Day 9 - Hunan Embroidery

Today we went to the Hunan Embroidery Museum of China. The Hunan province is famous for its embroidery. We saw many different styles and types. Can't really see her outfit - but I got her a "puffy" Chinese outfit from Walmart for a whopping $6.00. It is crazy. 3 Diet Cokes at Wacko Food Mart less than a dollar - at the hotel $3.50 / diet coke - the no ice thing is killing me - almost more than the no real diet coke - theirs is made with Saccharin or Splenda - who knows?










The work here is all hand done. To the left, we are looking at a master do very detailed work. This type of work takes a year for one person to create.


Here is a nice picture of Tabitha on the bus. She is getting more and more interested in us and we got a few more smiles today. ( That is Mickey's take on the situation - my take is that she has smiled once and it was today on the bus - but not to anyone - it was more just b/c she was happy - so I guess that is progress - all of the other babies are smiling and interacting with their new parents - Tabitha seems to be very reserved - she wants Mickey all of the time which is fine - but I would like to see her interact a bit more with us)


Here are some pictures of Tabitha's friend Shelby and her mom Kim. They are from Davenport, Iowa - her husband wasn't able to make the trip b/c he hurt his back.
















And we have some time to answer a few questions:




1) Do all the girls seem like siblings at all? For the most part they all seem different.
2) Is Tabitha particularly attached to one of them? Not really. She likes to see the other kids and will reach out to touch them - but no smiles.
3) Is she sleeping in the crib or does she want to sleep in the bed with you? She sleeps in her crib, she whimpers a little but usually we can rub her head and she goes right to sleep.
5) How is the weather there? The weather is rainy and in the upper thirties to low forties.
6) What sort of food are you eating? We have pretty much stuck to the hotel for food since no other restaurants have english menus-unless of course, we are with our tour group. We did order from Pizza Hut a few nights ago and got the American Special (Pepperoni and Cheese). Tastes just like home. We had this in Beijing once as well. It is pretty consistent. There is a buffet in the hotel with some "normal" food and some not so normal. They had snake, turtle, and cockscomb (the little comb on top of a roosters head.) I (Mickey) am fairly brave with food, but I did not try any of these.
7) Are most of the girls adjusting about the same? They are all different. Some are happy all the time, some cry a lot. Some will not let go of their dads and cry when their moms hold them. It is amazing all of the differences. They all seem to be coming along and adjusting well. Also all seem fairly healthy. One case of scabies, a lot of runny noses and we have heard of one ear infection. (Other than the scabies fairly normal childhood things) ... Tabitha seems to be behind the most in terms of physical development.
8) Did you bring enough clothes for her? In the right sizes? Jacquie will give an update on this, but so far the clothes seem to fit pretty well...she is some wearing 6 month stuff that fits just right - but her legs are long so I think 6-9 month will fit better...change of subject, as I am editing and adding my comments to Mickey's work - he is feeding her and she is very happy and rocking side to side and forward and backwards - and really interacting with him - I think she likes to eat! and it is good to start to see some emotion from her - previously she has shown us sad and stoic but not much more - I keep reminding myself not to compare and not to rush her - but she is just different than the other kids.
9) Are there any boys in our group? No all of the children adopted were girls at this time.
10) Why are these children given up? This is not a simple question. There are many things that come into play here. The people are poor and yes they would like a boy. The biggest reason for the preference for boys is due to the way Chines culture works. The girl will go away with her husband to his family and they will live with his parents. When his parents get older the husband and wife will take care of the husbands parents. When the girls leave it is the end of the family name - which is not good. My question is why do they keep having children - I guess the one child policy is not enforced so strictly in the rural areas - and it does not apply to the ethnic minorities in China. All of our babies appear to be Han - the majority. There are 55 minority ethnicities in Hunan though.
11) How do the Chinese people feel about these people taking the babies away? I am sure there are varied opinions, just like anything. Some people are happy for us and for the children. Some people are embarrased for their country that they cannot take care of their own girls. Some people are angry that Americans are taking the babies away. And I would guess the majority of people in China have no idea that this is happening. A couple with us (Lance and Susan) carry a card with them that they give to people explaining what they are doing. Most people are suprised by what we are doing and congratulate us. Hard to believe that people don't know this is happening - but when America is responsible for 5,000 adoptions a year/from China - compared to the 1.4 billion people there are in China - you can see that China is so huge it could appear that this is not very common. I am not sure (so don't quote me) but I believe overall there are roughly 11,000 children placed for adoption each year in China.

Once again we love the comments and questions. Keep them coming.

And finally another video of Tabitha.




Update:

We just received Tabitha's passport and Adoption Registration:































Isn't her picture sweet?

And one more picture with a group of babies from the elevator lobby.