Visa Pictures and Medical Exam

Saturday, March 28, 10 pm

Yesterday the rest of the Bethany families arrived. I'm still not sure how many there are ... seven or eight, I think. This morning we all walked across the street from our hotel to get our children's visa pictures taken. Following that, we proceeded to walk to the north side of the island to the medical examination facility.


Here are Aidan and me walking into the room where the adopted children are examined. The information gathered here is then written on a form which is submitted to the US consulate. By the way, is my hair really thinning that much in the back? Guess that's what parenthood does to a guy. Or is it just old age?

Aidan is thinking, "I have a sneaking suspicion that something really bad is about to happen. Why is this idiot holding me smiling?"

And here he is screaming bloody murder. Even Aidan's best friend (as of today), the green plastic spoon, could not console him. Good thing you can't see his face here. It was not a pretty sight. We have the whole scene on video, too, to embarass him in front of all his future girlfriends.

This evening, the Bethany families were scheduled to walk over to Lucy's and have dinner together. We all gathered in the lobby of the White Swan, but it was pouring down rain. And not just pouring. It was like someone was in the clouds dumping buckets of water. Thunder. Lightning. Blowing wind. The doorman was talking to someone in Chinese, holding up four fingers on his hand. Jeff Newell said, "I think he's telling her that a category 4 storm is approaching." We waited for a while to see if it would let up. It did a little, and so the hearty souls who waited it out tried to go. Didn't last long for us. Jan had an umbrella covering her and Aidan, but the streets had turned into a flood zone. Me? I was completely drenched in less than 30 seconds. Needless to say, we headed back to our room and ordered in Papa John's pizza. I felt sorry for the poor delivery guy, though, riding up on his little scooter in the rain squall.

It's hard to believe that we only have three more days here. When we first arrived, it seemed like an eternity was ahead of us. Now we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. Can't wait to get home and start working on bonding as a family and introducing all of you back home to this new little guy. He is indeed quite a character as you will see.