Henry, is that you in there?

Another fun and interesting day! We hit the wholesale market in Guangzhou with our new friends, Amy, Dave, and Mya. We all found a few souvenirs, but the best part was just seeing what goes on around the city on a typical weekend afternoon. We once again drew lots of stares and a few different women wanted to know what we were doing with these beautiful Chinese babies. It seems so strange that they do not realize the number of babies adopted by foreigners every year. Some seem utterly perplexed by the fact that these babies are actually coming home with us. We keep hearing, "beautiful, lucky, lucky baby" everywhere we go. They all love to touch Mae's cheek or hand and try to get a smile.

Henry was quite the hit again today. Many people just want to touch him on the arm or face. They just stop and stare at him. We heard "handsome boy" today several times, but Henry thinks it is getting a little old. We call him the Brad Pitt of China.

We finished the morning at the market with lunch at the Kentucky Fried Chicken! It was a nice change and tasted just like home. The restaurant was packed and the 7 of us made for some nice lunchtime entertainment, as everyone in the restaurant stopped to watch what we were doing. After getting our food, we tried to find seats but there were none to be had. The next thing we knew an employee was trying to make other people get up so that we could take their tables! The poor people were in the middle of eating their meals. Then this cute young couple started waving at us from across the restaurant to come take their table. They were finished but did not want anyone but us to sit there, the woman was so happy when we sat in their seats. Very strange and humbling. We took a taxi back across the city, got into our room, and I realized I didn't have my sunglasses. (Mom, I can hear you laughing all the way in China) I knew they were gone forever, either left at KFC or in the taxi. Rich insisted we go to Maggie and Kathy's room and ask them to help us call the KFC to see if anyone had turned them in. Valerie and I rolled our eyes at him but he persisted and we indulged him. We awoke Maggie from a nap and told her our story. She said she knew which KFC we were talking about and she would call. Two hours later she turned up at our door holding my sunglasses! I couldn't believe it. She had taken a taxi back and picked them up for me when she called and found out they had them. I asked her if this was typical behavior to turn in something valuable if you find it and she said yes. Needless to say, we are in darn good hands here. These women, Maggie and Kathy, are truly special. We were talking with the other families about how they just pitch in wherever they are needed without even being asked. When one of the babies is crying while we are out to eat, they swoop in and take the baby for a stroll. They usually return with a content or sleeping baby! They work non-stop during the day and are available to us around the clock. Valerie has also been a huge help and we are so glad to have her with us.

Tonight we ate with several families in our travel group at a local Cantonese restaurant and had a great dinner. Our amazing reps, Kathy and Maggie, ordered for everyone and we had lots of wonderful food to choose from, about a dozen or so platters of food for our table of 8. The tab, including beer, came to about $8.00 a piece. Oh, and a word about our travel group. What a neat group of people, we are making some friends we will have forever. All of the babies are doing quite well. We have seventeen in all. One 4 year old boy who has captured everyone's heart, 3 toddlers ranging from 17-22 months who are precious, and 13 beautiful babies that are 10 months old. Naturally, the toddlers are having the roughest transition, but it is wonderful to see them coming around. The babies all seem to have blossomed in the last day or two and are such fun to watch. Mae is definitely one of the most mild-mannered of all. She is even-tempered all day long, extremely curious about her surroundings, and a lot of fun. She is bonding well with all of us, although lucky daddy got the first kiss yesterday. She already has him totally wrapped around her little fingers.

By the way, we keep forgetting to mention how #*!@* hot it is here! Do we look a little sweaty in these photos? Well, we have never sweat so much in our lives. We thought we lived were it is pretty darn warm. We will forever refer to this as "Guangzhou hot"!

Our favorite thing to do each night is to read the comments on the blog! Thanks! We wish we could reply from there but it does not give us that capability. Keep 'em coming!

We miss you all and can't wait for you to meet miss mae in person!

Here are the day's pictures -- http://www.flickr.com/photos/caira/sets/751447/

Love,
Melissa and Rich