Nanchang, China-- Culture Shock???

Today we left Beijing and traveled via plane to Nanchang, China which is the capital of the Jiangxi province where Kaylee was born. Nanchang is a very large city with lots of high rise apartment buildings.  Beijing was similar to many American large cities, but Nanchang not so much.  I think everyone in our group agrees that we are now officially experiencing a little culture shock.  It is a vey noisy city with the constant sound of people laying on their horns.  In fact as I type this post, that is the only thing I hear and it is never ending.  Watching the traffic outside our hotel window is like watching a virtual game of Frogger.  There seems to be no rhyme or reason to the traffic pattern.  You have large buses sharing the same lanes with small cars and people on bicycles and motor scooters.  And the people on bicycles are not scared to cut right in front of the large vehicles.  Not to mention, you have what seems like hundreds of people milling around on the street and they seem to cross the street whenever and at whatever point they want.  It does not seem to matter if a large bus is headed toward them or not-- they just nonchantly walk out in front of it. 

I was a little fearful of our inner China plane rides, but turns out the plane we flew on was nicer than most planes I have been on in the U.S. and the flight attendants were defintly nicer than the ones you encounter on U.S flights.  It was only a 2 hour plane ride and they served a full meal.  A quick side note-- one of our travel mates had a forgotten pocket knife in an obscure pocket of their carry on luggage which was not caught at all by U.S security, but the Chinese screeners caught it right away.

We were warned that Chinese people like their beds very hard, and boy do they!!!  Imagine sleeping on plywood.  Our guide arranged for some extra padding to be put on our beds, but it literally feels like a piece of plywood.  I guess the hotel we stayed out in Beijing caters more to westerners so their beds were softer, but evidently we are now going to experience true Chinese beds. 

Today is the day that we will finally get to hold Kaylee.  In fact, our hotel room came equipped with a crib and stroller.  If that doesn't make this experience seem real-- nothing will.  We were hoping that the babies would arrive this morning so that it would correspond to Our Easter Sunday, but it does not look like the babies will arrive until later on this afternoon.  We have been told to just relax (yeah, right!!) and rest because this may be our last opportunity to ever do that again.  The babies our scheduled to arrive at 4:00 pm China time so that will be 4:00 pm Monday morning for everyone on Eastern time in the U.S and 5:00 pm for everyone on Central time.  Our guide has told us that most babies have one of 3 reactions.  1.) they cry because we look funny 2.) they laugh because we look funny 3.) they are very serious because again we look funny and they are trying to figure us out.

I cannot believe that our 4 year journey to Kaylee is getting ready to end and we will then start our next journey as a Forever Family!!!! Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers today.  Hopefully, my next post will include pictures of the one we have all been waiting so long to meet.