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HANOI & THE CLAUDIA

Most of the remaining paperwork involved simply waiting for documents to be ready. IMH did a great job of getting everything done quickly. On Saturday we went to apply for the babies passports, which we picked up on Wednesday, and the visas and all the final papers were delivered to the hotel on Friday. The rest of the time we were free to explore the city and play with Mandy! I was quite amazed to discover that I loved Hanoi! I've travelled a lot, but have never been particularly crazy about travel, and it had been a long time since I'd been overseas and I was fully expecting to be in culture shock. But it never happened - apart from the heat and humidity, I was really comfortable there. Hanoi is a fascinating city with so much going on that it seems impossible to take it all in. On our first day before Mandy arrived we took a 1/2 hour cyclo ride around town and were sure we would never be able to get oriented, but by the end of the 14 days we knew our way around! The traffic is unbelievable - masses and masses of bikes, motorcycles (often with whole families on them), cyclos, and the occasional car, darting every which way and the constant beep beep beep of horns. Crossing the street was terrifying, and I never did get brave enough to do it alone! On the first day that we went out I was convinced I would never see anything other than the stores that were on the same block as the Claudia! Luckily for me, Mom quickly learned the technique of stepping out into the flow of traffic and proceeding across at a slow, steady pace, and made me do it too! Cyclos were my favorite way of getting around - you can see a lot, feel like you're part of it all, and best of all, you don't have to cross the street!!! :) The shopping was incredible - so many things to buy at such reasonable prices it was impossible not to go crazy! The only problem is that it is SO hot and humid that you can't bear to go out for too long at a time! But we still managed to do okay - by the end our room was buried so deep in souvenirs that we couldn't move! Lacquer boxes and plaques, embroidered pictures & T-shirts, ao dais, frilly little girls dresses for $5 that I bought several of for Mandy to play dress-up in when she's older, paintings, cone hats, musical instruments, wood-carved wall hangings of Vietnamese people, to name just a few! I never thought we would get it all into the suitcases, but somehow we managed! We were wishing we hadn't brought so much stuff with us - we had been expecting it to be like Africa where if you don't bring it, you live without it, but it seemed like you can buy almost anything there if you know where to look, and the hotel staff can help with that. I didn't need to buy diapers because I had brought them, so I don't know how they compared price wise, but they were easily available. I would recommend not bringing formula, because the hotel goes out and gets whatever the baby was on in the orphanage for you, and you can switch to the brand you want to use when you get home. One thing that was a bit disappointing to me was the food. I love Vietnamese food here in the US, and had been looking forward to it there, but it turned out to be quite different. The Claudia doesn't have a kitchen - just a small area with tables set up and a menu - they run out and get the food you select. Most of it wasn't very good but we wound up eating there a lot for convenience. We tried several restaurants, but some of the best food we found was at the Queen Cafe, also known as the internet cafe, where you can go to send e-mail. They had delicious plates of noodles and rice with chicken and vegetables and the 3 of us could eat and have soft drinks for a total of about $1.50! I love noodles and rice and before I left I was sure I could easily live on nothing but that for 2 weeks if necessary, but I have to admit we got rather sick of it after a while! A couple of times when we felt desperate for a change we went to Al Frescos, which had wonderful chicken satay and westernized food. The people we met were some of the nicest I've met anywhere. On the streets they would point to Mandy and ask "Vietnam?" and when I said yes, they would give a thumbs up sign. Mandy was the center of attention everywhere we went, and seemed to enjoy being passed around and admired, although everyone thought she was a boy because of her short hair! They LOVE children, and wanted to know all about her and seemed to approve of the fact that she was going to America. I had one very sad experience though, which I'll never forget - a woman we passed on the street looked at Mandy, held her baby out to me, and said "Take my baby too". The Claudia Hotel is as wonderful as it has been described on the list. Yes, the rooms are very small, and it can be quite a hike to get upstairs if you're on an upper floor, but everything was clean and quite comfortable, and the staff there more than makes up for any inconvenience - they are WONDERFUL! By the end of your stay you feel as if they're family. Mrs. Thuy knows practically everything about babies and is happy to teach bumbling new parents what to do! Mandy, who fought like crazy when I tried to cut her fingernails, would sit calmly in Mrs. Thuy's lap while she sang to her and trimmed her nails. Tam took us on tours, translated, arranged for us to see the water puppet show, took us to be fitted for Ao Dais and shopping for music, etc. The rest of the staff will babysit any time, and will produce anything you might request at a moment's notice! We shared a room, which had a double bed and they bring a mattress to put on the floor for the baby, but Mandy used that as a play area and slept in the bed with Mom and I. By the time we put 4 suitcases in the room there wasn't much space left! Add piles of souvineers to that and we forgot what the floor looked like! There is a little refrigerator in the room, and every day they bring you a flask of hot water for making formula. We started out in a room on the third floor which had a funny bathtub with a seat in it which made it impossible to stand under the shower, but as soon as space was available they moved us to the second floor which had a normal bathtub. The bathroom doubled as our "kitchen", and Mom spent a lot of time squatting on the floor in there mixing formula and washing out bottles, dishes, etc.! The air conditioning worked most of the time except for when the power went off, and then it had to be reprogrammed by someone from the front desk. Despite these inconveniences, I wouldn't trade our stay there for anything in the world! We had a lot of fun, a lot of laughs, and got to know some really great people. And the total bill for 14 days in the hotel, about 3/4 of our meals, tons of bottled water and soft drinks, piles of laundry every day, about 10 rolls of film developed with double prints, a day trip Mom took to the Perfume Pagodas, the Water Puppet show, a city tour, medicine, formula for the baby, etc. came to just $650! A lot of people ask if it's possible to do this trip alone - my answer to that is yes, it is possible, but I would highly recommend bringing someone with you if you can. There was a woman in our group who was travelling alone and she handled it extremely well, so it can certainly be done, but I personally can't imagine having made this trip without my Mom there. She was indispensable to me, making formula, washing dishes, getting everything on video with the camcorder, hauling stuff around, keeping track of things, etc. so that I could concentrate completely on Mandy. Alone, I think the trip would have been very difficult - together, it was fun. The three of us had a lot of really great times that we'll remember forever.

