We finally made it to Xining, after our 23-hour train turned into 25 hours.
The difference between Xining and Chenzhou is wonderful. There’s more space, less people, and less noise.
We have rented an apartment in a very quiet area (don’t know how long it will last since the city is expanding both east and west). They say it’s on the 6th floor, but it feels more like the 7th (I don’t think they count the ground floor), and with no elevator, I should be able to lose some weight. The apartment is only an empty shell, so we have to paint and carpet it, as well as install a bathtub, fridge, and everything else. In the meantime, we’re staying in someone else’s apartment while they’re out of town.
We woke up to snow yesterday morning, but it was gone by mid-afternoon. Just the top of the mountains still has some.
The boys are settling in, but we’re all ready to move into the new apartment and call it home.
I haven’t posted in a few weeks because we’ve been too busy. After my first trip to Xining, the boys and I had to go to Hong Kong. That drew a lot of comments – one dad and 3 small boys on a train, then walking all over Hong Kong. When we arrived, there was no one going through immigration, but the next day there were tons of people headed into China for the Grave Sweeping Holiday. The boys did great the entire trip.
After leaving HK, we met JP in Guangzhou where we met some friends from home who were adopting their second Chinese son. Our boys had a blast playing with their friends for the next 2 days. After that, it was back to Chenzhou to start packing. Our stuff left Chenzhou last week, and we left on Sunday and arrived here on Monday.