Sleep

We landed in Hefei which is the capital city of Anhui.  The plane we flew over on was quite interesting.  The seat in front of Bill literally had an Air China sticker holding the arm of the seat together.  Karsyn's seat had the entire electrical box laying in her seat wide open.  Luckily it was less than 2 hours and we landed smoothly. 

A new guide named Georgianna met us at the airport because Grace had to stay back and take a test.  She flew in last night with another couple that is adopting.  We will meet them this morning before we go over to the Civil Affairs office to get Kora.  Yes, today is Gotcha Day!  Actually in 5 1/2 hours is Gotcha moment!

The hotel here in Hefei is their first 5 star hotel and is extremely nice. If I wasn't so tired when we arrived yesterday I would have pictures to post.  So I haven't really talked much about our sleep so far, but hopefully today will be the day that it gets a little back to normal.  China in general doesn't seem to believe in air conditioning so to our family that means no sleeping.  We are very used to freezing temperatures when we go to bed.  While in Beijing, the rooms were so hot that we slept in very short spurts and were always up by 1am to go stand outside the hotel to cool down.  Yesterday morning we all went down in short sleeve shirts and stood in the 25 degree weather until we felt ready to go back up to the steam bath.  No doubt the hotel staff thinks Americans are insane.  So today, when we arrived at the hotel in Hefei we were really hoping for better climate inside the room.  We were very disappointed when they too don't have air conditioner in the room and unlike Beijing, the windows don't even open.  However, they must not turn on the heat like Beijing because the room is naturally cooler.  We walked around the city of Hefei for a few hours, grabbed lunch, and came back for a nap.  This nap turned into an 11 hour catch up.  We are all awake again at 3 am, but at least this time we feel very rested.  I even got cold enough that I used covers on the bed for half the night.

Well I will post details later about how different the city of Hefei is from Beijing, but for now I want to eat and take a shower.  I will just tell you that I am not certain I will have many pictures to post because that will require me to take my death grip off of my children long enough to click the camera button.

Pray for Kora today.  She is leaving her mom and family of over a year to come to us.  She is no doubt going to be scared and sad.  I am hoping that having Karsyn and Billy will ease the transition for her some. I have thought of this moment over and over for two years and I pray that Kora will feel instantly all the love and security that our family has for her so that she is just a little less scared today.