Bringing Home Laine, Part 6: China is Amazing

Previously: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5

September 1, 2019

Kunming fun time! We visited the “ethnic village,” which is kind of an Epcot Center (minus the monorail) tourist park celebrating the ethnic history of China. Laine had fun in the stroller and even let go of mom’s hand sometimes.

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Since we had to be in the country for two weeks, our adoption agency planned some fun, touristy excursions so we could soak up the culture and not go stark raving mad cooped up in a hotel room with a screaming baby.

In addition to the Ethnic Village (and I’m capitalizing it like it’s the proper name of the place, but I don’t know if it is; that’s what our guide called it, but it could’ve been like when we call Walmart “Wally World), we also spent a lot of time in a big park that was near our hotel.

Even if there was nothing going on in the park, it would’ve been an great place to just take a walk and enjoy the day. But, oh boy, was there ever stuff going on in the park.

What kind of stuff, you ask? Well, how about these nice ladies, who are practicing some kind of dance routine with badminton racquets and nerf balls.

Need something a little more dangerous than badminton racquet dancing? No problem! We also had some synchronized sword swinging. You’ll notice I didn’t get too close.

And of course we had lots and lots of plain old unarmed line dancing. The song you hear is in fact the Chinese version of “Boot Scoot Boogie.”

And then there was this:

The people and places were all just fascinating, and I hope we get to go back someday when we’re not out of our minds with anxiety. But there’s no way I would go back without a good local guide, and our guide in Kunming was the best.

All the Chinese people we dealt with gave us Western pseudonyms because I’m sure they got sick of Westerners mispronouncing their Chinese names, so here we are with our Kunming guide, Susan. From showing us the sights to filling out adoption paperwork to finding Laine’s finding place and helping us try to get our many medical questions answered and more, she treated us like family. I hope she gets to see the Grand Canyon someday.