AN INAUSPICIOUS BEGINNING

The morning started off well enough. Lisa and I had a good night sleep, woke up at 7 am and went to the gym in the hotel. We had a great breakfast at the hotel and were ready to go. Not even the intermitten rain dampened my spirits.

At about 11am the other 2 families arrived at the hotel. All of the families have communicated by emails and phone and this was the first time that we all met in person. I'm excited to be sharing this experience with them.

Our facilitor from the adoption agency, Ninh, lives in Hanoi and will accompany us while we are in Vietnam. Ninh is also in charge of helping us with the process, making all travel arrangements and setting appointments for us. The other 2 families said that when Ninh picked them up at the airport, he informed them that we would only be visiting the babies on Monday but the adoption ceremony would NOT be held that same day. He said that it would be held on Tues or Wed, which was a HUGE disappointment to everyone. The normal process, as I've always understood it, was that we would meet the babies the first day and adopt them the second day. However, our agency indicated 2 weeks ago that we would be able to do both on Monday, and since another family was able to do both on the same day last week, we all had our hopes up. The other families do not speak Vietnamese and Ninh spoke English with a thick accent (I'm told) so I'm wondering (and hoping) that they misunderstood him or there was something lost in translation. I've called, and am waiting for a call back from Ninh, to find out what is going on. However, I am prepared to accept that this is a case of "false labor", but Fate was not through with me today....

The rain let up bit so Lisa and I decided to go site seeing. We took a taxi down to the Old Quarter and did engage in some retail therapy. After an hour of haggling over prices, I was exhausted (Tony, Cassi and Mom, all marathon hagglers, are shaking their heads in embarrassment right now) so we just walked around. We walked to a beautiful lake in the center of town called the Lake Hoan Kiem. There is a temple on the lake called the Ngoc Son pagoda that can be accessed via a red bridge called the Bridge of the Rising Sun. The lake is a very peaceful and serene place to be. Being that it is Sunday, there were many people walking around the lake, fishing or sitting in quiet contemplation.

The local folklore is that in the 2nd century A.D., Le Loi, the first king of united Viet people, asked the powers of the heavens to help him vanquish the Chinese from Vietnam. In answer, a giant turtle rose from the depth of Lake Hoan Kiem and gave Le a sword which he used to drive out the Chinese. Once his purpose was accomplished, Le returned the sword to the giant turtle, who took the sword into the depths the Lake. The Viet people took this as a sign that they could lay down their arms and live in peace. (The fact that the Chinese continued to rule Vietnam for centuries after the 2nd century should not get in the way of a good story.)

I would love to show you my pictures of the Lake, but I can't because as I turned around on the wet, slick red bridge to direct Lisa's attention to the murial of a giant turtle, I slipped and dropped my digital camera into the dirty, murky lake. One of the workers there climbed onto the side of the bridge and stuck his hand into the murky lake and fetched the camera for me. Luckily, I dropped it in shallow area. As it was wet, the camera does not work. I'm hoping that once it dries off, it would work. But, I am prepared to accept that it's a gonner. I typically travel with several cameras for circumstances like these so I have another camera but it's not a digital. I'll buy a new one tomorrow, which means there will be hours of haggling in my near future.....