Trip Photos Update

Here is the Fishing Girl statue in the Pearl River, the symbol of Zhuhai city (Jan. 21).

Jan. 21st, Zhuhai orphanage, the assembly hall, 

looks to be prepared for Chinese New Year celebration.

Miss Zoe "undercover" at the Victory Hotel in Guangzhou.

This photo was taken on Jan 20th. I and a Chinese comedian irritating mom by shutting the eyes, are waiting in the Immigration Clinic for Haifeng to finish.

This photo was taken on Jan. 20th, for the trip to the Immigration Clinic for Haifeng's physical.

Here is a picture of the lobby of the Victory Hotel.

This second photo was taken on Jan. 19th and represents the government building in downtown Guangzhou where we applied for the expedited passport.

This is a picture of Carrefour, the large French grocery store, where Haifeng got food she likes. It was taken on Wed, Jan. 19th, when we went there and applied for her expedited passport.

This picture was taken on Jan. 18th as we went back to the Guangdong Civil Affairs office to finish our paperwork.

The lady in front is the nanny who brought Haifeng from Zhuhai
and the lady behind her is Helen, our guide

The above photo was taken on the day we met Hai Feng.

Zoe and Me at the China Coast race in the Lion's Club in Hong Kong, which served as the gym and restroom for the starting area.

This picture of Zoe and me was taken by Julie outside the Comfort Inn by Detroit airport on the morning of Jan. 14, when we were delayed one day by our late flight from Jacksonville on the 13th.

This picture shows Haifeng with her teacher and Zoe 

at the Zhuhai orphanage.

Friday, February 18, 2011

We've been home three weeks now and Haifeng has made amazing strides.  

The first two weeks she was very depressed and missing her friends in Zhuhai orphanage.  Since then, we have had a wonderful interpreter over who has helped her immensely.  A vietnamese grandmother, friends of us, has also done some "teensitting" for us.  We have set up her computer and she is talking with her friends now.  

Today, she got a clean physical on her first visit to the doctor.  Perhaps China's signing of the Hague Convention was the reason our doctor here accepted her vaccinations she got at the International Immigration Clinic on Shamian Island, Guangzhou.  She got four shots there and thankfully, they were accepted as valid and she's good to go for school.  We plan to start her on February 28th.  We had resolved ourself to the fact that at 13, her adjustment would probably be very slow.  While her acquiring of english is still ahead of us, we are very thankful for the great strides she has made in the last week and the enormous number of people who have helped.  

Our local chapter of adoptive families also held their Chinese New Year's celebration last saturday night, Feb. 12th.  They very thoughtfully seated us with a family whose 18 yr old daughter had come over at 13.  She talked with Haifeng throughout the night.  Haifeng was also able to see all the adopted kids smiling and enjoying themselves.  This also had a very positive impact.  

We are looking forward now to the Spicy Hunan Reunion in June and continuing to make progress in the intervening months.  We feel so blessed at her progress, but the credit goes to Haifeng who has gone through a month that the rest of us can only marvel at and done remarkably well.