We’ve been in the city of Guangzhou for four days, having arrived on Friday afternoon. Two other families adopting with our agency have joined us here along with their newest family member, so now we are a group of 10. This is our last leg of the trip before bringing our son home.
We are staying in the section of the city called Shamian Island. This
little “island” is separated from the big city of Guangzhou by a big river on one side and a narrow muddy slough on the other. It is only 3 blocks long by 5 blocks wide, so one can walk the entire island in about an hour. You can reach it by boat on the river or by car by crossing a small bridge over the slough from the main part of Guangzhou. It used to be the only place foreigners could live in the late 1800s so there is a lot of old British and French architecture. A former ethnic ghetto, it is very interesting and beautiful. Many of the building have soaring ceilings and windows and columns, and wide porches. There is a canopy of shade over the large plazas formed by 100 year old soaring and sprawling ficus and fig trees between the rows of colonial era buildings. Liana vines wrap and strangle the trunks and hang down. There are paved walks along the river front. There is a gloriously moldy, century-old Catholic church and a freshly painted “Christ Church” built by the British. We can imagine it being 1890 with mustached export agents of the British Empire in sweaty white cotton suits and straw hats sitting on the porches drinking tea, griping about the lack of British sausages and writing letters to send home on the next steamer to Bristol… It is a very popular place for taking wedding photos. We see brides, grooms and photographers here everyday. Last Saturday we counted 20 brides looking romantic and glamorous and demure - though several wore pants and tennis shoes beneath their gowns. The grooms were looking obedient.
Aside from brides, you see babies. They are everywhere. In fact, Shamian Island is a bit like the
Twilight Zone. You are still in China, but everywhere you look you see American families with their newly adopted Chinese child with a backdrop of Empire European architecture. Every store offers cute Chinese clothing, laundry services and baby wipes. Every restaurant takes your order in English. Several stores loan out baby strollers. Saturday morning we went with our guide to the
medical center filled with white tile and aluminum trim. It was loud and laboratorial. She led us to the back of the clinic to a room clearly labeled in English: “Examination Room for Adoptive Families.” Do they do this often?
We were glad that our group arrived there first because soon after us came a group of 8 families, and we stopped counting when we got to 20. Children adopted from China are required to get vaccinated and a TB test prior to acquiring a visa to enter the US, so no matter which province your child comes from, everyone ends up on Shamian Island before returning home. The clinic experience is amplified by the fact that the cubicle where the kids get inoculated is located up front near the intake hall. So as you enter and for the entire time you wait you are serenaded by the wails of frightened and furious babies getting shots one after the other. The wails reverberate against the tile floor and walls.
The doctor pronounced Sam Sam to be a healthy boy, but he did not escape their care before getting 6 shots. He did not like that. Luckily his anger was directed at the nurses and not at us. Besides his loud comments in high pitched Chinese, he sat and behaved well enough considering the situation.
After the medical center, we explored, strolling the island. That’s when we met Penny of yesterday’s blog post.
On Sunday we were whisked off the island to the Guangzhou Zoo, and then to some shopping in the chaotic, crowded microstore shopping district visited by the proletariat.
That’s where Victor discovered the game of Xiangqi, or Chinese Chess. “Way cool,” thought Victor. And thanks to Wikipedia, Victor now knows that it may be a form of the precursor game that western chess is derived from. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xiangqi Victor also learned that game play was one of four arts that every cultured Chinese gentleman had to be proficient at. The other arts were music, calligraphy and painting. Victor subsequently purchased the game and is wanting to try it out. Between owning this game and his talents on the accordion, Victor feels he is now almost halfway to becoming a cultured Chinese gentleman.
The zoo is clean and lush and beautifully landscaped, and home to
one of China’s icons, the panda. The animal habitats are old fashioned and unnatural: concrete and bars and green moats and scratched plexiglas. The animals look healthy but bored and cramped. The chimps have some space and grass and trees. We saw coyru: they look like ginormous water rats swimming and scurrying around. Bigger than pampered house cats. An old, gray haired chimp sat quietly and looked bemused at the people making faces at him. He picked up a banana from the floor and placed it on the platform in front him for a later snack I suppose. There were adorably tiny deer. And there was a sheepish rhino, looking like an overweight lady in denial, wearing a tight dress and combat boots and who’s lost her glasses.
While out, we see so many amazing things. Here are a couple of things we want to
mention which you would not see at home: Bundled baby bottoms and Bike-trucks. Babies and toddlers here look a lot like those tomato shaped pin cushions. We believe their clothing that is made entirely of pillows. What is fun is that the cute Chinese satiny, embroidered look is still quite in fashion for them. And that their butt cheeks are always peeking out, ready for action whenever nature calls.
The other thing are the bike trucks. These guys can make their bike do anything. Forget pedi-cabs. Way too overdone. How about the bike truck? It can haul a pile of cardboard or sticks or boxes three times higher than the cyclist. We have also seen a variety of scooters. Scooter trucks. Scooter cabs. Scooter vans. There are bike lanes here everywhere, but they are almost as wide as the car lanes and are often separated by a low fence. Bellinghamsters, we have seen the future.
After his first week with us now, Sam Sam is already learning some English words. He mimics us a lot. He’s learned, "ready," "okay,” "uh oh,” “potty” and “more.” He clearly understands “more” and says it loud and strong when buns or juice or noodles are within reach. Chinese say "mama” and “baba" so he already knows those, except he has to switch to "papa" (“baba” in Russian is grandmother!).
the US, our diet has variety because various ethnic foods are available to many of us. Lots of towns have American grills, and Southern BBQ’s, and Chinese, Italian, Vietnamese, Mexican orIndian restaurants. But the types of food served in all those places fall in a narrow category of what Americans like on their plates. Here in China we’ve seen that categories of what can be cooked are much broader. A greater range of the anatomy (i.e. not muscle tissue) of animals is available. Some reptiles and amphibians and insects and marine life not consisting of shellfish or fish all fall within the spectrum of “food.” A new friend of ours had a big dinner prepared by her new local friends in her honor. She was served dishes of swan meat, snake meat and chicken feet (not the drumsticks - the feet). She enjoyed them all. We’ve walked into restaurant lobbies that looked like well stocked, high end pet aquarium stores. But all the tanks and the filtration and bubbling were not for displaying pets, they were for keeping the dinner ingredients as fresh as possible. (photos of snakes and sand worms) And the variety is not limited to protein sources, different fruits vegetables and spices are available.
And rice and wheat and other grains are processed into tasty breads and pasta/noodles and pastes and porridges that are baked and steamed and boiled and fried. So eating out can be quite the adventure! … At least Victor thinks so. Sam Sam pretty much eats everything presented to him. He doesn’t even mind using the giant spoon everyone has here in spite of the fact that it does not fit in his mouth. He did have a brief problem with that garlic clove Victor fed him yesterday. My, the look of confusion and horror on his face that interrupted his happy chewing!
Sam Sam has been enjoying the play structures at the plaza. We went to the rec room on the third floor of the hotel today and played ping-pong. Victor was magnificent with his paddle dexterity. Victor is also typing this paragraph…
Tomorrow we plan to experience a Chinese tea ceremony. And go to the American consulate to take an oath.
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