This place is just like Seattle…

…but hotter. And grayer. And without the good coffee. Well, there are a few Starbucks nearby but you get the idea. Today is our seventh day in Chongqing and today is the seventh consecutive day of rain, fog and oppressive

humidity. It’s cooled down quite a bit since we got here but the 125% humidity ups the gray factor significantly. Everything is moist, nothing is ever completely dry, just more dry than it was before. But today is our last day here, so hopefully our seasonal effectiveness disorders will clear up in Guangzhou.

It occurs to me that I have talked a lot about what we are doing with Ty and not a lot about him as a kid. So, here’s what we know so far about the new addition to our family. First of all, we don’t call him Tyson yet b/c he doesn’t know Tyson from a hole in the wall. He only responds to his full name, Hui Qiang (pronounced quickly as one word “we-chong” but with the slightest hint of an ‘h’ in front – hweechong. Everyone at the orphanage, including his classmates called him that. It is the first time we have heard of an orphanage doing that – maybe because he is a boy they do things differently. We’re not sure yet how to may the transition to Tyson – we are thinking of starting with Ty Qiang (Tychong) in Guangzhou and transitioning to Tyson after he her gets home. One thing at a time.

The Diego briefs and the Kung Fu Panda briefs all fit fabulously. The boxer briefs we are trying out today. We’ll get back to you on that. He is about 40-42 pounds but it’s hard to weigh a moving target so that’s our best guess – so no 5 point restraint needed. We’ve been training him to wear a seatbelt – something our driver and guide (and the whole country) find curious. Here they pile 2-3 kids and the wife on motorcycle without helmets and don’t think twice about cutting off a speeding bus.

Tyson is a very happy kid – he has a joyous heart and wears it on his sleeve. He is full of fun and laughs, always goofing around, running around, making silly faces. He’s got a whole catalogue of facial expressions and even though we don’t understand him vocally, his intentions and needs have been crystal clear. He says some phrases repeatedly and we’d love to know what he is saying. If only someone here spoke Chinese, we could find out what he is saying, but our translator hasn’t been very forthcoming with that info. An constantly asking him to translate for us gets annoying. So there are somethings he says that we just don’t understand.

His first English words “no!” – not on the survey. I wonder where he picked that up from? Aside from his name, it’s the number one thing we end up saying to him. That should give you an idea of the time we are having with him.

He loves to see himself in pictures and on video – what kids doesn’t? – and he shouts out his name every time he sees himself. In fact, he is sooooo smart. Going through his learning books he can match up color and look at pictures of things and go find them in the room. He knows how to change the channels on the TV and correctly get the TV back to the DVD player setting. He can figure out how the computer and DVD player plug in and recharge. He remembers where everything is in the hotel, knows how to operate the elevator and whether we are going up to eat or down to the lobby, and when he sees pictures in the hotel literature of the pool room, executive lounge, front desk or our bedroom he squeals with delight and points. He recognizes the places he has been and hose he hasn’t. He is very independent in the happy room and bathtub, getting dressed, cleaning up after himself., etc. We were very worried about his physical and mental development as institutional life tends to diminish this in kids. But, praise the Lord, he seems to be doing great. Time will tell we know, but he seems like he is very smart to us. When he feels like listening, he follows directions very well. He is doing so well, in fact, that we are wondering if he got a little extra attention at the orphanage because he is a boy and they just don’t have many of them there.

In fact, the only place the little guy seems to be behind is with his speech – which he can’t help b/c the cleft is a physical impairment he has had to learn to work around. Considering that obstacle, his vocabulary and pronunciation is pretty impressive. For those of you who don’t know, Ty has a cleft palate that is unrepaired – something we will remedy in few months at CHKD back home. He has a hard palate but his soft palate is wide open all the way back making his nasal cavity and the back of his mouth one, big, open space. He has no soft palate to close of his nose when he swallows and when he tries to speak air rushes out both his nose and mouth – creating a nasally sound kind of like a little trumpet. Certain sounds tent to honk more than others based on how the human mouth makes those sounds. So, even the Chinese have a bit of trouble understanding him as the subtleties of the language seem to get lost in his nose. One other thing, he can’t use a straw – that requires creating a vacuum in your mouth by closing off your nasal passageway and inhaling. So, the Diego sippy cup (flip top straw cup really) that he loves so much is useless. It took two tries for us (and him) to realize that wouldn’t work – air just rushes in his nose when he suck on the straw. So, we’ve found he is very good with a plain old cup, since he’s had to use one his whole life. So, considering that formidable obstacle , he is doing really well. He is able to eat anything we’ve given him – his teeth work just fine and his eyes are bigger than his stomach. He like to cram food in his mouth – but we imagine this will dissipate once he learns that there is no limit to the food. He’s already figured this out with drinks; the first day we got him he must have drank a gallon of water with the obvious and previously documented consequences. Now that he knows there is water aplenty, he has slowed down a trifle.

So, we went to the Chongqing Zoo, which was actually a really great zoo. We had heard that the zoos here tend towards the anemic and disturbing, but Chongqing is reputed to have a pretty good zoo. The whole city is in the mountains so the zoo is pretty hilly; this adds to sense of size as every exhibit is kind of set apart on top of a hill or around a rocky outcrop. We saw elephants and hippos and tigers and giraffes and kangaroos and of course the Giant Panda. There were a ton of the Pandas. The one pic above shows that my arm is all that separates Tyson from a ten foot drop into Panda pit. Not so much on the safety here. Thankfully there was glass separating us from the Tigers, or Ty might have jumped in to play with them. The place was bigger than we were able to get to (missed the aviary and who knows what else) but our guide is always in a hurry. Guess that happen when you visit the same place over and over again for a living - but seriously a little more time would have been appreciated. Today we fly to Guangzhou - the last leg of our trip. His first flight - this ought to be interesting.

I'll update later if i have time.