smokerblog

Bonding

[SHENYANG, 1/19 8:30PM]

Today was another good day. Ben and I sleep in separate beds on account of his mega-squirminess--plus also he wants it that way. I knew it was going to be a good day when Ben climbed into bed with me a 6:00AM to cuddle.

This was an off-day, no business or sight-seeing scheduled. Ben and I hung out in our room all day with just a couple of brief wanderings around the hotel to relieve the cabin fever. Tomorrow we fly to Guangzhou to do some US Consulate business. Because of the travel, I don't know if I will be able to post tomorrow night (tomorrow morning for most of you). Plus, my webhosting service had some planned maintenance that might temporarily put the site out of commission.

We were warned at our travel meeting that people would stare at us and walk up and start talking to us as we walk about on the street. That's been true for the most part. Yesterday a bunch of students from a Chinese University asked to us to pose with them for a picture at the Imperial Palace. Today we stopped and visited with a housekeeper for a half hour. Ben is obviously very bright. He holds long and involved conversations with people and In every single conversation, he points to me and calls me ba-ba and tells his interlocutor about flying on a plane to be with his American ma-ma. Ben also gets very excited every time the phone rings. He's always hoping it's his American ma-ma on the phone.

It seems like the bonding has begun. These will be the moments to remember when Ben hits his surly teenage years.

Here are today's pics, combing ba-ba's hair and playing with his toy train in a deserted second floor lobby where we go from time to time to decompress: