November 2007

My Trip to China

Travel Group - November/December 2007 to Chongqing, Ningxia and Guizhou.

During late November and early December 2007, ten Ontario families travelled to China to pick up their precious little bundles of energy.

Eight families travelled to Chongqing, one to Ningxia and the other to Guizhou.

What a whirlwind couple of weeks we had. On November 26th most of us flew out of a cool Beijing climate and landed a couple of hours later in a much warmer Chongqing. After a quick but spicy hotpot lunch we met that afternoon in the hotel conference room and received our girls. I must admit that after two years of paperwork, research and reading, I was so happy to see all the girls looked clean and healthy. It was such a wonderful moment for all of the families that were seeing there much awaited daughters for the first time after a couple of years of waiting.

The rest of the week was spent in Chongqing completing the adoption,visiting different interesting spots and of course more hotpot(now I know why beer is so cheap in China...it is a must when eating hotpot). The Chongqing zoo was really neat, it is the one of the few places that you can see an abundance of real pandas.

Eventually we left Chongqing behind (and maybe thankfully the hotpot meals) and returned to Beijing for week two. Back in Beijing, we spent the week visiting all the different and interesting tourist attractions, the Great wall, Tienaman square, Forbidden city to name a few. One of my favourite memories though was the morning I took our little peanut, strapped her into the Snugli and went for a two hour walk. Beijing is so interesting as it is a city of 16 million people and 3 million cars(and then throw in a few bikes for good measure). It is such a contrast of old and new, tall modern buildings everywhere mixed in with ancient hutongs.

On December 6th, we left Beijing for home. I was glad to be coming back to family and familiar surroundings but I look forward to the day when we can return to China to the birthplace of our daughter, the one that has made such a difference in our lives.

As I reflect on our trip, I am so thankful for Yulin. She was there every step of the way for everyone, there were no surpises and the process went smoothly. I still don`t know where she finds her energy.

As I write this, the good old Canadian winter looks to be breaking, and we can all finally enjoy some warm sunny weather.

Ian & Roslynn Norma