The Getchell Girls: Amy's Take on China (Pictures by Julie)

It’s been a little over two weeks since the Getchell Girls returned from China. A few things stand out in my mind as I think back over our trip. (Sadly, I’m here in California and the girls are in Colorado.)

The babies! Aria is a perfect child! She’s good-natured, quick to smile and laugh, and healthy. She is a blessing to our family and we will love her forever.

All of the babies were given to the families on our first day in Nanchang (third day in China). We were with a group of nine families, and each got a beautiful baby girl. Aria was a bit upset about being given to her new family at first (all of them were) but she revised her opinion of us quickly. Julie was MOM, and THE ONE AND ONLY, in no time. It seems like Aria was our flesh and blood from the moment Julie was matched with her.

Aria (Xiu Yi): Despite Aria’s cold, she was the best baby ever, from day one (potty trained for one thing! as Julie mentioned).

She was hitting milestone after milestone with us. She cut her first tooth her first night, hated being on her stomach when we got her, but got used to it and began rolling herself all around quickly, she stood herself up in the crib the second week we had her, she learned to hold her own bottle, etc. I hear that day by day she continues to learn new tricks.

She's a cutie and laughs a lot. We call her Ribbit because she's always sticking her tongue out.

She came with some instructions that spelled out when she normally ate, how much, when she normally went to the bathroom etc. We called it the “baby manual.” It explained that “she enjoys watching TV and playing on the street.” Something must have gotten "lost in translation."

Julie and Aliya: What troopers! It was so great to spend so much time with them! Julie was a real doer, as always, but kept her good sense of humor throughout the whole trip. One of the fellow moms (Pamela) called Julie “Queen Muthah (queen mother)” occasionally. Because Julie had been through an adoption trip once before for Aliya, she knew the ropes and had lots of good advice. Aliya danced whenever she could, striking ballet poses and entertaining many of us as she pranced through hallways and lobbies. She helped Julie and me with the baby, and loves her baby sister like nobody’s business! She needs to stop grinding her teeth at night though. Argh. ;-)

Babies and Families in

CCAI Group #1657

Beautiful flowers... these were on the girls' drinks. Fresh watermelon juice, Yum!
Aria can already drink from a straw! All that noodle sucking has its benefits.

Abandonment of the babies: We were most struck by the sadness of the fact that the BEST option for the birth mothers of these children, was to abandon them. Eight of the babies in our group were abandoned within two months, all in one city – Feng Chen. We traveled there, about 1 1/2 hours through the “countryside” from Nanchang one day, and went to all of the “finding places” of these babies. Some were left in places you might expect (hospital, orphanage gate), others in places like in front of a motorcycle shop, and under a TV/radio tower. The countryside had some rice paddies, and men selling sugar cane along the highway, but it also had lots of clusters of buildings, and rubble from buildings that had been destroyed.

These are what I understand to be the circumstances contributing to this phenomenon:

One child policy – most families are only allowed one child.

- if they have more than one and report it to the government, they must pay a steep fine – the equivalent of $30,000 US, and possibly more each year (and they must consider the cost of school)

- if they don’t report the child to the government, the child will never be able to get a job

- boys are preferred, because they can get a job that pays well, and eventually carry on the family name and take care of the parents

Ultrasounds to find out gender are illegal.

Abortions are illegal.

Abandonment is also illegal.

While some exceptions are made to the one-child policy, and wealthy families can get illegal ultrasounds and abortions, poor families end up abandoning their girls.

We were told that most of the babies were left in cardboard boxes, in a place where the mothers knew they would be found. Most families who abandoned the babies would have someone from the birth mother’s family sit far away, and watch to make sure the baby was discovered.

As an aside, we were also told that there are no single women with children in China. They simply can’t afford to have a child on their own.

Rapid development: Feng Chen had a new skyline of high rises, all built within the past 7-8 years our guide said.

The same thing was true for Nanchang. It’s new skyline had been built up in the past 8 or so years.

Lack of freedom: One time during the trip, Aliya jokingly said a common American phrase, “It’s a free country, isn’t it!?”

No, actually it isn’t, we told her. That was evidenced by the fact of the abandoned babies.

We told Aliya that people could be jailed in China without reason or representation etc.

And on the trivial and immediate level, we were blocked from using this blog, Facebook, and YouTube while there in China.

Fast pace, family pace: 6 a.m. wake up times reigned.

Our itinerary: All the families (great people from all over the US) met in Hong Kong late the first night, and spent the next day touring. The time there helped us adjust to the time difference etc. The Victoria Peak view was totally fogged in, and Aliya got sick from the bus ride up there. Bleh. I let Julie and Aliya go back to the hotel and spent a few hours with our new friend Pamela in Kowloon.

On our third day (second full day) we flew to Nanchang, the capital city of Aria’s (and Aliya’s) home province.

