3 Weeks to China

Today we received our final itinerary for the two weeks we will be in China.  The first 5 days will be in Guizhou, our daughters province.  We will meet her on day 2, and she will be with us for the remainder of the trip.  During that time, we will be finalizing the adoption and doing some sightseeing with a guide.

On day 6, we fly to the city of Guangzhou, where the US Consulate is.  We will spend 8 days there and during that time we will be taking care of Yu Pings passport, visa, and medical exam, and she will be sworn in as a US citizen on March 1 (exactly one year to the day we first saw her picture).  We will also have some time to sightsee there.

We are frequently asked if we will be changing her name to an American one, and the answer is "maybe".  We will leave that decision up to her.  At the very least, we will keep "Yu Ping" as her middle name (like we did with Evan's Korean name), but neither Don nor I feel comfortable walking into the life of this 7 year old child and telling her that her name isn't good enough for us.  We first saw her picture and claimed her as our own 11 months ago.  During this wait, we have thought of her as "Yu Ping" or "Ping Ping" (Chinese kids are often called by the 2nd name twice), and it seems very comfortable to us.  If she wants to have an American name, we have a list of some we like, or if she has heard of an American name that she likes, then thats ok too.  Regardless, the decision will be hers.