Wednesday - Dec. 13th

DAY THIRTEEN: Guangzhou -> Los Angeles -> Scottsdale

This final day update page is being composed from the good 'ol USA. We made it home, but here's a recap of the "longest day" -- Wednesday, December 13th, which for us was 39 hours long!

Our flight didn't leave Guangzhou until after 8pm China time, and we didn't have to check out of the White Swan Hotel until 5:30pm, so we had one final day to "kill" before we got to go home. After breakfast, Kevin decided that he would take Jocelyn and Shane to the "mall" that he visited the day prior so he could share his experience, but mainly because he knew there was a Pizza Hut there and that sounded awfully good for lunch. Kevin had previously gotten a little hotel business card with the name of what he thought was the "mall" that he found yesterday written on it in Chinese. With that little document in hand (and our umbrella and borrowed stroller, because it was another cold, rainy day), we confidently boarded a taxicab and showed the driver the card and he shook his head confirming he knew where we wanted to go. Not 3 minutes later, the cab driver stopped and motioned "we're here," but the location did NOT look familiar to Kevin. We tried to ask the taxi driver probing questions like "This is what this card says?" and "Pizza Hut?" -- all in a language he didn't understand. Being in a bit of a bind, Kevin thinks that maybe we're just on the back side of the mall or something, and so we get out of the taxi into the rain and head into the "department store." After wandering a bit and realizing this was not the place -- and definitely no Pizza Hut, we decide to start hiking a bit, hoping we are close. At least we had the card that said "take me back to the White Swan" so we knew at least that we could get home if we got lost -- well we already were lost, so no harm in getting "more lost."

We hiked in the rain -- thank goodness for the stroller -- and probably ended up wandering for a mile and believe it or not, we actually found the place we originally were looking for...and the Pizza Hut was open! Shane fell asleep in the stroller during that journey and after a little shopping, we plopped down in the very nice Pizza Hut restaurant for lunch. Ahhh....just like home...even had Celine Dion and Michael Bolton CD's playing Christmas music! After lunch, we taxi'd back to the hotel.

At 3:30pm we were all to gather on the 17th floor of the hotel so Helen could distribute the pile of sealed immigrant visa packets that she earlier picked up from the Consulate. This is the final key needed to escape China and bring our boy home! Of course, our resident comedian Leo wanted to know if this was the point where we give the rental babies back!?! We decided to keep ours and packed up and checked out and headed for the Guangzhou airport. It took a while, given the heavy traffic, but we made it into the airport, through customs and check-in and we boarded the plane. We had previously decided to upgrade to business class for this particular leg of the journey. It wasn't cheap, but the extra room was great to have for an active toddler. Thankfully, the long ride home went more quickly than the flight TO China, given westerly tailwinds, and Shane and us actually got a reasonable amount of sleep. They served us breakfast just before the plane landed in LA -- only problem was that the time in LA was 5:00pm.

The customs and immigrant check-in process in LA wasn't all that bad. We handed over the mysterious sealed immigrant visa package that we were told not to open, and then after a few minutes, the INS official (or whatever he was) returned with our 3 passports and said we could proceed. The sealed packet stayed with them and we may never know what was inside! After a short layover in LA, and a flight delayed a half hour, we finally boarded our final short hop from LA to Phoenix. It went quickly as Shane took his "afternoon" nap, and we arrived in Phoenix around 10:30pm to a wonderful group of 24 people who were kind enough to stay up late, trek to the airport and greet us. Shane was a little overwhelmed by all the attention, but he charmed them and WE WERE HOME and our new little family of SIX was finally together in one place!

We got our bags (they all made it!) and got to the house around midnight. The kids stayed up a bit, but eventually pooped out, and Shane and us stayed up until 3 or 4am...being that our clock was a little backwards.

Today's Pictures:

	<- Final day at the beautiful White Swan Hotel in Guangzhou
The destination for the day -- achieved! ->
	<- Our bus to the airport being followed by all the well-wishers from China seeing us off -- OK, not really, it's just the traffic, including all the amazingly daring motorcycle riders.
Shane checking out the audio selections before settling in for the long plane ride home. ->
	<- Catching some Z's on the ride over the ocean.
The airplane screen display showing our progress. This time, we ARE going over the water. ->
	<- Shane trying out the drinking fountain in the LA airport. They basically don't do these in China, so Shane's first reaction when we held him up to it was to wash his hands. Oops! :)
Shane meets his brothers and he opens a gift they had for him ->
	<- Shane's brothers "demonstrating" his new bed to him. Of course, still being morning on his clock, why would he want to use it now?