So much has happened since the last time I was able and to sit down and put fingers to keyboard (pen to paper just sounds so much better). I think I will start with the story that rocked my day and then go from there. Yesterday was a hot day. As we approached dinner it was still a heat index of 111 F. I know this is about par for home but it is pretty uncomfortable to sleep three to a hard bed when you have no AC. I decided that it was time for us to do a few days in the local hotel. With the rate of $23 a night, it is almost worth it just for the toilet. Yesterday, as we were walking the 1 ½ back to the center from the bus drop off after our Walmart trip (more on that later), I was thinking about how far we’ve come in the last two weeks when we were dropped off on the side of the road in a strange city in a strange country. I was feeling pretty confident as we walked along the road alone. I had bought a Chinese umbrella at Walmart and had it open for sun protection, so if you could get past the skin color and height, I probably looked just like everyone else out for an afternoon stroll. We were old pros at navigating this town. After dinner, A. drove us to the hotel (a hotel and a car ride. Life has too many luxuries).
Checking in was a hassle. The last time, he had gone in the afternoon and got the key for us and we just went to our room. This time, we were with him. Since most hotels do not take credit cards (even Walmart wouldn’t take one), you show a passport for ID and give them an extra 100 yaun for deposit (this is about $15). This time they wanted my passport, but they also wanted for the kids as well. I couldn’t understand why. They struggled to fill out their forms gathering information from our passport and visa. Since they spoke or read no English, they couldn’t even determine which words were our names. As we were standing there, I almost just said, ”Forget it”. Things just seemed wrong. Brad had been very sad about us leaving, their were a group of men that just kept watching us and we couldn’t even figure out how to check in. However, the thought of the western toilet and ac just kept coming to the front of mind, so we waited out the process and then went to our room. Once we got there, we all started getting ready for bed and taking our Benadryl, which is a necessity for our allergies in the hotel. The only place that is smoke free in China is the airplanes and when you caught a whiff of the air when people would leave the bathrooms, I don’t think they are following the rules. By about 8:30, we were out for the night. All of sudden, I was awoken by knocking on the door; it was around 10 PM at this time. I decided to ignore it and stay in bed with my Benadryl induced slumber. They wouldn’t go away and then they started yelling, “Police”. Great. I jumped from bed in a panic and Jared is right behind me. I looked through the peephole and couldn’t see a thing. It didn’t help that I had forgot to bring my glasses to the hotel and had to sleep in my daily contacts that by this time were glued to my eyeballs. When I asked them what they wanted, they said they were the police and needed to come into our room and see our passports. Hello, no way. I told them that I wanted them to come back with a hotel employee. Well, apparently there was one with them, but they just wear skirts and white blouses, so it could have been anyone and none of them speak English anyway. They want in the room. Ok, I will be honest, my cool collectedness was gone. I was freaking out. About this time, I make Jared go wake Jaclyn up. How could she sleep through this anyway? Could the tension running through my body not spark some type of current that would have jolted her awake? I decide to sacrifice my only son for the safety of the women of his family, and open the door with the chain so we can at least see clearly what is going on. I tell him to ask what they want. He does, but they respond with “He is not the male of the family.” Well, duh, the male of my family is home probably eating at some yummy restaurant and enjoying AC. He is not going to find him there. I decide at this time, I am going to have to figure this out. I go to the crack and tell him I cannot let him in. He tells me he is the police again. Ok, I am not dumb. The man is wearing some type of basketball shorts and muscle shirt. I tell him he is not in uniform, but he tells me not to worry. It is because it is the weekend. Really?!? I tell him to hold on and shut the door. I go and dig through my stuff and find the number for H., the assistant director and the one who speaks the best English here. I frantically dial her. Well, if you can’t remember, I am in China and cannot read a word on the phone and apparently, you don’t dial 9 to get out. I feel trapped. There are a group of men at my door wanting in my room and I have no way to reach the outside world. Even if I knew how to make an international phone call on my phone, David wouldn’t be able to help me out of this one. I did, however, find the card for the orphanage and went back to the door and pointed to A.’s number and asked them to call him. He did and passed the phone in to me and A. told me to trust them and let them in. No! Easy for him to say when he isn’t there. A.’s wife gets on the phone and at this point, I am big time fighting tears and beg her to come and help me. She tells me it is okay to trust them. I tell her he is not in a uniform. The dude hears me and changes his story that he is not really the police, but a translator and doesn’t have a uniform. Ok. Changing your story dude doesn’t make me want to let you in my room any more than before. When E. realizes he is not in uniform, she asks to talk to him and comes back and tells me it is the weekend and he says it is okay. I get it. It is way past the appropriate calling/visiting time on a Saturday night. I am still not okay with letting him in and handing away my passport and my ticket home. I finally give the phone to the basketball cop and tell him to tell A. that I will open then door when A. is with them. The