February 29
Matt put this together, in flight...
It's currently 6:30 pm and we've traveled almost 2500 miles already. We still have 9 hours to go and are flying at an altitude of 34000 feet. We are presently north of canada with an outside air temp of -64F! The lowest its been so far was -82F!!! So far I've watched two movies and Shari's on her third. (She cheats though because she only watches the scenes she wants and forwards through the other parts) :)
The morning was a blur. We had a great morning getting the kids off to school and then headed to the airport. Check in was a little rough but mostly fine. The flight to DC was uneventful until we realized that we had experienced a weather delay and were landing with only 40 minutes before our connecting flight took off! We had to run to the complete other end of the terminal but made it on time thankfully.
Everything seemed to be going well until the pilot came over the speakers and told us they were having difficulties with some immunization equipment. We finally backed out of our gate and headed towards the runway where the plane stopped and we were again told there were some problems and that we would be waiting for another bit of time. Long story short we took off two hours late and should be arriving around 5:30 instead of 3:30.
Notice the temp. Shari and I keep saying how excited we are and how we can't believe the day is finally here! Surreal is the only word I can think of when I think about how I feel. I'm sitting in an airplane on my way to a country I've never been to meet a little girl I've never met and bring her home to be my daughter. A year ago I would have never believed you if you would have told me I would be doing this.
I'm so excited to see China and meet its people. It's funny because Shari and I are definitely the minority on this flight! I'm thankful that God has trusted us with this opportunity and we hope to be a faithful steward of it all. That's it for right now. I'll write more later.
March 2
The Great Wall
I couldn't tell you exactly what I expected of the Great Wall, but it wasn't snow. It made the wall pretty, but the steps terrible!
Matt made it farther up than I did. I waited for him and took others pictures, some of myself, and attempted to talk to a security guard who asked me questions about the snow and showed me coins he had. I'm not real sure what he was telling me. : ) Unfortunately for Matt though, I stepped into a souvenir shop during the time that he was coming back to get me. The poor guy walked all the way to the bottom assuming I had just started down without him. When he got to the bottom, he found out I was still at the same place and he had to come back up for me! Oh well, at least he got his exercise for the day. :)
Some Chinese people saw us and wanted their picture taken with them. Too funny! So, I gave them our camera as well.
Beijing is crowded; I have never seen so many cars. People do not have the right of way here, I thought our driver was going to hit several! And the way people merge here is crazy!
Tomorrow we will visit the Forbidden City. We were also told that we will get Maggie on Tuesday now, instead of Monday. Our guide said the change is because of bureaucracy. While our hearts are sad, I know God has a reason for this and we will continue to trust Him through it!
