LIfe Is Good

Day 16 July 30th Monday
Written July 31st and submitted July 31st

Today starts the week of waiting for the magical phone call. We are waiting for a call from our caseworker that says the investigation has been completed and Gracie’s visa has been approved. Several people here at our hotel have been waiting a little longer than they have expected so everyone is on pins and need. We hope to get the approval before our flight this Sunday.

The four of us awoke from our sleep and everyone seemed healthy. Logan is much better now except for being a little plugged up and Becky is running about 90 percent, which for everything she went through the night before that sounds pretty good. Gracie is always so smiley in the morning and always happy to see us. She has her classic open mouth smile that always reminds us why we made the trip.

Once we got ready, we went downstairs for breakfast. This wasn’t a good breakfast day for Logan because there wasn’t much on the menu he wanted. He managed to find a couple of items that he would eat and then he grabbed the room key from Becky and headed to the room to get on the computer. Becky and I sat with Alison, who has been here a week longer than us and is still waiting for her baby’s visa to be approved by the US embassy. We really hope she gets approved soon because like everyone else she’s ready to go home. After a quick meal, Becky, Gracie, and I headed back to the room to begin our wait by the phone like everyone else.

About an hour later, Becky called Christy to see if she was going to some shop a couple of blocks away and that she would like to join Christy. So the two of them left for some shopping and Logan, Gracie, and I settled in for the morning. It was about an hour later that I heard the phone ring from the bedroom. I yelled at Logan to answer the phone because the phone in the bedroom doesn’t work that well. By the time I got in the front room to see who was on the phone, Logan had the phone in his hand but said nobody was on it. I picked up the phone and said hello. Martin, our caseworker, was on the other end. He must not have known what to say when Logan greeted him. Martin told me that our visa had been approved and that the interview will be sometime Tue afternoon and that he would call us tomorrow when he gets the appointment from the embassy. He said he was trying to call Christy’s room because her baby’s visa had been approved as well so if I could let her know, then that would be great. Matter of fact all the visas had been approved for the parents in our hotel and the Melia. I told Martin that was excellent news and when I got off the phone Logan was looking at me funny because he has never seen his dad dance like that before. I haven’t been that relieved in a long time and I couldn’t wait to tell the girls when they returned from the shopping trip. Logan was happy but he’s a man with little emotion unless he just bought a gameboy game and can’t figure out how to advance to the next level. Then his emotions really come out of him.

About 30 minutes after Martin’s phone call, I heard the girls in the hallway so I opened the door and told Christy to step inside because I had some news. The girls were ecstatic. Christy and Grace have a flight early Thursday morning so getting our visas on Wed means she can make her flight. We decided to meet for dinner for a little celebration meal.

Becky soon got on the computer to email Todd, our travel agent, to see if we can get us a sooner flight. Our current flight has us leaving Sunday so we are going to try to leave Thursday or Friday. The worst case is that we would have to wait until Sunday. We will fly into Chicago Monday 8/6 at 6:00 am. Just knowing the paperwork is complete and all we have to do is wait is good enough for me at this point.

We didn’t do much the rest of the afternoon. I ran down to the tourist center to read the comments on the blog. I copied the comments to an email and then mailed it to ourselves so Becky could read them in the hotel room. Logan got his fill of movies and video games that afternoon. We could tell Logan was feeling much better now because he was having fun pestering his little sister. As soon as we told him it was time to read for 30 minutes, all of a sudden he was hungry or tired or something else was wrong with him. We knew then that he was back to his old self.

Late in the afternoon, Gracie was sleeping so Logan and I went down to happy hour for some snacks. Every day between 2:30-4:30pm the hotel has snacks laid out for the guests. They usually include about five different types of pastries or baked goods and Logan usually likes them. We took our seat at the front window to watch the people on the street. I explained to Logan the events that will be taking place this week so we would definitely be home on Monday. I asked him what’s the first thing he’s going to do when we get back home and he said PLAY! I don’t blame him because he’s been cooped up with nothing but mom and dad and other adults for the past two weeks but he’s done an excellent job. I told him it was important that he came on this trip because Gracie’s going to have many questions about the place where she was born and she is going to be asking him questions. It will mean a lot to her when she gets older that her brother was there when we received her from the orphanage and that we spent the time in the hotel room getting to know her. Logan seemed to take it in.

As usual when sitting at the front table next to the window, street merchants still like to come up to the window and show you their goods. The cyclo drivers will stop in front of the window as well and wave at you to take a ride with them. Even sitting behind the glass in the security of the hotel, Logan has a hard time with this. He will slouch down in his chair to try to get out of their line of sight. I told him they can’t come in the hotel but he just doesn’t like people standing there looking at him. I just smile and wave back and eventually they move on. About an hour later Becky and Gracie joined us at the front window. Gracie just woke from her nap and she was happy as usual. After a short while, we went to the room to call Christy to see if they were ready to go to our celebration dinner.

We all headed out to dinner about 5:30 to a new place that Becky and Christy found earlier in the day. It was a small place that served Western food but this was the first place that was a little smoky. As soon as the waitress brought our food, Gracie decided she wanted to eat NOW! She is pretty good about letting you know she is hungry but this time we received no type of warning. So we quickly made her a bottle and she was happy again. On our way back to the hotel we stopped by a shop that Logan had spotted earlier that sold gameboy games and purchase a game for Logan. They’re only $6.50 US per game so it’s hard not to buy them while we are over here.

We went back to the room and Becky got on the computer and Logan played his new game. Becky and I got Gracie ready for bed and she went fast asleep. Logan and I watched a terrible movie because there was only one channel then we went to sleep