Longest day of our lives, 32 hours of travelling. BLAH! Our bags had to be outside our room at 5 AM. We met everyone downstairs at 5:50 and it was on the bus back to the airport. After we arrived we checked our luggage all the way to Orlando and then went through customs and immigration to leave. We have one and a half hours to wait around and then we boarded the plane for the 40 minute flight from Guangzhou back to Hong Kong. Everything on that China Southern Flight was just fine! In Hong Kong we had to go through security again and then had a 3 hour layover before our flight to Chicago. Someone said, wow look at all the babies as we were getting on board. It seems like we were sequestered to the last part of the plane. It was almost entirely adoptive families with babies/children from row 45 back (we were row 60 out of 62). One poor man who was travelling alone kept requesting to move. Apparently he didn't believe the flight attendants when they kept telling him the entire plane was full and there was not an empty seat to switch to. Ainsley was a pretty good flyer for the big part of the trip. After a little more than 14 hours we landed in Chicago. It was so NOT fun. It was very windy and the plane had to circle a few times so every so often the wind would hit and the plane would drop. It was worse than the Changsha flight. When we landed it was on the back left wheel and then the front one and finally the back right wheel. Very scary to say the least.
We had to go through the non-citizen line for Ainsley. We picked up our bags to they could be screened, our paperwork was gone through and then Ainsley's Chinese passport was stamped twice and she became an American Citizen (she is actually dual now). We said goodbye to most of our travel companions for the last 2 weeks and headed to the other terminal at O'Hare for domestic flights. We had to go through security AGAIN! and then headed for our gate for the rest of the 5 hour layover. While we waited, our gate changed 3 times. So that kept us on guard from falling asleep. Eventually we boarded the flight to Orlando and were met by Babcia (grandma in Polish) and grandpa at the airport. They were happy to meet Ainsley and were very good about only trying to talk to her. We got on board the little park and ride bus and got to the car. Ainsley was introduced to her car seat which was pretty much hysteria since she was very used to being held by us in vehicles. Much screaming ensued during the 2 hour drive home. Poor thing.
We arrived home at 2:30 AM, stayed up for about an hour with Ainsley looking around frantically trying to figure out where the heck she was and then all crashed in Ainsley's room. The next night we moved her crib to our room so we could all be comfortable on a bed and she can wake up and see her Baba is right there.
We had to go through the non-citizen line for Ainsley. We picked up our bags to they could be screened, our paperwork was gone through and then Ainsley's Chinese passport was stamped twice and she became an American Citizen (she is actually dual now). We said goodbye to most of our travel companions for the last 2 weeks and headed to the other terminal at O'Hare for domestic flights. We had to go through security AGAIN! and then headed for our gate for the rest of the 5 hour layover. While we waited, our gate changed 3 times. So that kept us on guard from falling asleep. Eventually we boarded the flight to Orlando and were met by Babcia (grandma in Polish) and grandpa at the airport. They were happy to meet Ainsley and were very good about only trying to talk to her. We got on board the little park and ride bus and got to the car. Ainsley was introduced to her car seat which was pretty much hysteria since she was very used to being held by us in vehicles. Much screaming ensued during the 2 hour drive home. Poor thing.
We arrived home at 2:30 AM, stayed up for about an hour with Ainsley looking around frantically trying to figure out where the heck she was and then all crashed in Ainsley's room. The next night we moved her crib to our room so we could all be comfortable on a bed and she can wake up and see her Baba is right there.
No comments:
Post a Comment