupperware we're briging to act as a little sink for cleaning dishes and bottle nipples). But, back to the rare occassion where I heap praise onto my husband...

Kohji has somehow - I'm sure as a result of his many years training as an engineer - managed to fit this:




... into this...



I should point out that the middle size suitcase with the rainbow strap, is in fact empty, but for an extra duffle bag (we've been warned that you bring LOTS of stuff back!) To get a good idea of the enormity of the challenge involved, try putting a bag of 60 Pampers in a suitcase and see what it looks like.

With Kohji's packing prowess in full evidence, it would seem that we are more or less ready to go... and a day and a half ahead of time at that. Some wonders never really do cease. Either that, or all those years of leaving on vacations within an hour of finising work have trained us well.

Friday was my last day of work for a full year. My colleagues had a little farewell gathering, with cake and pressies, which was greatly appreciated, and a little unexpected as my work mates had taken me out to lunch earlier in the week. But then again, we always were a crew willing to accept any excuse for cake!

The house is starting to come together as well, with Kiyomi's room actually looking like a baby's room. Furnished, of course, completely by the generosity of family and friends. Even the overflowing toy box was the result of gifts and hand downs of well loved favourites. We're also planning on getting a couple things in China to decorate the walls, so she'll also have some familiar looking things around her.

Despite the addition of new furnishings, in many ways, it feels as if we are just off on yet another vacation. Only this time, we have sippy cups and a snugli, in lieu of a camp stove and trekking poles. But of course, as one friend put it to us on Friday night: "I don't remember you coming back from Alaska with a daughter!" Ah well, as they say, plus ca change, plus c'est pareil.

All and all, we seem to be as ready as you can be for such a momentous change. Even KT the cat is learning to adapt. She's been a little suspicious of all the comings and goings, and the additions to the furnishing, but she's making her peace with things in a way that only an 18 year old cat can...


... we'll just have to wait and she which one of them is the bigger Dora fan!

Stump tales and a right of passage (not necessarily related)

So, while frantic baby preparations are on-going, we also have been trying to get our derriers in gear with respect to some rudimentary landscaping. One would think that this would be a relatively easy task... think again. We are in a battle to the death with a stump and it's not at all clear to me that we have the upper hand. Let me start by introducing you to the stump





He's a stubborn old bugger who sits in the corner of our yard, coincidently in the exact spot where a fence would go. As evidenced by the old rusted gate that the stump seems to be in the process of devouring, this guy is not prepared to go gently into that good night. In fact, thus far, stump (as he is not so affectionately come to be named) has resisted all attempts at removal. Oh sure, you might say that it's because the guy who was supposed to removed the stump didn't show up, or that the company that said they would do it, when confronted with the actual act of removing the stump, decided that they don't actually have the machinery to do it! But, I am convinced that the stump has some special power to foil the slings and arrows (or chainsaws) of mere mortal men. In fact, I think that stump's going to outlive us!

Ah well, enough about the great stump (who I have now decided is a distant relation to the Great Pumpkin of Peanuts fame) and on to better, if not bigger, things like Kiyomi preparations.

This last week has marked a number of milestones towards parenthood. Kiyomi's room is coming together and actually looks kinda like a little girl's room, rather than a storage closet. Half of the back seat in the car is consumed by a baby seat and we now clamber over a baby gate at the top of our stairs (both courtesy of our friend Catherine). Yesterday, there was a baby shower hosted by Kohji's lovely and gracious sister-in-law, Aya (who would have made Kenji proud with her picture taking prowess this afternoon). Sushi and a wonderful chocolate cake with strawberry filling were promptly devoured by all. And while that was underway, Kohji and Kenji headed to Future Shop to pick out a video camera, the amazing gift from Kohji's family and, as we have been told repeatedly, a must have for any parent-type. Top that off with a bbq in the evening, where a cake (thanks to Gaby, a baking goddess) is brought in celebration of Kiyomi and a gift is snuck in for her as well (all Renee's doing)! It was indeed a day of milestones.
Now, each of these would be considered a right of passage in their own right. However, there was an even bigger and more profound right of passage that truely marks the beginning of our new lives:


Yes, you guessed it, this house now contains a Dora the Explorer chair (thanks to Kathleen and the ever jubiliant Ella). Now, we're truely ready for parenthood - as soon as someone tells who the heck Dora is and why she hangs around with that little monkey all the time?!

