Our last day in Guangzhou! We’re heading home! We had an easy day killing time before our flight… we stopped by Maggie & Grace’s room to pick up Zhilu’s VISA paperwork. So we now had his passport with US visa, and the infamous brown envelope… which must make it with us to the US, and will be opened by the immigration officers in NYC. I was SO happy to have that envelope in my hands… and then will be SO relieved to be able to hand it over and not worry about it.
We stopped by Judy’s shop to say goodbye… she’s the shopkeeper Adam chatted with his last day here and she offered to keep an eye on us. We managed just fine, but appreciated her offers for help and visited frequently to drop off laundry or pick up a few things at her store. Unfortunately, while her laundry prices were great, her store prices seemed high compared to others so I didn’t shop there as much as I would have.
We did some more shopping, got lunch at Lucy’s, then Zhilu took a nap while I finished the packing. We checked out a bit earlier than we needed to so I could make sure we got dinner before we left for the airport. We headed back to Lucy’s. Zhilu saw a picture of Nicholas Cage on the wall and kept saying “Baba”. Haha! So he does remember Adam just fine, and I’m impressed he could a) see the pictures details from as far away as he was and 2) figure out that they have similar facial shapes. His vision definitely seems much better than we would have expected.
After dinner we had time to do some more shopping in our last minutes on the island… didn’t want to waste any of our Chinese currency! As we were doing our last minute shopping, we ran into the sweet family we’d spent so much time with over the trip and got to say goodbye. We’re going to miss the wonderful people we’ve traveled with.
Grace & Maggie picked us up at our hotel and we headed to the airport. We dropped Grace off at their office, and Maggie continued on with us. Poor girls… they’ve had to manage getting 16 families to the airport over four different days… it must have been exhausting. Maggie was not feeling well when she dropped us off, I felt so bad she had to support us with this late night flight.
We made it through customs, immigration and airport security without a hitch. I again was able to get the airport inspectors to hand-inspect Zhilu’s disposable cameras from his orphanage (for some reason, they are ‘fancy’ ones – 800 speed – and thus can be damaged by the carry-on baggage scanners). I tried to get them developed on the island, but I stopped in too late and it was going to be cutting it way too close getting them back in time… like within the hour of the time I needed to leave. I didn’t want to risk them not being ready, but now I have to deal with these things all the way back to the states. We were also able to make it through with a TSA-style liquids bag, which our guides really thought we wouldn’t be able to take. I’m so glad I decided to ignore their advice and ‘risk’ it.
After we got to our gate, I realized I probably should have done just a BIT less shopping… I only had 7 RMB left on me, not enough to purchase a water or soda during our two hour wait. We were parched! Thankfully, though, once we got on the flight, each seat had a bottled water waiting in it.
The flight was barely 45 minutes, and we were able to get our own row so Zhilu wouldn’t bug anyone. By the time we arrived in Hong Kong, it was midnight and we were both exhausted. I got a bit lost trying to find the attached airport hotel, but we made it. Zhilu crashed right away, and Mama enjoyed an honest-to-goodness Diet Coke (well, a Coke Light, which is Diet Coke in China… NOT a Coke Zero!!) from the mini-bar. Ah, feels like we’re nearly home! (And why in the world can one not find Coke Light in Guangzhou, but just a few hours away, in Hong Kong, they are plentiful!)
Saturday, Dec 11
This was officially the longest day of my life… Gotta love traveling half-way around the globe! We woke up at 6:30… an hour later than I planned, but since when do I ever give myself more than enough time? Our flight was at 9:45, and we were already checked in, so I figured we didn’t need the recommended 3 hours. I managed to get about 5 hours sleep, which is many times a normal night in my regular life so I was good to go. Zhilu got about 6 hours, and then I was hoping he’d sleep more on the plane, so I left him in his pajamas as his travel garb.
We had a quick breakfast at McDs and then headed to our gate. We walked around a bit, and then it was time to go! Zhilu did SO great on the plane… we lucked out in that there was an empty row near us, so we moved over there so Zhilu didn’t bother the person next to us. It was nice to have the spare seat to throw blankets, clothes, toys, etc. He enjoyed both of the meals he was served, including a meal of soggy fish-sticks… the smell of which completely revolted me, but he ate them up like crazy. He slept well, and liked to play around with the TV remote control. He didn’t play much, since he usually ends up throwing his toys when he’s done and I wasn’t going to be chasing toys under airplane seats nor dealing with angry passengers who got bonked on the head with a flying kiddie cell-phone. He was content, though, so it worked out fine. I slept when he slept, and we made it through. All 16 hours were… dare I say… relatively pleasant. I can’t tell you how excited I was to change him out of his jammies into his “USA” t-shirt about an hour before we landed. And then when we landed… wow! Emotional!! We got through immigration relatively smoothly and then it was official… Jack Zhilu is a US citizen!