 

MANDY IN VIETNAM

The best part about our time at the Claudia was having two weeks with few other responsibilities and lots of time to spend with this amazing child of mine. From the very beginning it was as if we'd always been together. I loved her with all my heart from the first moment, and despite her initial fear she bonded very quickly to both Mom and I. During the first week she seemed happy to be with us, but would still go to anyone and didn't seem to mind when we left her with the hotel staff if it was too hot to take her out shopping. By the second week she had claimed us as "her people" and would cry if she saw either of us put a purse over our shoulder to go out! She was cuddly and loveable from the start, and quickly learned to give big hugs. I feel certain that she was loved at some point in her life before she came to me.The progress she made in those first two weeks was amazing. It was like going through the chapters of a child development book on fast forward, moving through a chapter a day as she changed from infant to toddler before my eyes. She had so little strength in the beginning that although she could walk, her little legs were shaky and she wouldn't go far. She had little ability to grip with her hands, and would sit most of the time with her fingers fully extended, rather than wrapping them around an object. She would get frustrated very quickly because she wanted to do things by herself but simply didn't have the strength. If she didn't get what she wanted immediately, or couldn't do something on the first try, she would go from laughing hysterically one moment to a screaming tantrum (we called them Mandy Meltdowns!) the next. Between bottles of formula and the huge bowls of chicken noodle soup and rice that she was consuming, she visibly grew and gained more strength every day, and as she got stronger she was able to do things like feed herself, push buttons on toys, climb up onto the bed, and before I knew it she wasn't just walking, she was running! With the ability to do so many more things her frustration decreased and so did the tantrums. By the time we left she would only have tantrums if she was really tired. Despite her physical weakness, it was apparent from the start that she's a very smart kid! She watched everything that we were doing and would try to copy us. She knew which lids went with water bottles and which ones went with other containers and would try to put them together. She devised a method of communicating with us immediately, pointing and gesturing with a sign language that became more complex every day until she was capable of issuing whole series of commands for Mom and I, her faithful servants, to carry out! By the end of the first week she was even starting to understand quite a bit of what we were saying to her, and by the end of the second week she had attempted a few English words! She was generally unimpressed with most of the toys I had brought - she much preferred to play with real life objects - our shoes, water bottles, the diaper wipe container, her bottles, etc. One of her favorite games was pretending to cook and eat - we would shred up a kleenex and put it in a bowl and she would stir it and pretend to eat it. She seemed to be able to tell the difference between food and non food and never put anything in her mouth that wasn't edible. She watched Mom mix her formula and would point to the step that came next - first the powder, then the water, then the vitamins, then the nipple goes on the bottle - she knew the whole routine! The only toy she really liked was the stacking cups. Anything soft or furry was rejected completely, and would promptly be flung across the room! She loved to fling things, and began testing us immediately, throwing something and looking to me for my reaction. If she threw something right at one of us I would take it away. I let her throw things away from people but made her go get them herself if she wanted them back, and by the end of the first week the flinging had slowed down considerably! She loved to trade things, and we spent a lot of time with her bringing things back and forth between Mom and I. We bought some cone hats and straw hats that the little girls there wear and played dress up, which she loved. She likes to be lifted high up in the air and would laugh and laugh. She was a fastidious eater in the beginning, getting extremely upset if so much as one noodle was stuck to her bib! That has since changed and now her highchair looks like a disaster area after every meal! She watched EVERYTHING around her, taking it all in - one day we were in a restaurant and there was a little girl about Mandy's size sitting in a chair by herself (Mandy had been sitting in my lap at mealtime) and the next morning she wanted to sit in her own chair! I tried several times to sneak a piece of candy without her noticing, and every time she caught me and would pry my mouth open to look inside!!! Her head sores healed quite quickly, but she developed a terrible diaper rash from a combination of the heat and not being used to paper diapers. Desitin didn't touch it and we weren't able to get it cleared up until we were home and out of the humidity. She had a little bit of chest congestion which cleared up right away with an antibiotic I had brought. The biggest problem we had and continue to have is sleep. In the beginning she would scream and scream at bedtime, and my Mom was the only one who was able to comfort her - she would accept me during the day but did NOT want me at bedtime! Mom would hold her and rock her until she would finally fall asleep, and towards the end of the trip she started going to sleep more easily and would let me be the one to rock her. She still sleeps very restlessly, crying out every one to two hours, and suffers from frequent night terrors, thrashing wildly and screaming, still asleep and completely inconsolable - it's such a helpless feeling to not be able to do much for her. She's improved slightly in the past 2 months since we've been home, so hopefully more time will help. Meanwhile, I've adapted better than I expected to the sleepless nights, and she seems totally unaffected by it during the day, and is a happy, loving little person full of energy and laughter.