Slaves to the list and much much more

Ok, it has definitely been awhile since we've updated, but it seems that all our predecessors on this journey were absolutely right. Once that referral comes, you get hit with a whirlwind. All of a sudden you have 8 short weeks to prepare for the arrival of a baby and for international travel.

As for us, we've been consumed. It started even before we got the referral. Building in our heads. Consuming our thoughts.

It was given life once the referral came and Kohji sat at the computer. Somewhere between a stream of counsciousness and ramblings, it took it's first breath. Now, we are slaves to it, unable to leave the house without consulting it or carrying it with us. We strike at sections of it, but like some sort of self-healing mutant organism, when you cut off a limb, it grows others. We're now convinced that it has passed the final hurdle to ultimate survival - it is self-replicating, growing on its own. It is... THE LIST ... The list of stores we need to go to, things we need to buy, things we need to organize, people we need to consult, things we need to pack, people we need to pick up things from... It's exhaustive and it has started to rule all our free time. In fact, it's even crept it's way to work, carried out at lunch to run a couple more of its devious errands. The list might expand and shrink, but it never goes away (and frankly probably won't for the next 18 years or so).

We have managed to fight off the list long enough for a couple of more interesting outings and activities - like visiting our friends Heather and Steve, and their beautiful daughters AJ and Charlotte (http://ying-er2006.blogspot.com/). Charlotte is from Guangdong province, and Heather, Steve and AJ were gracious enough to pass along helpful hints for our upcoming trip, as well as a bag of supplies and the biggest suitcase I've ever seen (I think Kohji can actually fit in it) . Very much appreciated.

We also had the opportunity to get together with a few people from our travel group -those of us here in Ottawa. It was nice to meet the people behind the email addresses and share some collective anxieties, questions and giggles. They're a lovely bunch of people, and there is something reassuring knowing that we've embarking on this journey together (especially for we first time parents who are still trying to figure out the difference between a soother and a teething ring!)

We also now have some pretty exciting stuff in hand - like the itinerary. We finally received the in-country itinerary yesterday, and it looks like we pick Kiyomi up on Sunday, July 2nd. A day earlier than we had initally thought. Here's how our time will be spent

Jun.28: Suzuki Family (that's us!) arrive in Beijing, guide will meet them at airport and transfer to International Hotel.

Jun.29 - July 1st - amuse ourselves in Beijing and get over jet-lag. Meet others in our travel group as they arrive.

Jul.02: Beijing to Nanchang (13:40-15:45), transfer to Gloria Plaza Hotel. Go to the Civil Affairs in the afternoon to meet the babies and sign the adoption agreement.

Jul.03: Go to Civil Affairs again for registration, notarization and applying passport.

Jul.04: Guide will bring the families to the local department store to buy some daily necessities for their children.

Jul.05: Visit the Temple of Teng Wang Ge.

Jul.06: Visit the resort for Ba Da ShanRen.

Jul.07: Pick up passport. Nanchang to Beijing on Flight(17:50-19:55), transfer to International Hotel.

Jul.08: Medical exam and take photo for babies.

Jul.09: Sightsee the Great Wall with lunch.

Jul.10: Go to Canadian Embassy for visa appointment.

Jul.11: Visit Tian An Men Square and the Forbidden City.

Jul.12: Rest.

Jul.13: Hutong Tour. Pick up visa. Beijing Duck Dinner in the evening.

Jul.14: Fly home a family of 3!

Children's Bridge is also trying to - somewhere in that packed agenda - a day trip to the city of Wanzai, where the orphanage is actually located. It's an 8 hour round trip from Nanchang, so it's not likely that we'll take Kiyomi on the trip, but if it's at all possible, one of us will go to take pictures of the city and get a feel for the town where she spent the first year of her life. Unfortunately, it's not likely we'll be able to visit the orphanage itself. However, a trip to the city is better than nothing.

