This morning our fellow Minnesotans staying in the room next to us, checked out and moved to another hotel. They had stayed at this hotel when they adopted their first child, 5 years ago. We are going to have lunch with them on Wednesday and tour the hotel. We may end up moving, but are unsure yet. It has been really nice having them here, and we already miss them. We are thinking of a trip to the coast for a week, so if we do that, we'll have to check out of our hotel. When we come back from our trip it may be a good time to check into the other hotel. We will have to check with our rep, Cecilia to see if this is a possibility. If it's an issue, than we will just stay here. We'll probably make a decision after we visit them on Wednesday.
This morning, before they checked out, they brought their new daughter Emma and their five year old, Ellie to our room to say goodbye. Emma and Manny ended up having some play time under the play gym. See pics below. So cute! Johnny, Manny and I went for another walk, and went to lunch at The Bogota Beer Company. Very delicious! Then we had to have dessert at Crepes and Waffles since it is next door!
We spent the rest of the evening hanging out with Manny and getting a lot of fun playtime. He is so much fun!
Manny is 4 months old today! It's hard to believe, since he looks like he's about 6 months old! We had a great weekend and hope to share all of the fun with you through our journal below, and pictures.
Thursday and Friday (9/18-9/19) Not much to report for these two days. We went for walks both days and took a couple naps with Manny. On Thursday, we went to a store called Maku, which is a very large Souvenir shop with 4 floors! We bought Manny a Colombian Soccer jersey, which we'll have his name embroidered along with the number 08 for the year he was born. We took a picture of him in it. (So cute) There is an embroidered wall hanging in our hotel room that Manny just loves to stare at. It's a farm scene, and is very colorful. We found one exactly like it at Maku, so we bought that to put up in his room. We also purchased some fun gifts for friends and family back home. Friday, we walked to the mall, Unicentro. We've done quite a bit of walking, which is helping Johnny and I lose some weight. Let's hope we don't find it when we get back to Minnesota!
Saturday, 9-20-08
We took a trip to the Salt Cathedral with another family from Minnesota. Steve and his daughter Ellie came with us. Steve and his wife Carie just adopted their second daughter Emma. They adoped Ellie 5 years ago. Ellie and I have become fast friends : )
Our tour guide, Paola, picked us up at 9am and we drove for about an hour north of Bogota. The salt cathedral is amazing. The pictures can not do it justice because of course we are in a dark tunnel, but hopefully you can get a feel for what we experienced. There is also a link below for the salt cathedral's website, where you can read about the history and see more professional pictures.
After the tour, we drove down to the village below and had lunch at a beautiful Colombian restaurant. We had Ajiaco soup, which is a very popular dish in Colombian cuisine. It's like Chicken soup, but it's very thick with a potato base. It's got half of a cob of corn in it along with chicken and other veggies. You put fresh creme', capers and avacado in the soup. Yummy! After lunch, Ellie and I went out to the playground because she was dying to get out and play. She showed me a few tricks on the monkey bars, and then said, now you try it. Yeah Right! I tried hanging from the bar and I felt like my arms were going to come out of my sockets. Getting old, is so much fun : ) Our tour guide was a lot of fun, and of course Johnny had her laughing so hard, she was crying. She wants to bring us on more tours while we're here, so we'll have to take her up on that.
Sunday, 9-21-08
Another Sunday taking advantage of the streets being closed for pedestrians. We walked to a beautiful old part of Bogota called, Santa Barbara. We saw the Zona Colonial (Colonial area), which consists of the Santa Barbara church (constructed in 1665 and modernized in the 20th century), the old country manor of the same name (now a mall), seminaries, schools, and the famous Mercado de las pulgas, which is the large flea market. We also had lunch at a wonderful restaurant where I had some of the best roasted chicken I've ever had. It was right up there with The Redstone's fire roasted chicken. We are now snuggled in for the night and almost ready for bed. We can't believe we will be starting our third week here already! Fortunately, time has been moving very fast. The strike is still going. We heard that they will meet again for negotiations, this Thursday. We are praying for resolution! Have a great week, and we'll try to post more this week.
Yesterday turned out to be a great day! On Monday evening, we received a call from our Representative, Cecilia, telling us that our appointment with the defender of minors had been cancelled for Tuesday. We received a call at 9:15 am on Tuesday morning saying that someone was on their way to pick us up for our appointment. WHAT?! Manny was taking a nap, hadn't had his bottle or diaper changed and Johnny and I were not dressed in our fancy duds, which is a requirement for this appointment. Now we know how fast we can do all of this when it's necessary!
We made it to the appointment just in time, but then found out that the orphanage had not delivered our dossier paperwork to this office, so we had to go out to the waiting room and wait for 45 minutes until the messenger could get there. It turned out to be a blessing in disguise. A young pregnant woman was also sitting in the waiting room. It turns out that she is working with the same orphange from which we received Manny and she is considering adoption for her child. She asked our representative, Isabella, if she could ask us some questions about our adoption. Isabella told her some information about us, Manny's name and the woman asked why we changed his birth name. This is a very common question that many pregnant women ask. They may find it sad that the name they have chosen for their child is changed, unless they understand why. We told her that we wanted to honor my grandfather by naming our son after him. We also said that his birth name will always be special to us and we will make sure it is special to him as well. We then explained how his birth name happened to be the Juan (John) and Esteban (Steven, my dad's name). She smiled, nodded her head and then started to cry.
Johnny was sitting next to her and placed his hand on her shoulder to comfort her. He asked her if she would like to hold Emmanuel. She held him and started to sob while she was talking to him. It was a moment we will never forget. It was almost as if she was saying goodbye to her own child or coming to terms with the decision she was making. We only hope that her chance meeting with us, helped her feel at peace in some way. As she handed him back to us, she said, may God be with you and your family. Johnny again, comforted her and she went to sit down in her original seat. It was a few minutes later that we were called in to the office of the defender of minors. We signed paperwork that officially relinquished custody from the orphanage to us. Johnny gave the defender of minors a gift that was a hand turned wood pen that he made on his lathe, and we signed the documents with that pen. Now that this step is complete, we will just wait for the courts to open again, so we can have our case assigned to a specific court. No news on the strike being over, but they say that they try to go back to work before the end of the month, otherwise they will not receive any pay.
We then made our way back to the hotel rested for a bit, and then ventured out to the streets of Bogota once again. We ate at El Corral, which is a burger joint. It's a very popular spot. It kind of reminded me of A&W. Then we did some more walking and somehow ended up in front of Crepes and Waffles! What a pleasant surprise ; ) We shared a banana strawberry sunday and a cappuchino, then headed back to the hotel. Another Minnesota family received their baby girl yesterday, so we had a welcome party at the hotel. She is a little peanut! Manny is only a week older than her, but out weighs her by a lot! We held her, and they held Manny so we could compare and wow!
We think Manny is starting to get a tooth already. Yesterday he was a little fussy, drooling and had some flush cheeks. We gave him a cold wash cloth and rubbed his gums with it, which he seemed to love. Not much else to report today. Probably will do some more walking around lunch time.
P.S. - Johnny had a mild case of Montezuma's revenge last night, but he must have a stronger stomach than me, because he's feeling better already. (Lucky!)
