Table for a Party of 26

Chen Clan Academy

One of the interesting things about adopting in China is that adoptions need to be finalized in the Guangdong province, which means a trip to the provincial capital of Guangzhou for all families adopting.  Since Luke lived in Guangdong province, we didn't have to travel once we got to Guangzhou.  Because of this requirement, you often run into families that are adopting and the Garden Hotel seems to be a common place for families to stay as it is a top quality international hotel centrally located for many of the appointments required.

During our stay at the Garden, we were in the apartment wing of the hotel and on the 13th floor.  We've already mentioned the McCarthy family with their four kids and our family with five kids.  And late last week, the Blechacz family joined us with their family of six kids and today our friends from the Milwaukee area, the Franke family, will be joining us with their three kids before they add Jacob.  Dana has been communicating with many of these families through Facebook groups so it's like a reunion with someone you've never met.  But tonight our plan is to eat dinner together after the Frankes arrive.  But after we did a head count, we realized that there are 26 of us.  We haven't found any restaurants that can seat 26 - a lot can barely seat 26 total people!  Having this many kids has also been interesting for the staff at the hotel.  One of the desk attendants on the 13th floor said she's never seen so many large families here all at once.  Having so many kids around has created a little extra stress for them.  We've gone through so much water that they've starting delivering cases of water to our room!  We've also had to repeatedly remind our kids that while it seems that only other families live on our floor, there are other guests who might want some quiet time.  Overall, the staff at the Garden has been very friendly, very accommodating and hopefully we leave a generally positive impression with them as well.

In the last post, I mentioned that we weren't sure what we were doing on Sunday.  Ultimately, we decided to go to Chen Clam Academy

Artist carving Luke's name into a stamp

An artist personalizing his artwork

and then go to Shamian Island, a sandbank island with European colonial roots. Our time at the Chen Clan Academy, a building built by the Chen family for ancestor worship and academic training.  It is a fine example of Chinese architecture and interesting to look at so I'm glad that we went.  Like any good historical site, it had souvenir shops.  Luke and Ian both got a hand carved Chinese stamp with their names and there was an artist on site who had painted pictures that he was personalizing with the buyer's name in Chinese.

Map of Shamian Island

Originally, we were going to have our guide drop us off at Shamian Island and then we would take the subway back.  But it turns out that we could catch a ride back on the bus if we wanted to be picked up in an hour.  We figured that might be easier so we headed to Shamian.  Shortly after arriving, we had an urgent bathroom need and spent 15 minutes trying to find and get to a bathroom.  We found one near Lucy's, a popular diner not far from the water.  Since it was lunch time and our crew was in that tired/hungry phase, we thought we could sit down for a quick lunch.  We thought we had plenty of time, but the service is not speedy at Lucy's so we ended up having to put our food in a to go box and dash back to the bus.  So we didn't really see much of Shamian Island.  We have some time in the afternoon on Monday so we may make a return trip.

That afernoon, we made another trip to the pool.  The kids were excited to see the Frankes but they weren't due in until 4:30 so I told the kids we could grab some ice cream and hopefully by the time we would get back they'd be in their room.  As we were walking across the lobby, we ran into them and ended up taking their kids, Madison, Logan and Sammie along with us to get ice cream while Ross and Jenn got a head start on unpacking.

The rain that we had been expecting since Saturday finally came about the time we planned to go get dinner.  Instead of getting a table for 26, we decided to get food and just eat it in Ross and Jenn's room since they got a 3 bedroom apartment.  All of us 2 bedroom apartment families were a bit jealous, but after realizing that we could have gotten two hotel rooms instead of an apartment, the jealousy faded.  The rain was coming down in buckets so our feet got wet with all the flowing water on our way to get McDonalds and Pelicana chicken.  It was fun to have our large group together for dinner.

Tomorrow we have our consulate appointment and the Frankes will get Jacob.  We're excited to complete the last step in our paperwork process and for Jacob and Luke to reunite.