A Special Piece of Mail

On Friday afternoon, our daily trip to the mailbox was more like a lucky day in Vegas -- a letter from our daughter. As we raced back to the house to open it, our hearts were beating a mile a minute. Once we opened it, several different thoughts hit rushed through our heads. It was beautiful -- excellent penmanship and a few little smiley faces drawn in the margin displaying her artistic side! This was quickly followed by the realization that, while Chinese characters look very nice, neither one of us are able to read them. At this point, we both are staring at the letter like some piece of magic will enter our brains and allow us a moment of clarity and understanding. Yes, at this moment in time, rational thought had clearly gone on vacation.

And here is where we owe a strong debt of gratitude to Al Gore for his fine work in inventing the Internet. While we may not be able to read Chinese, we are fortunate enough to have met people who are both able to translate and kind enough to help us out (a special thank you from the bottom of our hearts to the wonderful lady that translated for us). Through the wonders of digital photography and the Internet, we were able to take pictures of the letter, send it in an email, and get a translation back that same day.

While we do not want to post the whole letter, we would like to share with you some of the information:

• She love to laugh and enjoys comic books, joke books and magic shows.

• Art books and hair/fashion magazines are also listed as favorites.

• She likes to swim.

• A couple of her favorite school subject are Chinese, art and music.

• Her favorite foods are beef, yogurt, bok choy, mango and seafood.

• Favorite colors: pink, white and baby blue.

• She is working on improving her English.

We can’t wait to fly to China and bring our girl home!!!