Last Note From China....

Joshua says "ANOTHER picture??? Let's eat already!"

Ready to enter the Guangzhou Zoo...

Not a great picture of Russ or Joshua, but the the ladies in the background are our fan club, so didn't want to leave them out! Guess I forgot to say cheese! :>) :>) Just a glimpse of the "attention" we get most everywhere we go.... Just have to tune it out. We probably get the same attention in the U.S., but people are more subtle....They don't know what they're missing, but I sure hope they wonder! :>) :>)

An Asian elephant in Asia! The crowd had a healthy respect, staying well back from the wall. An elephant attack on a home was reported in the paper in another province, so I suppose you would be leery of them if they roamed like deer in your part of the world!

A break to cool down. It has been upper 90's to 100's the whole time we have been here, with very high humidity--probably don't want to know what the "heat index" has been! The constant haze is probably both pollution and humidity....

Yes, we did get to see the poor, hot panda--he is cooling his head on a block of ice!

The street we walk down daily--note Holiday Inn in the background.

This is a "recycled" photo from last year! This is NOT gridlock--all of these cars (and bikes, and mopeds and buses!) are actually moving!!!!!!! I would NEVER get used to traffic here! :>) (Gives me perspective on St. Louis traffic, though!)

A banana farm, and farmer's house on the way to Shenzhen.... Today's paper says the farmers' income in the Shangdong Province (where Jeremy is from) has risen 17% from last year. Sounds good, except that 17% represents $50 a year.....

If you look on the building with the red bricks on the middle of the picture, there are kids playing on the roof. Just before I took the picture, they were all over the roof, jumping up and down. And I worry about the kids falling off of our backyard playset!

The local vet--and we thought our office was small!!!

Notice the "false front" along the street to hide what is really there. Kind of symbolic of a country that values "face" so much.....


By the time many of you see this, we will have begun the trip back to the USA! We just had our last breakfast at the motel, and will go to the American Consulate later today to get Joshua's visa and permission to enter U.S. as our son, the last step before we return!!! YEAH!!!

The zoo yesterday was very different from U.S. zoos--all concrete and bars, no stimulation for most of the animals... They had Pomeranians (a breed of small dog) in several cages, which we would have thought was funny (we AFFECTIONATELY refer to some of the more "feisty" small breed dogs as "land sharks"!), but they were obviously very neurotic--more than is "normal" for the breed... They seem to be common pets here, so we are unsure why they were on exhibit at the zoo... They actually let people down into the monkey pit for pictures, etc. Monkeys can inflict some pretty serious bites (think missing fingers!), so it was unsettling to see toddlers down there offering food from their hands. Liability must not be a big issue here! Mary told me at a similar set-up with alligators, one of the patrons was killed by an alligator--wonder if people continued to line up??? Anyway, we went with the mom and her daughter of another Lifelink family, and the kids had a good time, even though it was VERY hot.

Seems hard to believe it is time to go home, and yet seems we have been gone forever! This trip was so very different than the trip to meet Jeremy since Joshua is healthy, happier, fairly self-sufficient, and we were in the same province for the entire trip. We certainly saw all the sites of Guangzhou that we missed the first time here! It was very familiar this time since we are in the same motel, same guide, same city--it was as "relaxing" as it could be adding a new child to our family with whom we can't verbally communicate yet, in a completely foreign culture! :>) :>) The real work begins when we get home! Two weeks worth of catch up at home and work, 4-H and County Fair cattle shows, new school year for everybody, new schools for Erin, Audrey and Jeremy, and oh yeah, get settled into a new family routine. Yup, this was the definitely the "vacation" part this go-round!!!! However, because we have an AWESOME family who has plugged into all of the holes while we have been gone, from getting us to and from the airport in the middle of the night (who planned those flights anyway?), to keeping the routine at home with the kids (including redecorating and shopping services!), to helping the kids get their cattle ready for and delivered to the show, our transition home will be as easy as possible, and we appreciate it more than we can ever, ever say! We also have a great staff at the clinic keeping things running smoothly in our absence. We are blessed in every way! :>)

As I finish up the tale of our trip, just as last time, I have such mixed feelings. We are excited and joyful to bring our new son home, and so thankful to count him as our own. There is NO DOUBT this boy is going to add a whole new dimension to the Kinzinger family, perhaps Freeburg in general! :>) :>) But, now as his mom, and as someone who again has seen the faces of the kids who wait, I grieve anew for their losses and the fact that we will add to Ze Ze's loss again tomorrow when that plane takes off and EVERYTHING familiar is stripped away from him. It is unimaginable to me, as an adult... I know how anxious Russell and I are to come to a foreign land with plans, a guide and full understanding of what will happen--but to go without a clue as to what is about to happen and have to assimilate, for the third or forth time, into a whole new life, seems beyond comprehension to me... How these kids survive it is amazing to me. On the way beck from the Consulate, Joshua had a meltdown over not being able to hold a bag of cookies--not usual for him, but he was overtired and Mary says she thinks that kind of behavior will escalate, as she has been telling him that we are leaving soon and he is nervous... Tonight, she came up to give him a final account of what will happen tomorrow and in the days to come, and I cried the whole time--he cannot possibly know the extent of how his world is about to change, what he is losing or what he is gaining. Poor Mary then had to reassure his parents that it will be okay too......... And it will be, but it will never be the same, and for a child who has known uncertainty his whole life, I am sorry he has to face it in a huge way one final time...

So, while I am feeling more than a little "weak" at the moment, I have the promise that His strength is made perfect in my weakness, and so I am glad for the chance to rest in His strength and realize that less of me is always best....

See you all soon!!!!!!!!!!!!