It's Now For Forever

Well, today was the end of the harmonious period.  No, it’s not like we spent all morning spanking misbehaving girls and have decided to get a divorce when we return to the US.  It just means that now the 24 holding period of temporary custody (or more like 19 hours in our case, boy did we get gipped!) is over and now Juliana is officially Juliana Elaine Fuyang Pasakarnis.  This involved another trip to the Provincial Office, which today was a bit calmer.  On the way over Juliana seemed a bit withdrawn; made us think that she was wondering if the vacation was over and she was going back to her SWI.  Fortunately that did not happen since she said yes when the adoption official asked her if she wanted to be adopted.  We found it interesting that her approval only had to be verbal.  She definitely did an about face since that visit as her and Hailie are now starting to act in girl posse fashion while we go out and about.

Please sign on the dotted line; the girls can't bear to watch

Now that she is now officially adopted, in the time honored (at least for the past year and a half) tradition of celebrating an adoption day in the Pasakarnis household we went out for ice cream.  It is interesting to note that our 4 scoops of ice cream cost about $22, while a huge lunch (you guessed it again, Chinese) cost us about $16.

Happy Adoption Day!

However, let me explain that this was not just 4 scoops of ice cream.  We were led to a secluded booth area, given silverware and glasses of warm water with lemon.  The menu was also full of magnificent desert creations like this $45 dollar Pu Pu platter of ice cream that our server was pleased to point out to me when we were seated.

While I am on the subject, let me tell you the customer service we have experienced here has been simply amazing.  I went to Pizza Hut to pick up pizza for tonight (perhaps Juliana’s first taste of pizza) and was greeted at the door by two very pleasant young employees who opened the doors for me on the way  in and way out.  The two grocery stores we have been to have one, maybe two employees at the end of every aisle just waiting to help you when needed.  And we have already talked about the high salesperson to customer (and rambunctious child) ratio we had up in Beijing.

On deck for tomorrow is Juliana’s TB test and we apply for her Chinese passport.  Then finally Thursday is a totally free day.  Sarah has been working on a visit to Juliana’s orphanage.  Initial answer yesterday was no for the reason that it takes two weeks to set up even though we informed our agency months ago we wanted to do this.  We’re hoping Sarah can again go into kicka$$ mode, but this is all by phone to orphanage directors 150 miles away, so we are not holding our breath.  Juliana seems comfortable with her transition so far so maybe it won’t be needed for closure for her, but it would be nice to see where she had been for the past 10 years.

P.S.  the videos just don’t seem to want to load up.  I don’t know if the firewall has something to do with it or going through our VPN is creating the issue.  We may have to wait until we return to the US to add them in.  Any experts out there?