 

BANGKOK, FLIGHTS, & HOME!

On Monday, May 25th, we left Vietnam, headed for Bangkok. As excited as we were to be so close to going home, it was also sad, leaving this wonderful country where my daughter was born. The Somerset hotel seemed very large and luxurious compared to the Claudia, but we missed Mrs. Thuy and the gang. They brought a crib to the room for Mandy, and I wasn't sure how she would react to it, but she actually slept better than when she was in bed with Mom and I. We took her swimming at the hotel pool, and my child who had screamed like we were murdering her every time I tried to give her a bath in Vietnam absolutely LOVED swimming and it took two of us to keep her from jumping into the deep end by herself! Tuesday morning at 6:30 we were met by Dan Clark from IMH who took us for the kids medical exams, passport photos, and to the US Embassy for the visas. The hospital where the medical exams were done was very impressive - spotlessly clean and nicer than any hospital I've seen here in the States. Mandy had never seen such a big open space and had a great time running around and I took her up and down on the escalator which she loved! The exam itself was quick but Mandy screamed the whole time even though they didn't do anything but look in her ears and open her diaper! The passport photos were easy and fast. We had to wait a little while at the embassy, but that also went very smoothly and we were done with all of it by about 10:30 that morning. We went back to the hotel to rest, swim, and shop, and Dan delivered the US Visas to us later that afternoon. What an incredible feeling to finally have that final piece of paperwork in hand! Wednesday afternoon we boarded the plane headed for home! I had been dreading the long flights with Mandy, but she was a real trooper and it was much easier than I had expected. The three of us had a row of 4 seats to ourselves, so she was able to stretch out and sleep on the two middle seats which helped a lot. Mandy slept about half the time on each flight, and was very good when she was awake. Coming through customs and immigration in LA was a breeze - they had a separate line for us and whisked us right through. In fact, the most difficult part of the whole trip was the 1 hour flight from LA to San Francisco! We discovered that half the flights to SF, including ours, had been cancelled due to to bad weather, and there were long waiting lists for the remaining ones. We begged and pleaded and must have looked pathetic enough with a half asleep child draped over my shoulder because they put us on the next flight out. It was packed, so Mandy had to sit in my lap, she was wild by that point, and squirming all over the place and splattering 7-up all over us and Mom and I were half hysterical with exhaustion and were laughing like lunatics - I felt very sorry for our seat companion!!! We arrived in SF to discover that my suitcase, which had made it from Vietnam to LA unharmed, had a big gaping tear down the middle. Luckily nothing had fallen out, but the suitcase was ruined. My aunt and uncle had come to meet us, but since we were on a different flight than expected it took a long time to find each other, and the limo they had hired to take us on the 2 hr drive home hadn't shown up! Finally, somehow it all came together and we made it home. Mandy walked into her room, and her eyes lit up and a big grin appeared on her face - it was as if she knew this was what all the travelling had been about - she was home!!! We've been home for 2 1/2 months now, and Mandy is barely recognizable as the little girl I first met in Vietnam. She's growing in leaps and bounds every day, her skinny little legs have become muscular, and she fits into 18 month size clothing now! She runs around, climbs on furniture, can walk up and down stairs with only a little help, and is learning so many new words every day that I can barely keep track of them! She gives big kisses and hugs, and keeps me laughing all the time. I can't even remember my life without her in it - she's the best thing that ever happened to me! We've had a few minor problems - she's had recurrent hives, which I've finally figured out might be caused by an allergy to both milk and soy, and after 3 negative parasite tests we found out that she did indeed have worms ( a pretty gross story if anyone is interested!), and of course there's still the sleep problems, but otherwise she's as healthy as can be! I had 2 months off of work and had to go back two weeks ago, so she's going to daycare in the mornings and spending the afternoons with my Mom, and is adapting very well. After 3 days of daycare she had added "NO" and "MINE" to her vocabulary! Now the answer to every question is "NO!" - pretty typical 2, I think! :) She's finally starting to get the hang of toys, and loves her doll house and tea set. She rejected every cute doll and stuffed animal I offered her and selected an ugly troll doll and a funny looking green alien doll as the honored ones who get pushed around in the doll stroller. She loves birds and ducks, and adores the cats, who unfortunately don't feel the same about her! She was afraid of my Dad in the beginning, but now she loves her Papa, who builds great block towers for her to knock down! Every day she grows stronger and is more confident and secure. It's hard to imagine that there was ever a time when she wasn't a part of my life. So to all of you who are still waiting, hang in there - the wait is worth it when you finally have your incredible child in your arms!!!