We had to collect our bags from our flight and then carry them to the Delta terminal. We were BEYOND exhausted and starving at this point, so I did not enjoy the trek through the JFK airport, onto the AirTrain, into the Delta terminal… then they made me use the kiosk to check-in, instead of going into the empty line, and when it wasn’t working for Zhilu’s ticket I almost lost it crying. Thankfully, it was quickly resolved and we headed for security. Ah yes, welcome back to the USA… where my hip replacement garners me the “new and improved” pat-down instead of the quick wanding that they had been doing in China. The lady kept telling me to relax, and the while she’s making me remove my money belt and trying to place our passports in a spot I couldn’t see. Yeah… there will be no relaxing. It was finally over, and we headed to grab some quick food before getting on our flight.
The flight to Syracuse was short and Zhilu did great, sitting well in his CARES harness again. Then we landed, waited for what seemed like forever to get our stroller, and then headed out to be greeted by our wonderful, smiling, waiting family!!!!
Zhilu went right to Adam… he definitely remembered him. We all headed home for dinner and visiting, and he took well to the girls and enjoyed playing with them. They follow him around like his entourage… we’re going to need to work on teaching them to give him some space. But they just adore him, and he was charming them with his giggles and smiles. He got to meet Grandma & Grandpa, Aunt Erin & Reagan, and Uncle Colin. It was so amazing to be home with my family again!
After everyone left, the girls got ready for a family movie night, but Zhilu and I lasted about 5 minutes before I realized we weren’t going to be able to stay awake for it. So at 8pm, we headed to bed…
Sunday, Dec 12
Zhilu and I are trying to adjust back to this time zone. He woke up at 3am and I really thought we were waking for the day, but after about 10 minutes, he fell back asleep. Then again at 8:30, when the girls awoke, everyone piled into our bed and Zhilu played with everyone for about 20 minutes. Then he started putting his arm up near his head, which he does when he’s ready to sleep, so I shooed everyone off and we went back to bed. We slept until 2pm… yes, IN THE AFTERNOON! This boy is a true Schickling!
We got up and got dressed. We realized quickly that he was freezing in our frigid CNY temps… I dressed him like the girls, took him downstairs, and then realized that he was shivering. He’s now a sweater & shirt boy… and that seems to keep him warm enough. It’s going to take some time to get used to this cold weather. We headed over to Grandma’s to make Gingerbread houses with our extended family…he did so well meeting all these new faces, and enjoying some snuggle time with Daddy.
We both ended up staying up until 1:30 am… not sure I expected anything different after sleeping until 2, but it was amusing to have a wide-awake little boy running around well after midnight.
Monday, Dec 13
We slept today until 11am… haha. Getting closer to normal! Zhilu is really doing so well… he sleeps great. If he wakes, he cries a bit but then settles right now… I think it’d be a lot harder if we weren’t co-sleeping, though. Its working out wonderfully. We took his first trip to Target today, and I got him some lactose-free milk… hopefully, this will solve his tummy issues. Also picked up several more sippy cups with straws… for some reason, he prefers those and is not amused when I give him our normal sippy cups that are a bit more work. Of course, the girls love these and now everyone wants to use straws. The girls got their ‘treats’ I brought home from China… some small things, but they loved everything. Check out Rachel rocking her new purse! I love it! I feel like she grew up SO much while I was gone... maybe it’s just that she’s no longer the baby in the family. I missed them all SO much! Its so wonderful to be home again, with ALL my kids.
Tonight was my first night alone with all five while Adam works, and amazing, by 10pm, I had all of them (including Zhilu, all snuggled up with his new blankie from Aunt Marie!) asleep in their beds. I was able to have my “mommy” free time, which tonight means catching up on bills, mail, email, etc, but at least I know that I can manage bed-time on my own with all of them. Really, we’re just so surprised by how easy everything is going… it’s been amazing.
Tuesday Dec 14
Today we woke up at 8am… Yay! Back on normal time.
Zhilu is petrified of the dog, and the cat, but we’re hoping that will improve shortly… we’re having the girls majorly love on the dog in hopes that Zhilu notices that he’s not so bad. And the name “Jack” is getting used much more often, though even the girls have realized that if you want to get his attention, “Zhilu” is the way to go.
We’re scaling way back on Christmas this year to avoid overwhelming him, so we minimized the amount of decorations we put up. Adam pulled out the stockings today. A few years ago, when we only had three children, I bought these “SANTA” letters for our stocking holders, and just in case, bought the two extra stocking holders. Really, only one of those was intended for a possible future child, and the last was meant to have a balanced look on the shelf (one ‘extra’ at each end). In fact, my sister said as I purchased them, “see… now you’re all set for five kids” and I just laughed at the thought.
Well… here we are. The stockings are hung and the hangers are full… and how blessed are we that we’ve made this leap, and have this amazing child in our family now. We are so very lucky to get to be his parents!
