Thursday,
July 24, 2008
Before we headed to Hong Kong we had a wonderful dinner
with Dr. Meiji, Daniel and three international MBA
students - Rebecca, White and Terry and to make it even
more interesting, we had Italian food!! It was very
interesting to hear about the MBA program and China
through the eyes of these young students. Caroline did not
find it as interesting and fell asleep right in her pasta!
At least this allowed us to have more conversation! Kevin
carried Katie out of the restaurant and Dr. Meiji carried
Caroline - it wasn't until we were heading down the
escalator did we realize that we left Caroline's flip
flops (one of the 100 pairs she brought to Hong Kong) at
the restaurant. Thank you Daniel for going back to the
restaurant for them!
Kevin especially enjoyed the dinner until he realized that
Dr. Meiji had just played golf that afternoon - Kevin has
not played now for more than one month! Its killing him!
The morning of the 24th, we had an early breakfast and
headed to the HK train station - now we are seasoned Asian
travelers and enjoyed the trip to the station and the wait
at the station terminal. Adie was very right in her advice
to limit our luggage - the trip within the station is
grueling with several bags but Kevin did a great job - we
called him our Sherpa!
We made it back to the original hotel which started our
visit - the JW Marriott and had the room just down the
hallway so it was a full circle trip for us. We were then
greeted for lunch by our friend Theresa and her children,
Jessica, Marissa and Jonathon. Caroline enjoyed seeing
Marissa again and meeting Jessica and Jonathon. All the
kids seemed to love seeing Katie and were taking turns
playing with her. We thought that Caroline would resent
the attention to her little sister but she seemed to enjoy
showing her off and she was so enthralled by walking
around Hong Kong, she didn't seem to care.
We had lunch at a Thai restaurant and were also joined by
Adie and her daughter, Vanessa (this is Dr. Meiji's
family). Lunch was great although Katie had a better use
of the chopsticks than Kathy! Adie and Theresa and the
kids brought Caroline and Katie presents which were big
hits. Katie still carries her Elmo doll with her.
After lunch, we visited the Observation Deck to see Hong
Kong - it was spectacular! Just a beautiful city. Our
first two days in Hong Kong were rainy so this was a real
treat. After this, Kevin took Katie back to the hotel for
a nap (maybe he wanted to nap too!) and the rest of the
gang went for ice cream and a walk in the park. Adie had
to return to work but Vanessa stayed with us.
For dinner, we went to the Peak (the high point of Hong
Kong). The view was amazing. We were also able to meet
Theresa's husband, Hansen (hope we spelled correctly).
Dinner was amazing with the great views and we felt that
it was a day we could actually relax.
Theresa/Adie, we cannot express enough how much we
appreciated your support and company when we were in Hong
Kong. Caroline was very sad to say good-bye to her new
friends and wants to know when we can return to Hong Kong.
She's planning a visit next July (or so she says). Theresa
asked her if she would like to visit Hong Kong and stay
with her family and Caroline actually said that she would
- we can't even get to her spend a night in Grandma's!!
Vanessa, Jessica, Marissa and Jonathon - we miss you guys
and we'll send you some additional pictures to you guys
(yes, the one of Marissa will be part of it!).
Thanks again to everyone for their continued support. This
has been an amazing journey for us and one that we will
never forget. It has been filled with a variety of
emotions and ended with a sense of peace that our family
was meant to meet Katie and love and care for her forever.
She is truly our daughter and sister and we feel as though
she has been with us forever. We think often of her birth
mother and her foster parents and we cry for their loss
but we are forever grateful for everyone who has
contributed to this process - from our agency (Holt
International), our social worker, our families and
friends. We also appreciate the support of Joe and
Jennifer who help us maintain our web-site. This is a
family who is dedicated to providing families with an
opportunity to share their adoption stories and it allowed
us to stay connected with everyone who is important in our
lives.
Love,
Kathy, Kevin, Caroline and Katie |
Beautiful Hong Kong
The gang
Crazy kids
Great friends
The cool guys
Caroline and Jonathon
|