police dude says he will wait, but that I cannot leave the room until they return. Really? At this time, I am pretty for sure I may never slide the chain on that door. I am definitely not going to leave with a group of men waiting in the lobby and go on a late night stroll through town. While we wait, we pack all of our belongings, throw on our clothes and do some big time Talking to Him. About 10 minutes later, A., E. and their baby arrive. Friends have never looked so good. It appears, the hotel reported that they had foreigners in their hotel and the police were coming to check us out. The first day we were here, A. had made copies of our passport and visa and filed them with the police, but apparently, the ones on duty this night didn’t think to go and check at the station. They continued on with checking our passports and visas. Our visa was processed in Houston, so basketball cop asked if we were from Houston. I answered, “yes” right as Jared answered “no”. Great. Jared, when you are in China, Houston is close enough to home. We don’t want to draw suspicion to ourselves. I tell the man that we are very close to Houston. Apparently, they have strong feelings towards the Houston Rockets here. I tried to talk basketball like I knew much about this team and not let on that Mavs are the only real Texas team in my opinion. They finish taking their pictures and say they will all leave. They do along with A. and E. and everyone acts like we should be able to drift right back to sleep. Ha! I broke down like a blubbering idiot the moment the door closed. To make matters worse, they don’t give you Kleenex in hotel rooms and they give you about 20 squares of toilet paper. If I don’t stop the crying, there will be no using of the western style toilet the next morning! Janaye quickly drifted back to sleep, Jared tried to break the tension by quoting Community, and Jaclyn stroked my arm. I turned on my most favorite music, the McCoy Family Singers and tried to find peace. The first song that played was Beulah Land…”I’m kind of homesick for a country….” Quick, hit shuffle. That song is too much for the moment. As I laid listening, I realized that He just sent me a reminder, that I although I was feeling pretty confident in my abilities earlier, I needed Him in the worst way. I also needed David. Besides the time that we walked in on robbers in our house and my daddy held them at gunpoint while I ran to call the sheriff, I never remember being so scared, alone and trapped. I never really went back to sleep for the night. I laid in bed afraid there would be more knocks on the door. I was thrilled when morning came and we made the mile walk back to the orphanage. When we walked in, we gave the key to our room to A. and told him we would be staying here at the center from now on. He seemed surprised. I guess he just didn’t get the fear of the moment in a country where you cannot communicate. R. and Ra. understood. They couldn’t believe the whole thing had happened. Could you imagine the stink that would happen if we had foreigners staying in a hotel in America and the police show up at their door that late at night simply because they were foreigners? Oh, well. Today is a new day. This will be chalked up to a life experience and I am going to move on. The forecast is hot, but comfort and safety is going to win over AC. However, it is kind of weird. The 10-day forecast now covers our last full day here at the center. I can’t believe that today marked our third Sunday here. This last week flew by! Next week at this time, I will be hiking back down Kung Fu mountain after our camping adventure. Boy, life is an adventure.
Checking in was a hassle. The last time, he had gone in the afternoon and got the key for us and we just went to our room. This time, we were with him. Since most hotels do not take credit cards (even Walmart wouldn’t take one), you show a passport for ID and give them an extra 100 yaun for deposit (this is about $15). This time they wanted my passport, but they also wanted for the kids as well. I couldn’t understand why. They struggled to fill out their forms gathering information from our passport and visa. Since they spoke or read no English, they couldn’t even determine which words were our names. As we were standing there, I almost just said, ”Forget it”. Things just seemed wrong. Brad had been very sad about us leaving, their were a group of men that just kept watching us and we couldn’t even figure out how to check in. However, the thought of the western toilet and ac just kept coming to the front of mind, so we waited out the process and then went to our room. Once we got there, we all started getting ready for bed and taking our Benadryl, which is a necessity for our allergies in the hotel. The only place that is smoke free in China is the airplanes and when you caught a whiff of the air when people would leave the bathrooms, I don’t think they are following the rules. By about 8:30, we were out for the night. All of sudden, I was awoken by knocking on the door; it was around 10 PM at this time. I decided to ignore it and stay in bed with my Benadryl induced slumber. They wouldn’t go away and then they started yelling, “Police”. Great. I jumped from bed in a panic and Jared is right behind me. I looked through the peephole and couldn’t see a thing. It didn’t help that I had forgot to bring my glasses to the hotel and had to sleep in my daily contacts that by this time were glued to my eyeballs. When I asked them what they wanted, they said they were the police and needed to come into our room and see our passports. Hello, no way. I told them that I wanted them to come back with a hotel employee. Well, apparently there was one with them, but they just wear skirts and white blouses, so it could have been anyone and none of them speak English anyway. They want in the room. Ok, I will be honest, my cool collectedness was gone. I was freaking out. About this time, I make Jared go wake Jaclyn up. How could she sleep through this anyway? Could the tension running through my body not