Kohji and Papa also spent some time this past weekend researching Kiyomi's name, including figuring out what the characters of her name mean in Mandarin. They even found a cool website that gives you a recording of the sound. We've still working on Jin - it's a tough one.

KIYOMI
清美

Japanese:
清 – Kiyoi – clear, pure
美 – Mi – beautiful

Mandarin:
qing mei (“chiung mei”)
清 – qing – same meaning - http://www.chinalanguage.com/CCDICT/Sounds/Mandarin/qing1.wav
美 – mei – same meaning
http://www.chinalanguage.com/CCDICT/Sounds/Mandarin/mei3.wav

JIN DIAN
錦淀

Mandarin:
錦 - Jin (exquisite tapestry, or brilliant and beautiful)
http://www.chinalanguage.com/CCDICT/Sounds/Mandarin/jin3.wav
淀 - Dian (“Dien”small pool of still water in a stream)
http://www.chinalanguage.com/CCDICT/Sounds/Mandarin/dian4.wav

Alas, there is no Chinese or Japanese version of Miller - go figure. Guess we'll just have to go with the literal meaning - person who operates a mill! Not very romantic or poetic I'm afraid.

Well, that's all the news I can think to bring you up to date on. I'll try to post a little more in the next couple of weeks. Two weeks today and we're on that plane (knock on wood)!

Surviving Toys R' Us

Our first real foray into the world of parenthood was a shopping excursion to the mecca of all things bobbled and brightly coloured - Toys R' Us.

Let me be absotutely clear, this is not a store, it is an ADD inducement chamber (thanks to Daniel for that literary reference). There are entire walls of plastic gizmos and cotton doodads. Shelves overflowing with everything from playdoe to diapers. Children running wild with sensory overload, while in the distance, the faint echoes of 'It's a Small World After All' induces parents into comatose stuppors as a means of escaping the sensory bombardment (or at least as a means of escaping their children who are latched onto their legs pleading for the giant Dora pillow or the Thomas the Train poster thanks to the full package of Nerds, conveniently placed at the right height for 4 year old hands, that they downed almost as soon as they set foot in the store). Ok, I'm taking a little poetic liscence here, but I've had sugar highs that were less intense.

There were entire walls in that place that we, as complete novices, were unable to decipher. All we could figure out from the packaging was that if we did not buy this product for our child, she would obviously wind up sick, uncared for and unloved... or a used car salesperson. It was never really that clear. Luckily, we had a cell phone! Unluckily, all the people we could think to call had lives, and so weren't home. We were on our own...

Our first hurdle, diapers. There was an entire wall of them. Now it's hard enough picking out diapers when you're pretty much guessing at the approximately weight of your child, since the info you have on her is about 5 months old. But, the diaper companies make it that much harder by absolutely guaranteeing if you don't use their product, you will ruin your child for life. After a futile 10 minutes trying to figure out just what the heck was different between huggies, pampers and the other guys, we finally picked the package that seemed to have the greatest weight range (16-32 pds.)

After that rousing success, we moved on to the bottles, where we were totally out of our league. You can't just pick-up a couple bottles. Nope. You have to commit to an entire bottle feeding system. And woes for your baby if you pick the wrong one, because you will be condemning your angel to either starvation - whilst they try to draw liquid from a tiny-itty bitty hole in the nipple - or chronic gas - from the inappropriate bottle that you chose. This is the point where we dove for the cell phone. After that failed, we retreated to the same strategy we use for picking bottles of wine - we went for the ones with the pretty pictures on them.

At the end of the day, we came home with a couple bags of stuff, and muttled through with our own unique version. The picture kinda explains it all:

Yup, that's a bag of rice in a Snugli.

