Its a girl!

Sam and I are are thrilled to announce that at our 20-week ultrasound check we found out we are having a girl! We pretty much already have her name picked out, but we only ever call her by her Chinese name -- Try pronouncing this one: xia xi (sounds like "sha shee"). Don't worry, she has an English name, we will just call her xia xi here =). "Xia" means "summer" and also "Eve". "Xi" means "hope". So her Chinese name means "summer hope" or "Eve of hope". She looks healthy and everything seems to be developing according to plan. If you cannot figure out the ultrasound picture, I will try to explain. We are looking at a profile shot of her head. She has her mouth open and her hand up by her face. Isn't she beautiful!?

Hong Kong Trip

Who knew we would see Yao Ming in Hong Kong!? Actually, this is Yao Ming's actual height (although not his actual proportions =)

The temple in Hong Kong was a huge hightlight of our trip there. It is beautiful! We stayed in temple housing for one night. This picture was taken from inside the gates of the temple hostel.

This was the other place we stayed in Hong Kong -- a real Chinese hotel (complete with bed like concrete). The room was so small we could barely walk past one another without climbing on the bed. We were lucky enough to have the room next to the cat's abode. We hear our felion friend meow long into the night =)

This is Amy inside one of the fountains at the Hong Kong botanical garden. The garden was truly beautiful! This is a tropical island, after all!

Sam and Amy in front of the Church Headquarters in HK. This building happens to be on the most expensive piece of land the church owns =)

Foreigner!!!

So walking home just now I passed a group of children playing outside. They noticed me and started staring and pointing. One little boy (about 5 or 6 yrs old), stood up, pointed, and yelled "A foreigner! It's so scary! It really looks so scary!!" I laughed in my heart because I understood every word. (Am I scary? Maybe the blue eyes and blonde hair count as scary...)

Searching for a Hospital

So, since we are having a baby in June, we thought it of utmost priority to find a hospital that was suitable for delivering this little one. They have babies in China, right? So this will probably be no problem. Well, Sam and I set out to visit several hospitals. The first one we visited we met a fiend of a friend who is a doctor there. He showed us around and tried to answer our questions. He showed me the medication room on the maternity floor. They had Normal Saline and D-5 NS. That's it. For those of you who do not work in the medical field, those two "drugs" do nothing more than rehydrate. Our doctor friend then got me permission to enter the delivery room. I was informed that men were not allowed to witness the birth, so Sam could not be with me. After pushing it a little more, they said he could be there only if no other women were there delivering (the likelihood of that happening in a city of 16 million people is I'm sure pretty slim). Anyway, I was also told that it gets busy sometimes and I might have to deliver in the hallway anyway (I guess Sam could be with me there, right?). Okay. Next hospital. The next place we went was the women's specialty hospital. Upon entering I observed a small child being helped to pee in the plants next to the door. We then waded through a sea of people to the restroom. Just outside the bathroom, I observed a grandparent help a small child to poop in a bucket (why not walk 3 feet to the bathroom? I don't know). The bathrooms had only squatter toilets, no soap and no toilet paper. For whatever reason we still went up to the Maternity floor. It was so crowded I could not even get any one's attention to ask any questions. We left. But don't worry, upon leaving I saw another child squat and leave a gift right there on the marble steps leading out. Upon returning to the car, I was informed by our driver that "having a baby is a very simple thing". I said "according to men". And he replied that, no really, it is a very simple thing. I felt like punching him (you shouldn't tell any woman, but certainly not a nurse that!), but I just smiled and got in the car. Anyway, after making a few more visits and phone calls we have decided to deliver in Hong Kong -- I feel much better now!

The bed (continued...)

So the latest in our bed saga was the arrival of the repairman. His tools consisted of: a hammer. He beat the heck out of our bed for about fifteen minutes and then concluded the same thing that we concluded, "Its broken". Right. So our bed still slants and is currently supported by several rolls of toilet paper that are starting to bow under the weight. Its so ridiculous that I just have to laugh instead of get upset. (I might not laugh, however, if we are awoken one night plummeting to the ground with the final surrender of the last toilet paper roll!)