The next day I woke up around noon extremely jet lagged. My family and I decided to walk around the surrounding area of downtown Beijing. It was amazing, the ultra modern buildings mixed in with the traditional markets. As always, my dad would make himself tour guide saying,
“Follow me kids, I think I know where we are going”
“Are you sure about that”, I remarked. Followed by my mom saying,
“Chris, why don’t we ask for directions or get a map?”
Luckily, my dad was right and we made it safely back to the hotel, where everybody “We will be departing on December 31st”. These were the words I had been waiting to hear for three months. It was December 7th, 2012 and I was so excited that I started packing and preparing for our trip that very day. I was finally going to China and more importantly, I was finally going to pick up my little brother.
December 31st was the perfect departure date, as it was the day after my birthday and New Year’s Eve, which signified a new beginning for my family. We departed for Tokyo around one in the afternoon and toasted in the New Year over the international date line as we crossed the Pacific. 12 hours later, we arrived in Tokyo and caught our connecting flight to Beijing. At around 12 am we landed in Beijing and were at our hotel, downtown, by one. I was exhausted from the 19 hours of travel and crashed in my bed. got a quick bite to eat and promptly fell asleep. The next day we toured the National Museum and a mall that was close to our hotel. We then had one of the greatest dinners I have ever had at one of Beijing’s famous peking duck restaurants. The food was amazing and the smells were mesmerizing. After dinner, we went back to the hotel and called it a night. In the morning, we met up with our tour guide that had been provided to us by the adoption agency for our five day stay in Beijing. That morning we also met the two other families that were adopting in the same group as us. The first was a couple from Oregon in their mid fifties, the other was a young couple from New Jersey with their two year old daughter. Our tour guide brought our group all over Beijing for the next five days. We visited the Great Wall, a silk factory, a jade workshop, Tiananmen Square, The Forbidden City, a traditional Chinese “hutong” neighborhood, and countless wonderful Chinese restaurants. Then, on the 8th, we all departed for our different provinces to pick up our new family members. We would meet up again in Guangzhou, along with all the other families adopting in China that month.

My new brother was living in the city of Changchun in the Jilin province. Changchun is the car manufacturing capital of northern China and is also known as the Detroit of China. The temperatures there during my stay ranged from 10 to 40 degrees below zero. When we arrived, we met our tour guide, July. She spoke almost no English, but she told us we would be picking up my new little brother tomorrow. My mom couldn’t bear to wait and she spent the day preparing gifts for him and for his caretakers from the orphanage he was at. We woke up bright and early the next morning and got ready to meet my new brother. His new American name would be Henry, so we all wore shirts that had, ‘Journey to Henry’ and a picture of him on them. We arrived at a government building in downtown Changchun and went into a local official’s office to wait for him to arrive. Those ten minutes of waiting felt like ten hours. I was so nervous to meet him for the first time. Finally, he came into the room and we all took turns greeting him and trying out my Chinese I said,
“Ni hao, wo shi ni de gege.” Which means hello, I am your older brother in Chinese. He responded with a blank stare. Then after a moment he said,
“Oh, ni shi wo de da gege.” Which means oh , you are my big older brother.
I don’t think that he believed that I was his older brother at first since I look older than I am. He started to cry and cried for about an hour straight. After a while Henry started to warm up to us and began to play with me, my brother Noah, and my sister Ella. Our next six days in Changchun were spent holed up in our hotel rooms with the occasional visit to a government office to do an interview or fill out some paperwork. Finally, the day came to leave Changchun and go to the warm, tropical city of Guangzhou to meet up with the other families adopting in China and do the final paperwork and a hospital visit. We said goodbye to July and headed to the airport for Henry’s first airplane ride. He was so excited because he loves all vehicles and it was his first time seeing a real airplane. We took off and five hours later landed in Guangzhou. I felt a rush of warm tropical air come around me. I knew that everything from here on out was going to be great.
We arrived at our hotel around midnight and immediately went to bed. The next day we went downstairs to the lobby to find all of our friends from Beijing with their new family members. We had grown very close to the couple from New Jersey during our stay in Beijing and it was a relief to see them again with their new son Connor. That day we all took a bus to a hospital where all the kids were given checkups to make sure that they weren’t sick. Henry did not like this and cried for his first time since the day we had picked him up. After the hospital visit was over we all went back to the hotel and played at the hotel playground. Henry loved playing with his new siblings and friends. We also went in the hotel pool later that day. That was Henry’s first experience in a pool and his first time swimming. Over the next few days, we went all around Guangzhou. We went to a zoo, a pearl market, a park, and more traditional Chinese dumpling houses than I’d like to count. We also walked around the city by ourselves, taking in the sights and sounds of China.
All good things have to come to an end, and after six days of having fun in Guangzhou, it was time to head home. All of the families said goodbye to each other and parents exchanged contact information so that we could all stay in touch when we got back to the U.S.. It was hard to leave, and I didn’t want to go back to school, but I had to. It was also hard to say goodbye to our new friends, especially the family from New Jersey who we had gotten very close to during our trip.
Finally, we departed for Beijing. We had a one day layover and stayed in a hotel near the airport. When we were there, Beijing was having the worst air pollution on record. When we landed the smog was so thick that you couldn’t see 100 yards. It was also extremely hard to breath and black gunk built up in the back of your throat. My dad explained to us, “The air pollution is so bad here right now, that it would be healthier to smoke a cigarette than breathe this air.” I had never seen anything like it. We went to bed early that night and awoke early the next morning for our flight back to the States. The flights were long and when I finally got home after 27 hours of air travel I crashed hard. Arriving home I felt conflicted; on one hand I was happy to be home but on the other hand I missed the adventure of being in China. My new brother was so happy to be at his new house. He immediately went around the house exploring and playing with his new toys. My greatest adventure was over and my family finally felt complete.
My trip to China was a life changing experience for me. I witnessed different cultures and people. I went to incredible historic sites and saw amazing architecture. I made new friends. But, most important of all, I picked up a new brother and friend. Henry has changed my life and I will always remember my first day with him. That is something very special that I can’t explain in words. Through this experience I have become a better brother, son, friend, and citizen to the world.