Despite our shopping ineptitude, we do have confirmed travel plans. We leave Ottawa on Tuesday, June 27th, and arrive in Beijing on Wednesday, June 28th. In-country travel details are still forthcoming, but we expect to travel to Nanchang on July 2nd, and finally get to pick-up Kiyomi on July 3rd (if I remember right, that's also Geno's birthday).

Excitement is definitely starting to build... only 31 days until we leave!

On the paper trail...

So, a little more on the adoption process. When you finally get word that your child is there, waiting for you, the first thing you need to do is... paper work! Not quite mountains of it yet, but you fill out a bunch of forms and trundle them off to the adoption agency.

We met with our social worker last week and filled out all the requisite forms, signed them, copied them, sealed them and delivered them. As a result, we have now FORMALLY accepted the referral and promised to love and cherish Kiyomi for ever and ever (of course, that was the easy part). Poor Kiyomi doesn't quite have the same luxury - it seems she's stuck with us.

On a more interesting note, we now have confirmed travel dates - June 30 to July 14. We're hoping to get there a couple days early to get over jetlag and get our bearings, but for all intents and purposes, we must aim to be in Beijing by Saturday, July 1. No itinerary yet. That should come in early June. However, we have been told that we will be travelling to Nanchang, the provincial capital of Jiangxi.

As you can tell from the maps, Nanchang is in the southeast of the country, and sits on the banks of the Gan River, about 60 kms south of the more well known Yangtze River. It is also located near China's largest freshwater lake, Poyang Lake. The city is small by Chinese standards with only approximately 2 million people. Historically, it is the site of the Nanchang Uprising - the first major conflict between the Communists and the Kuomintang on August 1, 1927.


This area of Jiangxi is known for porcelain and has been a bit of a grain basket, as the fertile soil in the area makes it China's leading grain producer. Weather-wise, we can expect it to be pretty darn steamy with an average July high of 33 degrees celsius. Sun hats, sun screen and tank tops are already on the list...

Through the paperwork, we also had to come to a final decision on Kiyomi's full name. We've decided her full name will be Kiyomi Jin-Dian Miller. Hope she likes it!

Thanks to all of you you have sent congratulations and such a warm welcome to Kiyomi. We'll be saving all your emails and posts to show her when she gets older, and let her know how much excitement and happiness her arrival caused.

Let the Kiyomi tales begin...

The last week has been one hell of a whirlwind, but we have now come down from the clouds -literally and figuratively. I got back from Whistler on Tuesday afternoon (and for the record, despite efforts to the contrary, Lauren and I experienced smooth sailing with not a single navigational crisis at 4:30 in the morning), and Kohji arrived early on Wednesday morning, after taking the redeye in order to get one more precious day of skiing in (I don't know how the boy does it). We've now unpacked, done laundry and Kohji is presently re-packing for a conference in Toronto which starts tomorrow and runs until Wednesday.

While we had expected that the translated file would be ready on Monday or Tuesday of next week, we actually got word on Wednesday that we could pick it up that afternoon. We happily sauntered down to the CB office to pick it up (ok, well, actually, we got caught in a traffic jam on the Queensway and nearly jumped out of the car to run along the shoulder, knowing that we had to get there before 4:30 when the office closed, but who's recording details here).

So, we now have a few more details on our little monkey, including some medical information. We're happy to report that there doesn't appear to be any medical or development issues. This has been confirmed by Aunty Aya, who took time out of her exam prep to go through the report with us (thanks Aunty Aya), our family doc and grandpa Barry (sorry Dad, but you haven't given me anything else to go by, so you get to sound like a fruit). Everybody reading this, send good vibes Aya's way as she heads into her last set of exams as a medical resident!

We're expecting more travel details early next week, and have been informed for the moment that we should expect to travel around June 30. For the record, that is only 57 days away!

Thought we'd also post a few pictures to give you a sense of what's been happening around here.

What Kohji was doing when the call came in (those are his boots)...

What Tamara was doing when the call came in (with Lauren, my intrepid ski partner at the exact spot we were standing when the call came in)...

Proof that this poor child is in real trouble with us as parents (yes, it says Whistler ski bum)...