Picture Day at the White Swan

Today was picture day at the White Swan. I guess it is tradition for all the adopted children to appear in a photo together from this contingent of our agency. It was almost chaos getting them all to sit on the couch with crying or falling over. So that's Eli smiling in the picture and the other picture is of us in the center of the hotel in the large atrium.

Today was a relaxed day as Kim took care of some paperwork in the morning while Eli and I played in the playroom the hotel has. We then spent the day wandering the streets looking for good shopping deals. It is different because each store owner basically comes out into the street to bring you into their store. They all speak some english and try to flatter you in every possible way. Some even give out free gifts to the adopted child. I really think the store owners make up prices as we go and then when we are not interested they drop the price. Some are quite clever and some want to talk your ear off.

After shopping, we had the experience of taking a child to the barber for the first time. Eli's hair was kind of choppy, so we had a stylist here at the hotel trim him up. He was good for the first part, but we had to hold him down basically for the last bit as he didn't like the shaver behind his head. The stylist was very good with him. So Eli has something on Elise and Ella as they've never been to have their haircut yet.

Tomorrow we will be busy as it is a very important day. First we tour a Buddhist temple and Eli gets a blessing from a Buddhist monk I believe. Then the afternoon is spent at the vaunted U.S. Consulate where Eli's visa is finalized and we take the oath to be his parents from the US side of things and I think make him a US citizen. Then the evening we are going to be on a river dinner cruise around Guangzhou which should be a neat site at sunset. We do actually have sun here. Other parts of China it is often blocked out by the smog.

We are looking forward to getting home as it seems like a month ago we were even in Beijing. So much has changed. Tonight night I am going to be up at 2 am watching the pitch-by-pitch scroll come across the internet of the Brewer game. I'll be able to get the highlights on replay in the morning, but there's no way I can sleep knowing they are playing. They better win...I wouldn't want to fall asleep in the temple! Best wishes to all back home!

Todd, Kim, Eli