We received Aria the first day we were there. We registered the adoption with the Chinese government, applied for Aria’s passport, toured, rested and got to know Aria while we waited for the government to complete all the necessary paperwork.

Once that paperwork was finished, we flew to Guangzhou, where the U.S. Consulate is located. There, Aria had a physical, we had an appointment with the U.S. Consulate and applied for Aria’s U.S. entry visa.

Our guides: The adoption agency had their “representatives” meet us at each airport and take care of us in each city. Sometimes they were funny, like the first guide, Yuka, said “We have the second best bus driver in all of Hong Kong!” Where was the THE best driver we wondered? Did he die in a car accident?! ;-) She asked us not to call her “hey you, or hey lady.”

The guides we had in Nanchang, Karen and Evelyn, were real guardian angels. They were there to help people with the new babies, if they needed help, they ordered food for us, because we couldn’t do it on our own very well, etc. They each sang us a lullaby over the microphone on the bus on our way to the airport! One of them was so sweet it made me cry.

Jason was the guide in the final city we visited, Guangzhou. He made sure we got to the babies’ physical examinations, got to the American Consulate, etc. He helped people with misspelled names, money issues, shopping issues, you name it. He was a sweetheart.

Nanchang: From what I could tell, Nanchang (a city 5 million I believe) was not very tourist-friendly. Even the people in the hotel did not speak English. The 5-star hotel we stayed in had thin windows, and was very noisy and dark. The workers meant well, but were fairly unhelpful. The city seemed poor and crowded.

There was construction happening in the kitchen that produced our breakfast buffet, as evidenced not only by the noise, but by sight, dust and guys in hard hats when our noodle guy or servers would open a door to go get something. When we asked our guide Karen where to eat around there (aside from the hotel), she pointed to only one restaurant, “Just there,” she said.

We walked around near the hotel anyway, and nearly got run over several times by traffic. Also, it was so polluted, our eyes burned!

We heard fireworks go off all the time in Nanchang. We were told that one set of them was part of a funeral procession.

Celebrity status: In Nanchang, we visited a Pavilion, or an ancient palace (1,300 years old). We went to the 6^th floor to wait for a performance, and poor Julie and Aliya were practically mobbed by curious women. They would point and ask questions in Mandarin, and wanted their picture taken with us. One lady even tried to take and hold Aria as a photo was about to be taken. I had to physically push her away and say no!

They asked Aliya if she knew Chinese, if she studied Chinese, if Julie was her mother etc. Aliya was very self-confident and answered these women as best she could. After that, Julie got our guide Evelyn to write a special note for her to explain to people that she was the adoptive mother of both of these children.

Our guide said that the Chinese people say these baby girls who are adopted by Americans have been dropped into the honey pot. They know they have a sweet future.

In Feng Chen, lots of people pointed and waved at us as we passed them. One random woman even boarded our bus with her two children to have them take a look at us, wave, and say hello.

Shopping in Nanchang: In Nanchang, we went to WalMart of all places, for diapers, water, food. It was kind of wild. Whole, flat, dried ducks were hanging along with sausages and other dried meats in one area. There were a lot of different items there--dried fruits and nuts, huge vats of different types of rice. Shopping baskets were much smaller. All the locals were staring at us.

We also went to “porcelain street,” where they sold nothing but porcelain, most of it from the city Aliya is from, JingDeZhen, the porcelain capital of the world. Aliya was able to pick something out, and Aria (Ribbit) got a little watermelon with a frog on it, that when filled, spits water.

Buddhist temples: These were probably my favorite spots. Aliya and I went to one in Nanchang with Grandma Marcy (from another family) and Pamela the second or third day we had Aria. We went by taxi (what a wild ride!). The first temple was nice, but behind it were two others, each one nicer than the last.

The temple in Guangzhou was super calm and lovely. The babies came with us and were blessed by one of the monks. I believe it was called Hualin Temple. It had a super tall, leaning pagoda and a huge statue of the female Buddha, Guanyin.

Guangzhou:

This is a city of 12 million! We stayed on Shamian Island, along the Pearl River. It was very westernized, affluent, modern, and tourist-friendly. I just learned that the British and French spent some time there after winning the Opium Wars. That explains a lot.

One thing we loved there: Starbucks. I hate to say it, but it’s true.

The hotel was filled with other adoptive families just like us, so suddenly, we felt almost like the norm!

We went to a "pearl market" one day, which was a 6-story mall of nothing but beads and pearls and things to make jewelry with. The shopping area where we were is said to draw one million people on special holidays, like Chinese New Year.

We felt completely safe and able to find food for ourselves in Guangzhou, so we were happy there. On our last day we shopped at the Open or Free Market, an outdoor market for locals. We saw everything from freshly butchered meats (whole pig legs with feet), to live turtles, frogs and snakes, to dried sea horses for sale there. The locals were kind to us, but we heard that another family went there later with a video camera, and they weren't treated as warmly.