Beijing Day 2

I am playing catch up on our blog so please bear with me as I recall the events. It's another 4 am wake-up call here, I have so much on my mind to share that after it's emptied I will rest peacefully, hopefully.

Thursday evening Carmen & I crashed around 7 pm. Tim & Richie went exploring the nearby mall in search of food. Richie has become a picker and doesn't eat much at one sitting here, hence making him hungry ALL the time, even though he's not like this back home. When they returned it was with Subway, candy & coke. Dinner of champion I thought and went to bed.

Friday morning brought us rising up early and ready for the day. We weren't quite sure of the daily schedule, but knew it involved seeing our babies and the Beijing Silk Market. We were worried when our hosts didn't show at the time given and called, they assured they were fine. I forget they have lived here several years and won't get lost. This is a picture from our view of Tim & Carmen waiting.  Our hosts arrived with their daughters and presented Carmen with a paperdoll they had made to look like her, it was too cute.

Add caption

Our hosts had decided to take us to the silk market first. We had a few souvenirs to purchase and wanted to give Richie the full experience of the market. Little did we know, the silk market isn't ready for Richie! Our husband host took his daughters, Tim & Richie to the top where jewelry and toys were kept and our host wife took Carmen & I to the basement where purses were kept. We knew the routine since we had just visited last year. I love to bargain, but after NUMEROUS "you crazy lady", "I go poor at that price" and "come back, come back", our poor host looked as if her fingernails were being pulled out one by one so we settled on about the 25th store and made our purse purchases feeling good about our $$ choices.

We met up with the rest of the group and learned all about Tim's haggling skills. Richie felt so sorry for the people that they were being taken advantage of (this was Carmen's take on the silk market last year). He was amazed how his Papa had talked the people down. Tim cringes at the thought of ANY confrontation here, he would rather be beat than have to return here whereas our host hubby and I LOVE the place. Richie loves his new toy gun and Yu-Gi-Oh cards. A few more stops and out we go! It is the day after the silk market and Richie is still reminiscing on his purchases and the poor people who work there....BUT.....he's ready to go back at any given moment to get more bargains. He said over and over ALL day how he LOVES the silk market.

 For lunch we were treated to one of the local favorites of our hosts. They call it The Noodle Loft, I'm not sure the Chinese name for it though. It was very fascinating watching the chefs take the dough, whip it around, slap it on the wood counter, separate, and then stand back and thread it from about 3 feet away into the boiling water. Richie & our hosts children sat at the counter watching in amazement. It was so interesting watching their little girls, they speak fluent Chinese and carried on a conversation with the chef.

Then our treat for the day, back to the baby house to play with the little ones. When we volunteered at the orphanage last year it was quite a bit different. There were SO many little ones, you interacted with them all. But here, they are a family unit, the hosts, their children, the aiys and the little ones. This is the type of atmosphere foundation trying to be instilled in the baby home. Aiys are on 24 hour shifts and switch when the new aiys come to be with the children.

All the little ones have had or still have life-threatening illness that have been treated or are being treated. The foster home runs totally on donations from both US and China and struggles immensely each and every day because people just don't want to acknowledge responsibility to help these children. Not everyone is called to adopt, but almost everyone can sponsor.

More on this in my next post. Meet the little ones.

Timothy

Seth

Corrie

David

Rachel

Ruth

 Daniel

Sela

Our being at the foster home is a lot of work for our hosts because they have routines, as we do in our home, and when out of town guests arrive, routines go out the window. Their generosity in allowing us into their home was very humbling. Even though there were many laughs, at the end of the day, there is still the main thing, these children have no mom or dad, some may never know a traditional family because people cannot see beyond the black and white on the paper that lists the child's special need. There is SOOOO much love and life in these little ones. 

Our day ended with Richie in tears. We were sitting there playing with the kids and Richie went over in a rocker and was so silent. I asked him what was wrong, his response, "I'm going to miss all the babies, I want to bring them all home to have a family." That says in all in a nut shell. We were with the little ones 2 days and here, a 10 yr. old boy already knows and feels the depth of the longing they don't even realize they have yet, a family.