Hi, from Saigon! (Ho Chi Minh City)

Hello! I think we are finally up and running again! Thanks so much to my bud Emily for posting for me! The hotel in Danang blocked all blogger sites and acted like they didn't exist, and I couldn't remember my code to post by email--yet another thing forgotten in our haste to leave...

Anyway, like Em posted, we had the Giving & Receiving ceremony on Wed, so buttercup is officially our daughter! Woohoo! She behaved wonderfully, and fell asleep right up until it was our turn. She said goodbye to all the nannies who I know will miss her and she them. She was all dressed in her fancy duds (which then got put in a ziplock to suffocate the critters!) The next day, Thursday, we left Danang to fly back to Saigon, so she had her first flight in Business class. There we learned our buttercup has some good lungs and knows how to use them! Man can our girl scream! I am really looking forward to that 11 hour leg of flight home! Not! I finally got her to sleep--it was only an hour flight, thank goodness. She will not take a pacifier, so we couldn't get her to ease her ears that way. I never understood a baby not taking a pacifier until now, if we try to stick it in her mouth, she gets mad and screams louder! Ha, ha. She is getting us trained, I guess.

We are doing good and all getting to know each other. We spent that night getting settled and figuring out we didn't have the easiest baby in the world, evidently--she must have been pooped that first night because it was a breeze to get her to sleep then--check out the new pics of the sleeping angel. Last night the benedryl that helped her itching the night before didn't work so well, so it was a little battle of the wills to get her to sleep....The next morning, yesterday, at 8 am sharp, we all met Quoc in the lobby to pile in two vans to go apply for the babies' passports, get the babies' medical exams done for the visas, and to have their passport photos taken. All went well--we are in good hands with Quoc. He left yesterday and will meet us in Hanoi. We have until next Wed to wait for the passports to process, so we finally have a little downtime to get out and explore. After we got back fromt the appointments yesterday we did just that--we went to Pho 24 to eat---what else, but some Pho (Vietnamese Noodle Soup), one of our faves--with Bethany & Kevin and their daughter, Leah and then we braved the traffic to cross to the little mall to do some shopping at the "Big C" store. It is like a smaller Vietnamese Super Wal-Mart. There is everything from groceries, to shoes, to electronic appliances. It was really neat and I love that everyone is getting ready for Tet and is so festive--liken it to shopping right before Christmas for us. We managed to buy Buttercup enough fancy red envelopes to celebrate Tet for a few years to come. This is where we found the adaptor that saved the day and is allowing us to charge all of our stuff now. Whew, one crisis averted. We shopped our little hearts out, going down every aisle and bought some food for the room, so when Princess M is sleeping (or screaming) we have something to munch on. We got some interesting different fruits to try--it is really a mystery because everything is really all in Vietnamese there. Most places tend to have English translations on the signs, but not in there, so it's gonna be mystery fruit! The little bananas they have here are so good! They are really tiny and sweet--I stock up at the breakfast bar in the morning.

We all relaxed and had coffee at Highland Coffee (for those of you that didn't know, Vietnam is the second largest producer of coffee and it is so rich and good here) before braving the traffic to head back to the hotel. The traffic here defies description--it is absolutely insane. I had heard all about it, and still I am utterly amazed. Picture 1,000 motorbike/scooters and a few cars and vans in a constant stream of traffic that never lets up, just jockeying for position and passing and weaving around each other (it's scary enough riding in a car/van from that view) and needing to cross to the other side. Well, the method is to just pick a moment and step off the curb into it and they will just swerve around you as you walk (hopefully)--the trick is to keep a steady pace so they can anticipate where you will be to get around you. I just keep my eye on the other side and keep walking--imagine that with a baby strapped to you! So far, so good, we have crossed twice! On the way back another dad had joined us in his trip for supplies and he got video as we were crossing--I hope to get a copy to show later. Don't worry everyone--that is just how it is done and you see young kids carrying toddlers across in the same way. I guess they just have to be very aware of what everyone is doing around them--it must work, surprisingly we have seen no accidents at all!



Today, after Breakfast we took little Miss M to the International Clinic to have her looked at because she is still really uncomfortable and itchy and it gets worse at night and makes it hard for her to go to sleep (not hard to scream though!) and we noticed a little wheezing when she lays down. One of the other families who have a son from her orphanage took him in this morning, as his scabies is causing some major skin issues and he ended up having a slight fever and upper respiratory infection--we thought we'd better get her checked. The doctor said she had no fever and didn't seem too concerned, but told us to stop the benedryl (it will dry her up) and gave us prescriptions for an antibiotic/anti itch cream for the couple remaining places on her and an oral antibiotic to combat any infection. All that for a total of less than $20 (with no insurance!). Hopefully she will get some comfort soon--we go for a recheck on Wed. before we leave for Hanoi. She was pretty good for the doc (who was very nice, but a little hard for me to understand), and the nurse asked how long we had had her, and when we said three days, she was surprised and said she looked like she was more familiar with us--a good sign! After we got back, she played a bit and took an almost 3 hour nap, so we have been nap-trapped for the day just hanging out in the room (and spending hours uploading pictures with the much appreciated, but very slow/low internet connection--So enjoy!). New pics on the Flickr site--I am trying to slowly, but surely catch up.... Here she is getting weighed at the Visa Medical Exam--7.5 kgs and 69 cm long!



Will try to update tomorrow--hopefully we can get out and explore a bit more-hope things are open on Sundays!

Love to all! We are doing well and are loving getting to see and spend time in Vietnam-These are some of the nicest people in the world-I will try to post a pic or two, but since connection is slow, it may not work, so check out the flickr site!