spark some type of current that would have jolted her awake? I decide to sacrifice my only son for the safety of the women of his family, and open the door with the chain so we can at least see clearly what is going on. I tell him to ask what they want. He does, but they respond with “He is not the male of the family.” Well, duh, the male of my family is home probably eating at some yummy restaurant and enjoying AC. He is not going to find him there. I decide at this time, I am going to have to figure this out. I go to the crack and tell him I cannot let him in. He tells me he is the police again. Ok, I am not dumb. The man is wearing some type of basketball shorts and muscle shirt. I tell him he is not in uniform, but he tells me not to worry. It is because it is the weekend. Really?!? I tell him to hold on and shut the door. I go and dig through my stuff and find the number for H., the assistant director and the one who speaks the best English here. I frantically dial her. Well, if you can’t remember, I am in China and cannot read a word on the phone and apparently, you don’t dial 9 to get out. I feel trapped. There are a group of men at my door wanting in my room and I have no way to reach the outside world. Even if I knew how to make an international phone call on my phone, David wouldn’t be able to help me out of this one. I did, however, find the card for the orphanage and went back to the door and pointed to A.’s number and asked them to call him. He did and passed the phone in to me and A. told me to trust them and let them in. No! Easy for him to say when he isn’t there. A.’s wife gets on the phone and at this point, I am big time fighting tears and beg her to come and help me. She tells me it is okay to trust them. I tell her he is not in a uniform. The dude hears me and changes his story that he is not really the police, but a translator and doesn’t have a uniform. Ok. Changing your story dude doesn’t make me want to let you in my room any more than before. When E. realizes he is not in uniform, she asks to talk to him and comes back and tells me it is the weekend and he says it is okay. I get it. It is way past the appropriate calling/visiting time on a Saturday night. I am still not okay with letting him in and handing away my passport and my ticket home. I finally give the phone to the basketball cop and tell him to tell A. that I will open then door when A. is with them. The police dude says he will wait, but that I cannot leave the room until they return. Really? At this time, I am pretty for sure I may never slide the chain on that door. I am definitely not going to leave with a group of men waiting in the lobby and go on a late night stroll through town. While we wait, we pack all of our belongings, throw on our clothes and do some big time Talking to Him. About 10 minutes later, A., E. and their baby arrive. Friends have never looked so good. It appears, the hotel reported that they had foreigners in their hotel and the police were coming to check us out. The first day we were here, A. had made copies of our passport and visa and filed them with the police, but apparently, the ones on duty this night didn’t think to go and check at the station. They continued on with checking our passports and visas. Our visa was processed in Houston, so basketball cop asked if we were from Houston. I answered, “yes” right as Jared answered “no”. Great. Jared, when you are in China, Houston is close enough to home. We don’t want to draw suspicion to ourselves. I tell the man that we are very close to Houston. Apparently, they have strong feelings towards the Houston Rockets here. I tried to talk basketball like I knew much about this team and not let on that Mavs are the only real Texas team in my opinion. They finish taking their pictures and say they will all leave. They do along with A. and E. and everyone acts like we should be able to drift right back to sleep. Ha! I broke down like a blubbering idiot the moment the door closed. To make matters worse, they don’t give you Kleenex in hotel rooms and they give you about 20 squares of toilet paper. If I don’t stop the crying, there will be no using of the western style toilet the next morning! Janaye quickly drifted back to sleep, Jared tried to break the tension by quoting Community, and Jaclyn stroked my arm. I turned on my most favorite music, the McCoy Family Singers and tried to find peace. The first song that played was Beulah Land…”I’m kind of homesick for a country….” Quick, hit shuffle. That song is too much for the moment. As I laid listening, I realized that He just sent me a reminder, that I although I was feeling pretty confident in my abilities earlier, I needed Him in the worst way. I also needed David. Besides the time that we walked in on robbers in our house and my daddy held them at gunpoint while I ran to call the sheriff, I never remember being so scared, alone and trapped. I never really went back to sleep for the night. I laid in bed afraid there would be more knocks on the door. I was thrilled when morning came and we made the mile walk back to the orphanage. When we walked in, we gave the key to our room to A. and told him we would be staying here at the center from now on. He seemed surprised. I guess he just didn’t get the fear of the moment in a country where you cannot communicate. R. and Ra. understood. They couldn’t believe the whole thing had happened. Could you imagine the stink that would happen if we had foreigners staying in a hotel in America and the police show up at their door that late at night simply because they were foreigners? Oh, well. Today is a new day. This will be chalked up to a life experience and I am going to move on. The forecast is hot, but comfort and safety is going to win over AC. However, it is kind of weird. The 10-day forecast now covers our last full day here at the center. I can’t believe that today marked our third Sunday here. This last week flew by! Next week at this time, I will be hiking back down Kung Fu mountain after our camping adventure. Boy, life is an adventure.