To Lottie's Province

Sunday, September 9 – Travel to Zhengzhou

Again:  Joe’s journaling with Mikki’s commentary in bold

Thankful for a more restful night as we stayed awake later.  Still up about 4 AM – Mary seems to always be FULL OF LIFE.  We spent the morning leisurely getting ready, packing, and Facetiming home as well as Aunt Paige – to share our jade stories.  We took in breakfast a little later this morning and they were much more crowded.  But it was still awesome.  If food doesn’t exist after today, then we’re fine.  It was that good.  I’ll be interested to experience the restaurant/breakfast at our hotel in Zhengzhou.  Enough about food.  The main thing for today was GETTING ON THE TRAIN.

Helen and Fong met us at 11:30AM for the short van ride over to one of the Beijing Railway Stations (there are more than 1 apparently).  Helen warned us that she had to leave us for a while to get things situated so she could accompany us onto the train – there is no English and it would be very hard. (Could not POSSIBLY be more thankful for Helen!)  She was so absolutely sweet to us.  It took her a little over 25 minutes and I can tell you we were all the talk of the outer area of that train station.  We thought we were good at people-watching….. I was reminded of that brief situation from 5 years earlier of what it feels like to look so different from everyone else!  It was amusing and we just kept on smiling.  All manner of people taking a train somewhere.  I mean THOUSANDS on a Sunday at noon.  Old and young.  Saw a couple of teary departures – so that made it real.  One little boy was wetting his pants and his young parents stripped off his britches and underwear and let him finish right there on the pavers!  Then, without any lower garments on him, they carried on – OKAY!  Good to know that’s acceptable in case of emergencies!  Helen got back and put us in line with her at the front to get processed through the main ticket lady.  Did I mention she had our passports the whole time we were alone?  But by now, we have come to trust Helen for sure.

 Once in the train station, we proceeded like so:  Helen pushing one of our large black suitcases and a backpack, me pulling the other large black suitcase and the brown rolling duffel and my backpack, Mom pushing Mary in the stroller with one backpack up front and one on her back, Mary carrying her doll (from Jade Mary) and her blue stuffed animal from the Great Wall.  That’s 3 huge rolling suitcases, a stroller with a kid, and four backpacks. (I tried to pack light, but WE NEED STUFF) Now when we get to Zhengzhou, Helen won’t be there to help get us off the train…. So we’ll have to make it off and fast!

 

Now, here’s the God part:  when we were getting to the area to board our train – guess where it was?  WAITING ROOM 9!  That’s the same numbered waiting room in the Shanghai Railway Station where Mary was found in December, 2011.  So, when I saw that 9, I knew we were once again on God’s path for us.  (Joe was behind me and in the chaos of making it through the station, I so hoped that he’d noticed the waiting room number!  I had spotted it immediately, and when Helen turned and I realized that’s the room we were going through, I started crying.  You ever been in a VERY crowded place trying to push your way through and you’re sweating profusely, so the sweat is blurring your vision and then you start to CRY and have tears streaming down your face while Mary is saying, KEEP PUSHING MOM, Helen is UP THERE?  I was a scene. ) Now, this is not a room….. It was a vast place filled with thousands of people all in various “lines” to board various trains.  We were in there like sardines.  Tough with all our bags and trying to avoid people breaking in and separating our “obvious” traveling party but that is not rude here I think.  Helen kind of barrels through people, too.  She is leading, and we must follow!  (AND IT WAS SO VERY HOT IN THAT PLACE.) We had to put all bags on a security conveyor but all their security procedures here are very fast and non-invasive.  They really do manage well with SO many people, including these dumb Americans with TOO MUCH LUGGAGE. 

Helen got us through and then we were headed down some escalator to our platform and train – where there were NO PEOPLE.  “Where are all the people?” I hollered at Helen.  She showed us to our first class car 16 and got our luggage stowed.  We set our alarms for 20 minutes and 10 minutes prior to scheduled arrival so we would know when to get up and stand at the door with our luggage.  We bid Helen a loving goodbye – we had presented her and Fong gifts earlier in traditional red bags that included candy and Alabama Crimson Tide t-shirts, plus tips.  We had misread the instructions initially and put tip in RMB that should have been in US dollars.  This means we only gave about 1/6 of what we should!  It’s a good thing Mary insisted that Helen open the card…. We knew her face looked funny, but she’s so kind she never would have said anything.  We finally got it out of her and we quickly made it right!

 The train traveled almost 300 KM/H at top speed (=185mph). (I was totally and completely MESMERIZED by our time on the train – passing through big cities and then the Chinese countryside was AMAZING.  There were FARMS upon FARMS and always people working in them!  Out in the middle of a random field, you’d see a little couple with their bicycles and carts nearby raking or digging…. Sometimes they’d have a child running around as they worked…. Sometimes there were crews of people – men and women – picking, weeding, cutting, pulling… and ZERO farm machinery anywhere in sight.  Bicycles, carts, wagons, rakes…. But no tractors or machines.  THESE PEOPLE WORK SO VERY HARD.  And then you’d come across a village – it would look like something that was totally abandoned, but then you’d see folks standing in their courtyards or riding their bikes.  THEN, just a bit over, you’d see a BRAND NEW HIGHWAY with NO CARS ON IT.  So different than where we live.  I could just imagine what life is like in one of these villages.  And it’s not like our neighborhoods.  The houses are all kinda connected to each other.  They have a front gate RIGHT ON THE STREET and then there’s an open courtyard surrounded by rooms.  You really gotta like your neighbors, I guess!  And it’s mostly dirt roads, I noticed.  Then all around the village it’s FARM LAND.  ALL OF IT.  And they are WORKING.)  Our seats are not together but it was a full train.  Mikki and Mary are in 5D and 5F and I’m in 3C.  Very nice train with both squatty and sitty potty!  They brought through the trolley early on with free basic drink and snack.  I wasn’t going to take one, but the guy made it clear that they were FREE, so I got a sprite and the little snack pack of cookies, cake and a small candy – pomegranate, I think, based on the picture on the package.  The staff is very nice and even reassured me about our departure time when I thought I heard it one time – about two hours early!  We brought plenty of snacks from breakfast as well as another run to the bakery – Mary helped this time while Mom was working on the blog. 

We made it efficiently off the train – even the sweet cleaning lady on the train grabbed one of our suitcases and pulled it off for us.  So sweet.  We got ourselves together and made our way out and there was Celine, our guide for the week in Zhengzhou, waiting with our sign!  She and our driver took us to the opulent Hilton Hotel. (On the way to the hotel, Celine went over the schedule for the week.  We’ve asked her to see if we can visit the Foster Care Center where Lottie has lived most of her life.  It’s not on the schedule, but she’s going to ask.  The rest of the week is filled with sight-seeing, rest, bonding, and paperwork!) Celine showed us around the area a block or two around the hotel and pointed out various places to eat and get supplies.  Then, we stepped into one of her favorite restaurants where we ate noodles, congee, ribs and corn, kung pao chicken (is that how you spell that?), and vegetable pancake.  VERY GOOD.  And we rocked the chopsticks!  We were glad to make it back to the room where there was a CRIB waiting for us!  Mom loaded Lottie’s backpack for tomorrow, we packaged up nanny and orphanage official gifts, and set our alarm for GOTCHA DAY. (Course, we were up two hours before the alarm went off, as usual.)  READY TO MEET MY GIRL.