Medical Exam including TB test

Posted on:
Tue 7/21/2009 2:47 AM EST
Tue 7/21/2009 2:47 PM Beijing time

Saturday, July 18, 2009

We did it. We got up had breakfast at Café Veranda and met Lineker and Amy in the lobby at 8:30 a.m.! A little cranky but we were there. We got on the buses and headed out to Shamian Island for our Medical Exams. Effective July 1st, children being adopted abroad who are two years and older need to have a TB test done. So all of us families were given permission to "cut in line" to get through more quickly. We had that one extra "station" to visit. Avah did great at most of the exams. There was this one doctor who kept playing with her as he would walk by her. She seemed to not mind. In fact, she would smile at him. (She still doesn't talk to others who try to talk to her in Chinese)

Of course, she didn't like the TB test (and neither did mommy!). She cried and held her arm out. Sophia came over and softly blew on it for her. HOW SWEET!!! So then, I joined in and that seemed to calm Avah down. We are told she is not allowed to get it wet until Monday. Bummer, because we all wanted to go to the pool.

We were finished with the exams by 11 a.m. which is not so bad for 24 families. We were then taken to do some shopping at the Friendship store.

At 3:30 p.m. one member from each family met in Linker and Amy's room for our "paper party!" Woohoo!! This actually went very smoothly. Amy had it very organized and we were done by about 5:50 p.m. The "record" was 3 ½ hours and we did not want to break that record!!!

All the families met in the lobby at 6:30 p.m. and headed to Tatsunojo, this Japanese restaurant in the hotel. The food was very good.

The hotel was recently renovated so it is MORE beautiful than we remembered it to be three years ago. We didn't get to see much of it last night so walked around a bit this afternoon.