Wednesday

I don't know what happened with that first picture, but I'm too tired to mess with it now! It is Zeke taking a nap. Then, some pictures from our dinner, and one of Josh and Zeke before going to the consulate.
Today was our consulate appointment. That meant that at 11:30, one of us had to be in our room while our guide went to the consulate with our paperwork. When she called at about 12:20, the appointment was over. She told us our appointment to take the oath had been moved up to this afternoon. So we headed over to the consulate. There we waited in a room with a bunch of other adoptive families. First, a lady looked at our passports and Zeke's to make sure we were the same people we said we were. Then we all stood up, raised our right hand, and promised that everything we had said or written throughout this process was the truth. That's it. We should have gotten a visa packet, but ours won't be ready until tomorrow. Remember that consulate snaffu? Well not only did the Baltimore office have to resend our cable a bunch of times, they also didn't put on the cable that we were approved for special needs. So, when we went to take the oath, we had to take a copy of our homestudy. We'll get our brown visa packet tomorrow. This is something we can't open and must hand to the customs officials when we land in Newark. At that point, Zeke will be a US citizen!
We had dinner tonight at a restaurant on the Pearl River. I had the first meat I've had since Sunday night. I've been eating a lot of toast! By the way, thanks for all the prayers and well wishes! I'm feeling much better. Back to dinner...as it grew darker, all the buildings began to light up with neon colors. Once it was completely dark, they have a light show. We were gone by that point, though!
Tonight, we finally met up with Mary and family, whom we've tried to meet for the past two weeks! Our children came from the same orphanage. We had a "playdate" tonight in the play room at the White Swan. We really think the kids recognized each other. She just stared at Zeke, and her parents both say it is unusual for her to be so quiet for so long. He wouldn't look at her at all! As they warmed up, Zeke walked over and snatched the toy out of her hands and without blinking she snatched it right back! We all just laughed and said Yep! They've done that before! It was neat to have that connection. We were able to compare notes and see some common behaviors.
Tomorrow is still up in the air for us, so we'll just have to wait and see what it brings!