DAY FIVE:  Yangzhou

Today was a great day.  We spent the entire day in Yangzhou, Shane Fu's birthplace, that included sightseeing and a visit to Shane's orphanage, the Yangzhou Social Welfare Institute, where Shane spent almost two years of his little life.

We met in the hotel lobby at 9am and departed for the famous Ge Gardens in Yangzhou.  Quite fascinating...lots of bamboo along with rock gardens that were very impressive.  They had built some caves and small passageways through some of the rock gardens that we enjoyed taking Shane through.  After that, we continued on to visit a "jadeware factory" where they created many different types of creations out of jade.  We didn't spend a lot of time here, but bought a couple of gifts and saw some interesting handiwork.  There was an opportunity here for Shane to run around out front in a garden area with a pagoda and some fountains.  After boarding the bus yet again, we learned that Shane really likes to ride on the bus.  While he can be a little difficult in a restaurant or store setting, he sits on our lap and rides the bus like a champ.  More on that later.

Next we went to the orphanage.  It would take pages to describe the feelings we felt and the sights that we saw here, but we'll try to summarize quickly.  After arriving there, we met in the "reception room" where we were all seated and the orphanage director came to each of us individually and handed us a stack of wonderful items.  These included a map of the city of Yangzhou with a special mark showing where Shane was originally abandoned; a copy of the newspaper article that was listed after he was found, trying to find his parents, which of course went unanswered; a congratulatory certificate in a nice red velvety little booklet; a "chop" which is a jade (?) stamp that was personalized with the animal representing his year of birth (in Shane's case, he was born in 1998, the Year of the Tiger) and also the Chinese characters representing his name (Yang Fu).

After that session, we went to a dining room where the orphanage cooks prepared a wonderful lunch for us all, and most of it was quite good.  As is getting to be quite regular with meals here, there were several things that we did not recognize, and so a few things went untried.  The Chinese tend to have many, many plates of different foods that they continue to parade out with during the meal...all served on a big lazy susan in the middle of the table and they give you a "dinner plate" the size of a teacup saucer and so you are constantly filling your plate and eating small amounts at a time.  Shane liked a lot of this food today, and ate well.  One of the new moms' birthdays was today, and the orphanage prepared a gorgeous birthday cake and we sang to her and had the cake for dessert.  See below and you'll see that Shane really liked the cake!

We were very privileged next to get to visit the babies rooms of the orphanage.  They asked that we not take photos, but it was an incredible sight.  Of what we saw, they had two wings of rooms with cribs and babies, babies, babies.  We did not see any empty cribs and in some cases there was more than one baby per crib.  The orphanage staff was in most every room working and caring for these little ones.  It is a heart-wrenching experience to see all of this, but our impression was that this is a first-class orphanage and they are doing an admirable job of keeping up with the incredible responsibility.

During this time we were able to speak with the orphanage doctor, whom we had actually met the day before.  She was able to give us lots more information surrounding Shane and the abdominal surgeries which he has experienced.  After hearing the details that we did not previously have, we were both in tears with thankfulness to our Lord God for his awesome power in literally saving the life of this little one to now be a part of our family.  Obviously, these details would take too much space on this site, but suffice it to say that our little Shane is a miracle -- which probably could be said about each and every baby in these orphanages.

We were a bit worried about Shane returning to his orphanage and wondering if he would react negatively, as in thinking we were "sending him back" or something.  Being one of very few toddlers in the orphanage (we actually didn't see ANY toddlers in our visit today), Shane was something of a celebrity as we wandered the halls of the orphanage.  At every turn we were hearing cries of "YangFu!" from employee after employee at the orphanage.  The funny thing is, it was as if he didn't give them the time of day and just ignored all their attempts to get his attention.  He is with his new mom and dad now and that was that!  The only place where he acted like he was familiar with his surroundings was when we got to a play room at the end of the hall, where he ran in like he knew the place well and went for some of his favorite toys.  No time to play however, and so we ushered him out of there.  He resisted a bit, but Shane brushed it off and looked forward to the next adventure.

As we were waiting for the bus to fill up for our departure, Shane ran to the bus and boarded, but he noticed that the bus driver was not around.  He then marched back out of the bus, with Dad following at a distance.  Well, at this point a crowd was forming to see the bus off (don't know if this is a normal thing or not) and Shane was getting quite the reaction from the crowd.  He started hollering very loudly something that sounded like "neeyi, neeyi!"  What we realized later was that Shane was looking for the bus driver.  He finally spotted the driver off in the distance and literally went and grabbed the driver's hand...much to the delight of the crowd...and pulled the driver to the bus.  The timing was perfect, because we really were ready to go, and Shane took his place in the bus seat and we were off!  What an experience!

Did we say we were going to summarize?  Jeez...this is not easy to do, and really, you didn't get many of the amazing details above.  We end today still in Yangzhou, but we return tomorrow around noon to Nanjing for at least one more night there.

For those of you following this journey here and that have been praying for us, we want to thank you so much for that.  It is and has been apparent that God has gone before us and prepared the way.  He has honored those prayers!  Many times each day Jocelyn and Kevin look at each other and just share a sense of awe over this experience.  Please continue to pray for safety in travel and good health for all three of us as we continue on this amazing journey that the Lord is leading us through.

One last thing -- we got to speak with Tyler and Eric and Bryan today -- it was so great to hear their voices!  They are doing well in Arizona with Grandma and seem to be having a wonderful time.  We DO miss them greatly and can't wait to see them playing with and getting to know their new little brother!

Today's Photo Journal:

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