Childless Day in China

 No matter how much we look at this bed...

...and no matter how we fill it ourselves...

 

...we can only spend so many hours sitting in our room, imagining Michael lying there.

And, thanks to jet lag, I was up at 6 a.m., wide awake and ready to go--and John wasn't far behind me.

So we set off downstairs to try the breakfast buffet--a key part of any China adoption experience. We are in a new hotel this time--have I mentioned that?--and we have mixed feelings about it, so we were curious to see how the breakfast buffet would compare.

 

Don't see anything you like? That's because I didn't photograph the pancake/waffle bar, the omelet bar, the Japanese, Chinese, and Korean sections, the bacon-sausage-hash brown table, or the fresh-squeezed juice area.

The verdict? It is a fine breakfast bar. Is it the White Swan? Well, no. But the only thing I really missed were the amazing Chinese dumplings. I think I can survive 10 days without them. After all, I've survived 20 months without them. What I'm not sure of is whether John wants to spend every breakfast for the next 10 days listening to me speculating on whether they'll have the dumplings the next day. It's a good thing Michael will be joining us tomorrow and we won't have time for much more conversation.

We are so curious to see which foods Michael will want.

So here's the thing about the hotel. On our Trip to Louis we stayed in the White Swan when we came to Guangzhou. The White Swan will always be part of our memories of that amazing time with Louis. All families adopting from China come to Guangzhou at the end of their trip because the U.S. Consulate is here, and traditionally most families stay at the White Swan. But it's preparing to undergo renovations, so our agency moved its headquarters to another hotel. The China Hotel is going to be part of our Michael memories, and I'm sure we'll look back fondly on it. But we are just a little let down by the dramatic difference in the two settings.

 

It has a very different feel, a lobby that smells like incense, and two escalators, which I'll admit is a bonus for toddler entertainment. Saddest for us is that it's not on Shamian Island, where the White Swan is located and where we fell in love with China on our last trip.

Still, there's an easy solution to this: taking a taxi ride to the island on your first full day in China.

 

And our concierge claimed we could go to Mass in the church there. He even made a call to confirm the times.

Unfortunately he was wrong (we missed Mass by a few hours), but we visited the church, prayed, and talked to an English-speaking parishioner, a kind lady who was standing in the back of the church.

 

The church has no air conditioning--just large shutters they open for a breeze--and when we went in to pray, an older man quietly turned on the fan closest to our pew. The people here are so gracious.

It's a lovely little church, and a bride was being photographed outside. Brides apparently come to Shamian Island to be photographed all the time, and it's understandable. It's such a beautiful setting.

Since we were already on the island, we decided to do some exploring, talking about Louis and Michael most of the time, and sharing their photos with the shopkeepers we met. They oohed and aahed over our boys' pictures and offered us "good price, very good price for you" on everything in their stores. It was fun--and we had an excuse for not spending money since we didn't know Michael's size. We still had plenty to chat with them about. It's especially neat that Michael is from not far from Guangzhou, so some of the people we spoke to told us more about his city. We hope to go see it ourselves while we are here--and John really wants to see the daily (we think) kung fu demonstration they hold there.

On our travels, we saw a fisherman who had just pulled an eel out of the Pearl River. Then we watched the boats go by. We even took some pictures to confirm that we were here.

Yesterday our guide told us a Chinese maxim. The money you wear in front of you is yours. The money you wear behind you is everyone else's. We had no trouble with pickpocketing last time, but we're trying to be careful. You will note that my money is in front of me here.

Why do we love Shamian Island? Well, there's the lovely park alongside the Pearl River where people were ballroom dancing, playing live music, kicking around feathered hackeysacks, and doing slow, silent Tai Chi this morning. The people are not at all self-conscious about performing, and we saw so many people enjoying outdoor exercise--not jogging like Americans do, but playing badminton and other games.

The island also has these fun recycling trashcans I don't remember seeing in 2009.

It has large ads on display--and I like taking photos of ads in China.

John also had to photograph his favorite sign of the trip so far, though video might have captured this more effectively since the lights were moving.

Since we were on the island--and since that bathroom didn't look as nice as the restrooms we recalled at the White Swan--we stopped by the White Swan for a quick break. I was hoping it wouldn't seem all that great. One step inside, however, and we were both swooning.

I mean, it has enormous jade carvings.

It has a waterfall.

And it has this cabinet for sale. If only I could persuade my husband to buy it and squeeze it into our luggage.

John quickly pulled me away from the cabinet to go visit Susan's Place, a shop on the island where we spent more than a few yuan and several hours of our last visit. John and Dong, the owner (I believe he's the owner), hit it off on our last trip, and we have been looking forward to seeing him again.

While I shopped, John and Dong sat down to enjoy some tea together.



I can never decide whether Dong serves us tea because he likes us or because we overpay so much for his merchandise that he figures he's coming out way ahead. (And we really do bargain with him.)

I am assuming it's just that Dong is a great guy who knows we'll keep coming back. (And if we had $1 for every salesperson here who mentioned that we'll be coming back for number three--"and a girl next time!"--I couldn't buy that cabinet, but I'd at least be able to buy some tea leaves from Dong.

It was fun to watch him make the tea.

The first tea he brews he always disposes of--pouring it over these frogs, which changed color.

Then he served the tea.

I believe this was the lychee tea, and it was delicious.

The tea drinking is more about the experience than the tea itself. John and Dong chatted about China and America. They talked about Michael's city. They talked about the economy here and the economy at home. They talked about food--Dong described eating chicken feet and admitted that his favorite American food is fresh fruit--apples and oranges. I mentioned that there were no mandarin oranges on the breakfast buffet this morning, and Dong told me it is not the season for them.

As we were packing up our items to leave, I noticed this can with Yao Ming's image on it. It turned out to be  a can of Pearl River beer, which Dong happily gave to John. How is Pearl River beer? Well, let's just say that John definitely does not come to China for the beer. I got an orange soda, which was delicious. I wouldn't travel 7,000 miles to drink it, but I'd take a cab to Shamian Island for it.

All in all, we've had a good day. We miss Louis so much, but when we talked to my mother this morning, she assured us that he is fine. He knows where we are and he knows why we are here. He's eating well and sleeping well. Hooray!

This afternoon, in preparation for Michael's arrival, we also went to hunt down the hotel playroom. It's cute and small, but there's a playground in a courtyard off of one floor, and it has a slide and a red dolphin swing. There's some real potential there.

Then we walked past a hotel bar with this outside and Baba offered to pose for a photo.

 

When I saw the three enormous glasses, I decided the hotel might be better than I'm thinking. I mean, someone here must have some creativity and humor, right?

Besides, we're not really here for the hotel. We're here to meet Michael. And somehow I doubt he'll complain that there's no waterfall. But I bet he'd really love those dumplings. I know his mother would.

We can't wait to find out more about our little boy!