China Update #6 - Gotcha Day!

Today was Gotcha Day...for some of you that conjures up images of orphaned children running into the arms of their forever families, beyond ecstatic to be leaving their former life for a life of bliss and perfect love.  Well, more than one piece of that is untrue - almost all of it actually.  

Here is how it went down for us today:

We boarded the van with 2 other families at 9:30am and headed for the Civil Affairs Office.  We didn't really know what to expect so we settled into the available seats while our guide, Celine, took care of our paperwork.  So we're just sitting there for about 3 minutes nervously looking at each other when in walks Levi and Reece with their caretaker.  We were totally thrown off to be seeing them at that moment.  We thought there would be some kind of warning that they were on their way in. This also seemed to be a surprise to Celine.  No time to turn to the page in my Simple Chinese for Adoptive Families and read my initial greeting to him.  Levi seemed altogether surprised and confused as well.  Mind you, I don't think he's ever left his orphanage so he just took a fairly long car ride then walked into this big fancy building and is trying to explore the place when these 2 Americans come up to him and start saying non-sensical words to him.  If there was ever an awkward moment, this was it! But if there was one thing we had expected and prepared ourselves for it was awkwardness.  We shared his little backpack of toys with him and after several minutes he began to warm up to us a bit.  He would play with us for a bit then get interested in what someone else was doing (by this time there were probably 6-8 families there all receiving their children at the same time) then he'd come back to us.  Finally after about an hour the paperwork was finished and it was time for the caretakers to leave.  We had been forewarned that this was often where children began to grieve.  At first, it was just a small whimper and Levi gladly let me hold him.  But within 3 minutes it had evolved into all out sobs.  As I sat in the chair he tried with all his 43 pounds to get out of my lap and to the door the caretaker had gone through.  This was hard. But at this point, no family in the room was having an easy time of it.  After struggling for a few more minutes Levi reached out for Andrew so even though we knew it was crucial for the first bonds to be made with mom I decided to let dad take a turn because I was having trouble keeping him in my arms.  After several minutes of Andrew walking and rocking him he began to calm down until he eventually rested peacefully in Andrew's arms.  This turned out to be a sweet sweet blessing.  

Shortly after he calmed down we boarded the van which had brought us and headed to Walmart. The Walmart trip was not our idea and at this point we were feeling pretty skeptical about the sanity of it.  But thankfully Levi was totally calm by the time we arrived at Walmart.  He definitely had fun at Walmart.  He got the hang of shopping very quickly and picked out several toys.  The others in our group needed to purchase diapers and formula so we ended up following them around a bit.  Levi was quite curious about everything! And he was ready to explore so although we were anxious to lavish him with our love and gifts he also began to experience the boundaries that love also provides.  At this point we all became familiar with the Chinese word "no" ;)

Finally, we arrived back at the hotel.  Honestly we kinda felt like we were wrangling a bull in a china shop in Walmart. We definitely were enjoying seeing his personality come out but we were really ready to see it in the safety and confines of our hotel room.  

Once in the room we began playing with the toys we had brought and purchased at Walmart.  We spent much of the afternoon doing so.  Although there is a HUGE language barrier, by the end of the afternoon it seemed we were all getting accustomed to not being understood which I suppose is the first step.  And we began to receive hugs and even several minutes of cuddling on the bed together.  

Around 3pm we were going a bit stir crazy so we headed for the park.  Levi walked along holding our hands for over an hour just taking in all the sights and sounds.  As we finished our walk we realized it had probably been quite productive for bonding because he was able to feel the safety of our physical touch without any of the frustrations of the language barrier.  

Shortly after the park we headed to dinner with the other families.  We went in prepped for the possibility of needing to abandon ship mid-meal but they ended up seating us in a  private room which was wonderful!  The meal went great.  Save for the fact that the waitress didn't deliver 2/3 of our food and that's a pretty challenging idea to communicate using hand motions! Levi had his food and he was happy though so it was a win.  

We returned to the room about 8pm and gave Levi a bath before tucking him into bed.  He was asleep within 5 minutes of his head touching the pillow!  

You may have noticed my attention to detail waning as this email has progressed - I've fallen asleep several times while writing it.  We've all had a long, crazy day.  The emotions of today have been super high and super low for all of us.  And I do want to share more of those emotions with you in the future...but not right now ;) All I want to do right now is sleep! 

So thank you, thank you, thank you for your prayers.  Day one is over but we've got 12 more days in country to adjust to one another.  For tomorrow, please pray that we continue to make strides toward overcoming the language barrier. Pray also that we can begin to gently correct a few behaviors of Levi's - probably learned behaviors because of growing up in an orphanage- but several we feel cannot wait until we are home or until the language barrier is lessened. We'll start our day tomorrow by returning to the Civil Affairs Office and another office for a bit of paperwork.  Then we'll have the rest of the day free- I'm sure we'll be going back to the park! 

We love you all and treasure your prayers!

Love,
Andrew and Robin