We made it to Guangzhou!

I'm very tired and it's late, but I wanted to post a quick note that Marley & I made it to Guangzhou. We met up with two other families at the airport and all rode to our very swanky hotel together. Marley kept looking at the other families with such curiosity and then looking at me. Maybe she was thinking "Oh, poop. None of these funny-looking people speak Chinese either!" From what I could see out the window on the way here to Shamian Island, which is the part of Guangzhou we'll be in for the rest of our stay in China, it is very nice. I think one of the most welcome sights I saw was people eating dinner outside at the restaurants. Warm weather, here we come!

For our last afternoon in Nanjing today, our guide took Marley & I to visit an area called "Old City Town" (or maybe "Old Town City"??) and it was really cool. There is a nice hotel there that many adoptive families stay in, and I think if we had been there instead of where we stayed, my gloomy mood would not have been quite so gloomy. There are tons of cool shops, restaurants, and beautiful historic sights. There is a Confucian Temple, some small pagodas, river boats, and it was all decorated for the Lantern Festival which occurs right after Chinese New Year. It was crowded with young, happy people who were out for some shopping or dining. It was a very different side of Nanjing than I had been used to seeing. If I could have walked out of my hotel and into those surroundings, it would have been much more bearable after Dave left. I'll post some pictures from the area tomorrow--I'm not exactly sure which one of my over-stuffed bags is currently hiding my camera.

Marley's first flight was a breeze. She snacked during lift-off, which I think helped with any lingering ear infection issues, and she played with a book and ate most of my dinner. She was pretty happy the whole time. Granted, it was only 2 hours, which is a mere fraction of the time we'll spend on airplanes on Friday. But at least we made it through the first one okay. She was willing to eat food from my fingers (rather than only from a spoon), ate some crunchier snacks than we've been able to get her to eat before, and also drank some sips of water out of my cup. I'm not sure if she's been hiding some of her skills so she can dazzle me a little at a time, or if these are just new opportunities that she is seizing. Regardless, I am proud of all of her progress!

Tonight on the way from the airport to the hotel, she was a bit restless on my lap. She had not napped at all today, and it was already almost 10pm, but she couldn't seem to let herself fall asleep. She has this adorable way of taking her little pointer fingers and gently rubbing circles on her cheeks when she is falling asleep. She kept doing it over and over, but then she'd change positions on my lap again. It ocurred to me that she is probably not accustomed to falling asleep in someone's arms. And maybe, just maybe, tonight was the first time that she had even been given a chance to do it since the last time her birth mother held her.