Adoption debacle, part IV

Most of you have probably gone through the Gotcha Day experience. Suffice it to say that my daughter was beautiful and charming and, happily, recognized us because the WONDERFUL ayis at Langfang Children's Village showed her our photo book EVERY day and explained who we were and why we were coming. It was the smoothest transition I have ever heard of.

That pretty much the last of our good fortune, albeit the most important part, except for our traveling companions who were saints! Realizing we had no luggage they shared all their stuff with us, even though they were adopting a boy. They even shared gifts at one point, for which we reciprocated as soon as we could go shopping. But that first night would've been pretty lousy without them.

So.

Our Chinese guide fell in love with our daughter. She announced that she wanted to "know" our daughter, not just know her. As a consequence, she picked her up constantly. She patted herself on the chest and said "mama." She barely let us play with our own child. When our guide left us, our poor daughter cried piteously. I got pretty mad.

After a few days of this, I lost my temper. The next time our guide picked up our daughter, I said "NO." This was virtually the last time our guide would have anything whatsoever to do with us. Apparently she also stopped looking for our luggage. We had given her all the paperwork for our luggage (we'd filed a report with China Southern in Beijing) and been assured she'd call China Southern. She didn't.

Turns out, by the way, the luggage arrived the day after we did in Beijing. She never called. We never got it. It arrived back at our home several days before we did.

So...we went to Carrefours. We re-bought all the stuff we could find for our new daughter. Also provisions. Things were looking up.

However, there were no Western-sized clothes AND no makeup which was any darker than the cover stick I already had. Oh, and by the way, every single picture of us in China we are wearing the same clothes and my makeup and hair are hideous. No really. I do not exaggerate. My face was as red as a lobster, covered largely by pale, pale ghostly-looking cover-up stick, augmented by lipstick the wrong color for the ghastly shade of brick red with a layer of sheet white. And my hair was a helmet the entire time. And it's short. I looked like I had a military hairdo. No Chinese hair product had the slightest effect on it, except to make it more helmet-like.

Naturally we were photographed incessantly both by our travel companions and by each other to document the trip. Although I treasure the adoption act itself, I shudder to see myself in those pictures. Call me shallow, but I was one scary-looking gal!