A friend of mine on one of the many China-adoption-related online communities on which I'm a regular nuisance a contributing member recently posted this news photo of a Chinese kid in a clinic in Anhui. The kid, who seems to be about the age of most adopted children (maybe a year older at most), has been given an IV drip in the head.

This is pretty much standard operating procedure in Chinese medical care. If it's effective medicine, the belief goes, it's going to get into your body intravenously. ... more

I just discovered this great thing at http://www.chinesepod.com/

It's a Mandarin language podcast. OK, for those faithful readers not hep to the "pod" lingo, that means this site offers a series of handy lessons, between 10 and 15 minutes long, in the form of .mp3 files. They're free. Right click on the links, save the file to your computer, and listen at leisure.

Chances are, you've already got some software capable of playing .mp3s (Windows Media Player on Windows, iTunes on the Mac, and RealPlayer and QuickTime on either), but just in case you don't, most people seem to like the free Winamp player at ... more

My Resourceful Spouse and I enjoy traveling with our family. The Boy (now 11) is quite the veteran, and our daughter has made several long airline and car trips besides the one that first brought her to America. They're good at 'em.

But they're staying home for this one.

This was not an easy decision to make. In essence, it was the money that made our minds up for us. Last time, the biggest single expense in the whole adoption process for us was the airfare. And our daughter's too old to fly for free this time. We did a little figuring, which led us to the conclusion... more

My Knowledgable Spouse reports that not everyone was as lucky as we were today -- apparently many of The Stork packages haven't wound up where they're supposed to be. It *seems* like DHL misplaced a fat packet of referrals.

Whether or not this was passive-aggressive punishment for all the anxious parents-to-be haranguing the tracking information center ("IS IT HERE YET? IS IT HERE YET? IS IT HERE YET?") is not entirely clear. However, The recently cited Traveling Daughters Family are among the affected. I can't imagine the anticipation, and I don't think my cardiologist would want me to try.

Hold... more

His name is Yang Fu Huang, and he's from Yunyang County in the Chongqing Municipal District -- I think that's right in the Three Gorges area.

He was born last June.

The internet tells me Yunyang is known for archaeological remains of horse burials, which they find unusual because it's too hilly for horses, which reminds me of the Basotho ponies my mother's mother's family knew -- horses plying the impassable routes of the ... more

When we first met our daughter, she was a couple day's shy of her first birthday and had never had solid food. She was ready -- more than ready.

The breakfast buffet at the Chongqing Hilton had eggs and yogurt and oatmeal and cereal for us Westerners. Our young lady dove head first into steamed eggs and yogurt, but another thing she really went for was the Chinese breakfast: congee.

This is a rice porridge, usually served with some kind of sharp, savory thing on the side: pickles, preserved mustard root, salt-cured eggs, that kind of thing. A little cube of super-savory and a spoonful of soupy and bland, and you've got a great little meal going.

Making congee at... more

According to My Insightful Spouse, rumor has it the Stork has touched down in San Francisco and at least one packet of referrals has been delivered to an agency in a Western State With A Professional Sports Team Named After Horses And What I Think Is The Highest Baseball Stadium In America.

So it looks like tomorrow, I'll be looking at a referral for the latest family member.

1. The Stork has flown, officially. Because I don't know what the cut-off date was for the folders the CCAA processed, I won't know if my next child's photo is in a folder aboard this flight until Monday or Tuesday. My Beloved Spouse is getting reminders to breathe from our friends.

2. Why are you reading this blog? I'm a little nuts right now. Go read The One and Only G, who's writing about her experiences working in a Chinese group foster home (which in itself is remarkable) with a lot of special needs kids, primarily cleft palate and spinal bifida. She (she? why do I assume "she"?) has photographs of some of the... more

Rumor has it that the CCAA has decided to cut off the latest batch of referrals at the May 25 LID. The Stork may be in flight as soon as next week -- we might even hear about it by tomorrow, my time.

(Translation: The Chinese Center for Adoption Affairs is processing a lot of dossiers, so many that this month, they'll be matching kids with families who got paperwork in up to May 25 last year. This is the group that includes my family's application, which was logged in on the 23rd. The flight carrying the referrals -- the dossiers that have been matched with children by the Magic Stapler in the matching room -- might be taking off by next week. Or even tomorrow, even.)

(So grant... more

OK, for those of you not used to the paperchase part of the Chinese adoption process, it gets kind of crazy -- especially if you're net savvy. There are thousands of internet groups dedicated to the wait. Currently, it takes just about a year (give or take a month or two) between the time you're DTC (Dossier To China -- all your paperwork is sent off) and the time you receive a referral (the packet from China with the baby photographs, saying This one is yours -- if you've got a problem with that, now's the time to back out. If you haven't got a problem with that, see you in a month and a half. More or less.)

(Technically, the "month and a half" thing is a separate... more