 

GRANDMA’S VIEWPOINT

I’m Laurie’s mom, Nancy. I’m 52 and have been living in Asmara, Eritrea (North of Ethiopia) with my husband for the past year. I had been lucky enough to be home in California with Laurie when she got her referral and photo of little Mandy. I returned to Eritrea Feb. 3rd and Laurie and I planned to meet in Bangkok. The wait wound up being 4 months and those last few weeks were as endless as a pregnancy. Waiting for that phone call to come from the States was terrible and I began to despair that we would never travel. It was very difficult making such complicated travel arrangements from Africa but some how it all came together and I left Asmara May 7th. I had two super days by myself in Bangkok. I spent one night in a hotel in the city center where I shopped, went sight seeing, including the canal trip which was really nice, and went to a Thai dinner with traditional dancing. I spent my second night at an airport hotel so I could be up at 5 am to meet Laurie and connect to our flight to Hanoi. I can remember us laughing and talking all the way from Bangkok to Hanoi and holding hands and crying as we landed. Soon I’d be a grandma!!! In case there are any other waiting grand parents out there who might have doubts I’d like to be honest here. My husband and I were both very supportive of Laurie’s decision to adopt and were very excited. I did, however, have secret doubts that I was afraid to share. Would I love this child as much as a child Laurie had given birth to? It would probably take time, I told myself, to learn to love her. What if I didn’t love her? That was a very big and real fear for me. What if I couldn’t remember how to take care of a toddler (Laurie is 29 and her brother is 26 so it’s been a LONG time) and would be of little or no use to Laurie? My big responsibility when Laurie met Mandy for the first time was to be in charge of the cam corder. I had had little practice with it and the moment was so emotional and I was crying so much that I wound up taking half the pictures sideways, forgetting I had a camcorder and not a regular camera. Laurie says the pictures have character! I dutifully did my filming and stayed back, not going to meet my grand daughter for about 20 minutes which took a lot of restraint. That time in Hanoi was incredibly special for me and sometimes I still miss it. It was not only time to bond with my grand daughter but also with my daughter. Laurie and I have always been extremely close but that brought us even closer together. Remember all those fears I had about loving this little Vietnamese girl? Well, by day two I was ready to slay dragons for her! At the G & R ceremony when they asked Laurie if she realized the adoption could be denied, I quickly realized that I would die if they took this kid away from us. The past 3 months have been like a passionate love affair. I could not love a child from Laurie’s womb more than I love Mandy! I feel like she is my flesh and blood. It seems incredible to me that a woman half way around the world can give birth to a child who can so quickly become a member of your family. Not only do I love this tiny person with every inch of my being, I can’t tell you how wonderful it is to see the glowing joy of my daughter. I have never seen Laurie so happy in her life. It’s almost as if she’s been waiting for Mandy forever and is finally fulfilled. By the way, I more than earned the price of my air fare. As chief cook and bottle washer, pack mule and midnight rocker and baby comforter, Laurie often said she would never have made it without me. I’m sure she would have, but I’m glad she didn’t have to go it alone as it would have been VERY tough! And guess what? I didn’t forget how to feed, change and rock babies! Now, as temporary afternoon caregiver, I confess I do get tired and often mutter to myself, "I’m too old for this" and I’m awfully glad to see Laurie walk in the door at 6 o’clock and take over but I’m grateful I was here to help Laurie get settled . When I have to leave, it’s going to break my heart. I honestly don’t know how I can ever bear to leave Mandy. We worry as she’s already lost so many people in her little life. I just hope she will adapt yet again and I will visit her as often as I can. So, waiting grand parents - the odds of you NOT loving the little one your child is about to adopt are probably pretty slim. Good luck and enjoy!

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