We have tentative travel dates to China, leaving on or about Thursday, November 29 (the week after Thanksgiving) and coming home around December 14. Looks like we'll go to Beijing first to pick up our daughter from CHI's foster center, Haikou (on Hainan Island off the country's southern coast) to finalize her adoption, the US consulate in Guangzhou to get her an American visa, and then home.
We also found out that we will not be able to post to the blog directly while in China because the Beijing government blocks all access to Blogspot! We're pretty sure we'll have access to E-mail while we're over there, though - I don't think China blocks our E-mail domain. So we're planning a workaround - E-mail dispatches and photos back to the US and have them posted to the blog stateside. Should work.
And speaking of computers, we don't even have to buy an international power supply for our on-loan laptop; Toshiba verified that the laptop is designed to handle up to 240 volts, which is the electricity standard in China. We only have to get an adapter to make the laptop plug fit into the Chinese socket.
We also got a dresser for Xiao-Ling's room - believe it or not, we were driving home tonight and saw it at the side of the road! I checked it over and found the only problems were cracks in a couple of the drawers. Nothing too terrible to fix, but the previous owner apparently didn't want to take the time. So we loaded it into the car, brought it home and got it upstairs to its proper place in her room. (The cracked drawers are sitting on my workbench being mended with nails and superglue.) The only thing now missing in her room is a desk, and we hope to find one before we go.
More details as they come in...
We also found out that we will not be able to post to the blog directly while in China because the Beijing government blocks all access to Blogspot! We're pretty sure we'll have access to E-mail while we're over there, though - I don't think China blocks our E-mail domain. So we're planning a workaround - E-mail dispatches and photos back to the US and have them posted to the blog stateside. Should work.
And speaking of computers, we don't even have to buy an international power supply for our on-loan laptop; Toshiba verified that the laptop is designed to handle up to 240 volts, which is the electricity standard in China. We only have to get an adapter to make the laptop plug fit into the Chinese socket.
We also got a dresser for Xiao-Ling's room - believe it or not, we were driving home tonight and saw it at the side of the road! I checked it over and found the only problems were cracks in a couple of the drawers. Nothing too terrible to fix, but the previous owner apparently didn't want to take the time. So we loaded it into the car, brought it home and got it upstairs to its proper place in her room. (The cracked drawers are sitting on my workbench being mended with nails and superglue.) The only thing now missing in her room is a desk, and we hope to find one before we go.
More details as they come in...
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